Concert Reviews

CAYUCAS AT THE GARRISON – MARCH 2, 2014

After completing a recent tour with Young the Giant and weaving their way up from their home base of Los Angeles, Cayucas brought summery tunes to a crowd of people forgoing the Academy Awards in favour of the concert. Oscars aside, it was a pretty busy show for a cold Sunday night – a good sign for the quartet because it would appear they’ve fostered a receptive Toronto audience for their bright blend of tropical-tinged indie pop.

They began their set with “Cayucos,” a single off of Bigfoot, their 2013 debut. It’s a song heavy on harmonies of “woahs” and a big bass line, getting the crowd bopping along right out of the gate. Vocalist and guitarist Zach Yudin doesn’t have a particularly strong voice – delivering it with a lazy timbre – but he does know how to write for and deliver it.

Throughout the night, Yudin would often share vocal harmonies with his twin brother, bassist Ben Yudin. Third song “The Thrill” was unfortunately a bit of a miss in that department (Zach later complaining about the mix to the on duty sound engineer,) but as the show went on they both improved in their performances and got more comfortable playing off one another.

Now it would seem that on record the band’s found a pretty unique spot in popular music, but truthfully it’s a bit strange to witness four pasty white guys playing Latin-flavoured pop. This appropriation of other cultures isn’t by any means offensive or ill intentioned – it’s all light-hearted and fun – but there is an obvious disconnect between the band’s sound and their image.

There’s also one very noticeable thing that just about whacks you in the face from the first note: in concert, Cayucus sound like a bunch of guys covering Vampire Weekend numbers around an island campfire. This isn’t a bad thing, since Vampire Weekend are pretty much at the top of the quote-unquote indie rock game, but the similarities between the two outfits are hard to get past and something I found myself consistently coming back to.

“Hella,” a new song about California, sounded very Vampire Weekend in its in-and-out percussion from drummer Casey Wojtalewicz and in Yudin’s vocal delivery. By all means, it was fun – but it’s hard not to compare them to their contemporaries, and in that department, they’re losing the battle.

They traded lyrics about Northern California for ones about North Dakota on “Bigfoot,” a slow song that was dedicated to the couples in attendance. They followed it with another slower song: “Deep Sea,” a 2011 self-released single. This unfortunately missed the mark, sounding muddy and lazily delivered. Thankfully Cayucas quickly picked things back up again rather quickly, appearing to be more comfortable delivering their “dance hits” than their more down-tempo affairs.

Another new song, “Dancing at the Blue Lagoon” was well received, as was energetic single “High School Lover” – likely the most distinctive (and by that I mean most non-Vampire Weekend sounding) song in their catalogue thus far, keeping Ben Yudin occupied with a fast-moving bass line. They ended the main portion of their set with “Swimsuit,” a good chunk of the Toronto audience enthusiastically dancing along to Christian Koons’ spacey, reverb-drenched guitars as the song came to a close.

The music’s certainly fun, warm, and hard not to like – but with a juggernaut of a contemporary to hold their music up to, I have to think Cayucas will need to work a little bit harder to keep the project afloat and worth paying closer attention to.

About author

Former Music Editor & Concert Photographer at Live in Limbo. Sarah was born in Toronto. She's worked at some places that you've heard of (like NXNE) and some that you haven't. She is an Academy Delegate at the JUNOs (CARAS). You can usually find Sarah at a concert, on Twitter @beets, or on Instagram @sarahrix. She also likes dogs and cheeseburgers.