San Francisco – Canadian goth-dance outfit TRUST descended upon club venue Mezzanine the other night and delivered a brisk albeit deafening set drawn from their two stellar albums. TRUST is the moniker used by virtuoso Robert Alfons, and on his current tour he is supported by two backing members: a cool, androgynous percussionist who skillfully mixes drum machines and live drums in with an array of synths and keys played by a mellow girl sheathed in platinum blonde hair.
Both took care not to draw focus away from Alfons, whose convulsive, jumping movements perfectly matched his heavily stylized vocals that often make a home in his gruff lower register, though often he electronically alters it to sound much higher. The trio were situated on the band’s modest 10’x10’ stage amidst a handful of papery, jagged stalagmite-like constructs whose colors would change in relation to the synths the smiling blonde produced.
TRUST’s first album—2012’s TRST—was recorded when the band was a duo, sharing responsibility with Austra’s Maya Postepski. Since then, Postepski has left the band to focus on other projects, leaving Alfons to write and record by himself. With TRUST’s second album, Joyland, released earlier this year, the sound is noticeably darker but still retains the same creepy mystique that gave the band popularity with TRST. At this show, Alfons and his cohorts played a healthy selection drawing from both albums’ combined 22 songs.
The set started off calmly with the first track of off Joyland, the mellow “Slightly Floating,” easing us into the set with wary apprehension. This quickly gave way to the more industrialized dance tunes that permeated the rest of the show, starting off with TRST album closer “Sulk.” Next came my two personal favorites from Joyland, the darkly infectious “Icabod” and the restless villainy of “Rescue, Mister,” which really got the crowd going and catalyzed the hazy, sweat-filled mist that is often found at Mezzanine.
After those two thrashers, TRUST treated us to an especially demonic as-yet-untitled new track, reaching into the void of Alfons’ twisted imagination even further than we have gone so far. From there they journeyed deeper into their short yet impressive catalog with “Bulbform” and “Gloryhole”—both from TRST—as well as the falsetto-ridden title track from Joyland and “Capitol,” a song rooted in the gloomier sounds of 80s new wave. The tempo kicked up again for the wailing nature of “Dressed for Space” and “F.T.F,” before calming down a bit for set closer “Are We Arc?” TRUST encored with a single song—TRST’s “Peer Pressure,” a song which brought to mind the urgent brusqueness of early 90s Euro-pop from bands like Real McCoy.
I saw TRUST back in April in a much different venue with a much different setup, and while the show was excellent, the vibe didn’t quite fit the music. This time around, their sound is more polished, the venue was more appropriate, and their stage presence was much more effective. This reviewer looks forward to more material—and thus, more live shows—put forth by the eccentric Alfons, because this time, they definitely blew it out of the water.
TRUST’s Joyland is now available through Arts & Crafts. Their tour continues through October 10. For dates, click here.
Corey Bell
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