The Glitch Mob come by their name honestly. The L.A.-based dance-music trio is all about aestheticizing the rips and tears in the digital fabric, as if they were taking the twitchy repetitions of stuck machinery and turning them into the foundation of their music. This is club music, pulsing and pounding, with ultra-low synthy bass riffs that sound like ogres moaning. The higher melodic tidbits often have that pinched nasal-robot sound that brings to mind a tuned shop vacuum. All of this gets wedged between big boombap-ish beats.
If early rock-and-rollers took crummy cheap gear with torn speaker cones and strained fuses, making the most of the limitations of their equipment, artists like the Glitch Mob embrace something similar in terms of exploiting what happens at the outer edge of digital music-making.
Since 2014 Glitch Mob has toured with a stage setup/instrument called the Blade, which was assembled by movie stage-set designers. The configuration houses instruments, lighting and computers, allowing the group to perform in ways that erode the divide between electronic musicians/DJs and the audience. The trio routinely talk about their desire to get out of the way to let the music do its thing.
They’re bringing an upgraded Blade 2.0 out with them on this tour, with promises of enhanced immersive experiences for fans.
The Glitch Mob performs at the Webster Theater, 31 Webster St., Hartford, on Thursday, Oct. 18, 8 p.m. Tickets are $25 to $100. 860-525-5553 and webstertheater.com
