Fool’s Gold is heavy

We’re not sure if you remember, but Monday night was hot. Maybe not outdoors, but if you happened to be at Nectar with us and Fool’s Gold, chances were good you’d copped a sweat by the second song.

Trafficking in rapturous, meditative jams, Fool’s Gold bears little resemblance to its members' other gigs; outside of a few gentle guitar flourishes, nothing sounds like Foreign Born, We Are Scientists, or The Fall. Instead, FG is more reminiscient of El Guincho and Panda Bear, with obvious debts to the African pop stars they've gone to great lengths to namecheck in interviews.

Singer/bassist Luke Top (who mostly sings in Hebrew) laces evocative melodic vocal lines through the band's lush, percussive beds. It sounds like a call to prayer, or would, if the polyrhythmic beats weren't so insistent. Band members were mostly still, transformatively focused on the moment. One of the guitarists had reached such a level of zen, he spent the bulk of the set plank straight, eyes closed, itching out rhythms. In the crowd (sadly, but not suprisingly, small on a Monday), nobody fell to their knees, but quite a few lifted up their hands.

We could not stay for Metronomy--the night was already long--but we didn't feel cheated; Fool's Gold had made an experience of their hour we would not forget. As they wound down, Top told us they'd be back in a few months. We won't--and won't let you--forget that either.