Kachina

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As longtime fans of shoegaze acts like My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive, Charlotte-based act Kachina's founding members began as a psychedelic ensemble before breaking up and reforming with a new maturity and emphasis on rhythm and danciness.

Performing together eight years total, Kachina's ever-developing maturity shows itself internally with the cohesion of its roster as well as externally through the group's evolving, elaborate music and live sets.

In its previous incarnation, Kachina's music was centralized around droning, shoegaze-influenced guitars, but when the original trio was sized down to a duo, the band began incorporating a heavier beat focus. Today Kachina is a five-piece band, and its attention to rhythm is obvious at its live shows, where the group makes use of three drum sets and encourages additional percussion from its audiences.

"We started together in another band called Matador Blues in 2001," says John Morgan (vocals, guitar, percussion). "It was a really great psychedelic outfit ... loud and fun and beautiful. We played tons of show in lots of neat places, but by 2007 that band had kind of run its course. We fired up Kachina at that point. The idea was to create a more danceable version of the psychedelia we'd been accustomed to producing. When we were starting out with the other band, it was much more in the shoegaze vein. Don't get me wrong, that's still our favorite stuff in the world, and our current stuff still oozes the best of that style, but I think we've become a bit punchier ... there's a more primal, prehistory-campfire rhythm to what we do now.

"I'd say this is much more of a percussion-heavy collection of tracks," Morgan continues of Kachina's latest recordings. "We wrote almost every song from the drums up, rather than starting with guitars or keys. We bought, like, 30 tambourines and had our friends come over to record them in unison. We even got a tympani. So it's more of a beat-heavy disc than what we've done in the past, and I think that comes through in the songs."

Another major selling point of the band is its energetic live show that overwhelms the senses and welcomes audience participation. Striving for the largest production allowable by the venues it plays, Kachina incorporates an array of lights, props and video that it often has to pick and choose from in order not to crowd the stage that already supports five people and three drum rigs. The band also scatters an assortment of percussion instruments and noise makers about the front of the stage to encourage further crowd interaction.

"We have lots of pretty lights and backdrops and films and things we use from time to time," Morgan says. "When we're touring, space on the van and in some of the venues kind of limits how much we can do sometimes. Ideally, we'll someday have dancing girls in neon, some jungle cats, guys getting shot out of cannons, and maybe an F-16 flyover. We love bands that lean toward the sensory overload end of the spectrum.

"There's a healthy dose of Kevin Shields-esque noise and Robert Fripp-y solo stuff from the guitars, but the percussion never runs the risk of getting drowned out. We have two guys on proper drum kits, and we have a sort of 'communal kit' set up in front of the stage. We set up a bass drum, a floor tom, a crash and two cowbells as well as the tympani, when there's room, and we'll bang on that rig periodically throughout the set. We also leave extra sticks and tambourines out as an invitation to the audience to jump in and join in the fun. The shows are always most successful when there's no line between audience and performer."

Tonight Kachina will perform at The Longbranch Saloon with Chore Boys and Madre. The show starts at 9 p.m. After completing its regional tour in little over a month, Kachina will commence recording its sophomore EP, which the band intends to have available by early next year.

n HURRIED HOMECOMING: The Royal Bangs make a quick stop in Knoxville amid a long national tour, playing Pilot Light with Drummer Thursday night. The show is slated for 10 p.m. and costs $8.