Ratatat @ The Arches

Ratatat play well enough on your stereo. With layered guitars, well-crafted beats and riffs that straddle the indie and electronic fence, all of this performs well as your flat party's background music. Live at the Arches, all of this energy shines with a healthier glow, through the fog machine and strobe lights. The two characters, Evan Mast and Mike Stroud, both previous hired guns for other live bands (Ben Kweller, Dashboard Confessional, E*vax), pulled together in 2003 to construct something all the more meaningful, to fulfill their sonic premise. Tonight, duelling their guitars on stage brings better urgency and passion to Ratatat's all-instrumental tracks, that can otherwise feel overly ephemeral and moody. Mast's token spate of flipping off to the photographers alludes less to some rock n' roll image and more to just how seriously these boys take their riffs. [David Winton]