After being thrown for a loop during Loukeman’s short and distracting set (due to the sound at Main Stage cutting in and out) I hoped Yeule would be clearer. As she walked on stage smoking a joint, wearing a small, fitted, low-cut leather jacket and jean shorts with a rosary and foxes tail attached, it looked like she was wearing white contacts to give that android look. Yeule is Nat Ćmeil, a 27-year-old singer-songwriter from Singapore, but based in London. UK. Her band was a guitar player and drummer, and for a few more shoegazey numbers, Yeule herself played the guitar, one of them kind of looking like Prince’s power symbol axe, but white.
It seems the festival sound team got the speakers working, but the DI for Yeule’s guitar and vocals were super quiet, and with the legion of effects on her voice, it was hard to hear her for the first four or five songs. Once the sound became clearer, it felt a bit like Björk pushed through a fuzzy and shoegazey lens in the late 90s. I’m not sure why they had the bass guitar play as a backing track, but I was at least happy to see a band. Honestly, many of the songs blended together, and it was hard ot make out which were from her latest album, Evangelic Girl is A Gun. The set felt more like a scripted performance, but featured some of the most artsy video backdrop of the festival. On the giant screen was a video of Yeule straddling a dirt bike in a glitchy warehouse, as cybernetic metals and piping dangled from the walls. Mixed with the light show and Yeule’s subtle body bends and dance moves, this show felt like it was more about the look than the sound.
