Editor’s Note: Nils Frahm dances with machines. The Berlin-based musician, composer, and producer brought one of the more elaborate set-ups to The Sinclair ever Monday night (March 19), the back end of a two-night swing at the Cambridge rock club that presented an overwhelming mix of drum machines, synthesizers, keyboards, pianos, and more to his stage. During the show, Frahm noted that the United States is a “tough nut to crack,” particularly due to transporting his gear — this time consuming 40 packages for travel — across the Atlantic and across the country. On this night The Sinclair fell quiet, enraptured in each of Frahm’s delicate sounds, and our photographer, Scott Murry, admitted receiving a few glares from listeners as his shutter snapped. “He plays with a dynamic range,” Murry says, “and in the soft moments you could hear everything in the room. It was also pretty comical standing near the secondary bar on the first floor at one point. They had it closed down (presumably to lower audible distractions), but the ice machine was churning away, creating an odd layer to the cerebral tunes at rather inopportune moments. Frahm described all the random little notes he was excited to take from oddity to celebrity when mixed in a rich opus.” Scan through Murry’s full gallery below.
