Yeah Baby @ Brooklyn Made

Nov 30

It was a cold, rainy Friday night. There was a bit of a noir vibe in the air; the type you would typically associate with a crime ridden Gotham City. But alas, I was out and about in pursuit of the divine whisper that speaks to my soul whenever myself, good music, and a can of beer are all in conjunction. And on this particular Friday I happened to be in luck. After dropping off my belongings at Home Sweet Home in preparation for Get a Room, I grabbed my camera and called myself an Uber. Yeah Baby were playing at Brooklyn Made and I wasn’t going to miss it.

In case you didn’t know, Yeah Baby are a New York based band founded in 2016. Made up of Hanna White, Sean Kwon, Skyler Skjelselt, and Harry Smith, their music is sonically autographed by their distinct brand of shoe gaze, which features noise rock and post punk sensibilities. There’s a smokey quality to it that’s both ethereal and kaleidoscopic. And in the same breath they know when to keep it raw with heavy, manic instrumentation that reminds you how beautifully imperfect we are. Sometimes it sounds like frolicking in a field and sometimes it feels like stomping on sunflowers. It’s pretty fucking devastating in every way you would want it to be. Yeah Baby. They played at Elsewhere a while back and I was emotionally rattled by the end of it, so naturally I had to run it back. I was just trying to feel something (don’t we all?), and this concert happened to be the perfect means to that end.

Brooklyn Made housed an intimate crowd and a fantastic lighting crew, sufficiently matching the heady mood that Yeah Baby brings to the table. After their sound check, they wasted no time getting into it. Here they were in their full glory out the gates, playing with a commanding burst of emotion, and there I was, fumbling around my new (old) camera trying to power it on.

Whilst entranced by what I was hearing, I finally got the camera to turn on so you too can experience the aforementioned devastation that Yeah Baby serve best. However, you do miss out on all the awesome “Yeah babbyyyyy”s that the crowd uses as a rallying call in between songs. Bummer.

While the music itself can be quite vulnerable, the band makes sure to maintain a lighted hearted environment where everyone is enjoying themselves. While I did enjoy myself, I came to feel, and feel I did. There was a brooding tension and angst in some of the chords, with a sweet release that provided me blissful moments of escapism.

Sometimes it felt akin to the myth of Sisyphus; emotionally pushing up hill just to fall down and do it over and over again. It’s freeing to accept the ups and downs in life, and to me that’s what their music conveys. It’s dramatic, it’s a romanticism of both the good and bad, it’s a celebration of every facet of ourselves. Yeah Baby is momentous in its truest sense. My mission was to feel something and I did. I felt everything. Yeah Baby.

(that’s so fun to say)