Houses Energize a Quiet Darkness

In concert, the electronic duo muscle up its moody sound.

Electronic music often seems to be about nothing, but not "Houses. The concept of the Chicago electronic duo's latest record A Quiet Darkness centers around a nuclear holocaust. Dexter Tortoriello explains the album as a glimpse into the bittersweet journey of a man trying to find his lost lover in the midst of nuclear fallout. It follows a moodier brand of indie electronica popularized by The Postal Service's solo 2003 record Give Up which, coincidentally, features a track about love after nuclear war. Houses tells the explosive tale live at the Hi Ho Lounge on Wednesday when they open for Baths.

Much like the acts Houses are often compared to, the sad subject matter isn't expressed through stereotypically dark music methods. "From a musician's standpoint, I generally don't work in minor scales," Tortoriello says. "A large portion [of A Quiet Darkness] is written in a major scale, which keeps things from getting too dark."

Tortoriello's tendency for lighter sounds allows A Quiet Darkness time to sprawl out and build into symphonic, even spritely moments. Those moments help to drive Tortoriello's goal of keeping the album away from pits of despair. Clunking beats matched with big, driving percussion play a significant part, and this foundation moves the narrative idea along the album, through memories of better, less radioactive times, Tortoriello says. "A lot of that deals with people trying to live in their memories."

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTWiGy_n36A]

Mortality was on Tortoriello's mind as he wrote A Quiet Darkness, but gloom isn't a word apt for Houses. Tortoriello wants to maintain a higher energy for live shows, which adds a guitarist and a drummer to Houses' lineup. A Quiet Darkness especially was written with live performance in mind, Tortoriello says. "We are surprising people a little bit with how energetic everything is," he says, laughing. "We get on stage, and it feels like a party."

An energetic live show numbers among the ways Houses is trying to get its reflective electronica to a bigger audience. The group's debut album All Night found significant love from music bloggers, and a spot in an episode of medical drama Grey's Anatomy didn't hurt. But Tortoriello said he couldn't be happier that people find Houses' sound accessible.

"In my mind, I feel like it's experimental music," he says. "I'm happy making strange records that are really sad and dark and weird, but, you know, being able to have them play in Grey's Anatomy, trying to get a bunch of moms and stuff into our sound."