On Friday night, three indie giants kicked off what promises to be one of this year’s most unusual and exciting tours. The brainchild of Baltimore music maven Dan Deacon, this “round robin” features interactive play between three bands, and a rotating setlist. Deerhunter, No Age, and Deacon are playing just eight dates at out of the way places, eschewing tradition on all fronts. They’re skipping DC, they’re skipping Philly, and they started in Baltimore. The world has gone topsy-turvy and I like it.

I went to see them at Sonar Friday night, and I spent all day yesterday recovering. It was a full-on party. Starting over at the Deerhunter stage, we were treated to the hazy post-punk stylings of the Atlanta band. Their full sound took on a grandness not felt on their studio recordings, with the highlight being the epic “Microcastle.” Adding in tremolo-fuelled passing notes and milking it for drama, Bradford Cox led the band (and the crowd) through a shimmering, half-remembered journey through glamgaze and beyond.

Deerhunter: Never Stops
Deerhunter: Microcastle
Deerhunter: Rainwater Cassette Exchange

Looking across the sea of hands over towards Dan Deacon’s mission central, we watched him engineer his patented, singularly wacko version of crowd control. Akin to Brian Wilson leading the crowd in a round of “Row, Row, Row Your Boat,” just as goofy, but somehow suited to a sneering, youthful party crowd, Deacon’s machinations defy sociological definition. In the shot above, had led the ravers to form a campfire circle in the middle of the room, stopping just short of ordering a crowd singalong of “Kumbayah.”

We went over to Dan Deacon’s area next. I’m convinced all the plugs and wires are a decoy, and that Deacon just pushes one master button and directs the rest of his energy toward moving the crowd. He came down off his perch more than once, milling about, shouting orders. His hypnotic brand of electro-rave art was perfect for giving a pulse to the party, and I lost track of my friend more than once as we were separated by throngs of swooning, sweaty bodies pushing toward some non-focused point past the stage and beyond the imagination.

Dan Deacon: Red F
Dan Deacon: Woof Woof

It was over to No Age next, where they sat precariously on their tiny island stage, with hordes of slamdancers threatening to knock it all over. I caught an upended microphone stand and more than once barely kept my head from crashing into a cymbal. The DIY noise-poppers kept the energy level suitably intense.

No Age: Teen Creeps
No Age: Eraser

The round robin format was at once strange and enthralling for the crowd. Between songs, those at the front of the crowd would find themselves instantly in the back row. Inevitably there would be a mad rush to the next hub of activity. The stage-hopper could thus find himself experiencing three concerts at once, in three different venues. I let my imagination flow, and likened the No Age stage to seeing the Ramones at CBGBs before hitting mainstream success, with Deerhunter invoking the thrill of watching My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Shields strum his guitar with the tremolo bar (which Cox did as well), while launching the Loveless airplane at mid-size venues in 1991. The Dan Deacon stage had no obvious precedents, but I imagined a mash-up of a mythological Chicago house party from the mid-90s and a birthday party singalong for some bespectacled tyke named Johnny, as seen from a faded Polaroid.

From the bands’ perspective, the round robin format was equally as strange. Used to launching from one song to the next, they found themselves waiting with egg on their faces in between turns. No Age seemed to just take it in stride, patiently wandering around their island, going to get a beer. Dan Deacon, of course, lapped it up, taking multiple bathroom breaks, talking the ears off anyone who would listen, visiting the other bands, being his normal gregarious self. Deerhunter, on the other hand, were flat out perplexed. “What do we do now?,” is the unspoken question in the picture above. With the crowd’s backs turned toward the band, Bradford Cox caught me taking pictures of them and immediately jumped into action, a determined, insubordinate joker, and the below photograph is the result.

Deerhunter: Rainwater Cassette Exchange