Photos By Peter Nguyen, Words By Zeke Leeds 
Every band strives to put on a performance that’s something beyond a live rendition of the music you’ve already enjoyed listening to a hundred times on YouTube. What they’re seeking is to have their show be, in a word, an “experience.” A Chromeo show is both a personal and collective an experience, cheesy yet deadly serious. Chromeo reminds us there once was a time in which dance music was produced by human beings standing over instruments, not computers. 
Chromeo is true dance music for people who love to get down, regardless of creed, color, age or size. They create music that will have your inner system in a permanent boogie and leave you gleaming in sweat, whether you’re sitting on a stool in the back of a record store, or in the middle of a sold-out 9:30 club wiggling your hips and arms trying not to upset the mass of people surrounding you. 
There may not be a band better suited for a light show. The inherent gaudiness of 80’s synth-pop makes dazzling lights and laser beams the obvious choice, nonetheless a good one. In fact, the night climaxed with Dave 1 using his vintage aluminum-necked silver Kramer to harness a light beam and shoot it across the audience. Seeing a white light beam shoot from the crotch of a red leather jacketed man as he shreds on guitar was like an acid-induced 80s flashback. It was a stunt that would have made Hall and Oats blush and Sammy Hagar tremble in delight. 
Modern dance music has become synonymous with techno, house, EDM, and thousands of other electric beat driven genres. It’s often forgotten that dance music at it’s root is a blend of disco and boogie sounds, no MIDI required. Yet, under the sheen of the bright lights wildly bouncing off of the mirrors behind the stage, Dave 1 and P-Funk are working furiously to mix analog synthesizers, retro drum machines, live instruments and vocals into a reminder that non-electronica dance music is alive and well. If the Chromeo experience has a singular effect, it’s to connect-the-dots of dance music past, present, and future in the most exuberant style possible. 
