Three months ago, I encountered a TikTok declaring that “Two Star & the Dream Police” was the best album of 2024, initiating my reverie within the woozy, whimsical world of the project. It is the debut studio album by Michael Gordon, better known by his stage name Mk.gee. The desaturated, midnight turquoise album cover, and the bus and guitar motifs in his visuals demand an appreciation of Mk.gee’s world-building and escapism. These components set the stage for the idiosyncratic sounds emanating from Gordon’s experimental guitar playing and production, which deliver gritty textures and emotional pangs that heighten the listening experience to one of cathartic tactility. These spectacular oddities can only thrive in the “Two Star” world, one that invites its listeners to escape to and explore their strange, nuanced interiorities.I was stoked to find out that Gordon was performing at Minneapolis’ Uptown Theater for the last U.S. show of his world tour on October 5th during my exchange at Macalester College. The theater was my physical portal to the “Two Star” world. I had to make the most out of this precious opportunity.
I think I was the only Singaporean in the audience. I was definitely the only one wearing hot pink, amongst a sea of dark T-shirts, long Mk.gee hairstyles and sandalwood-scented cologne. It was hard to ignore the fact that Mk.gee appeals greatly to a certain demographic and that I felt out of place. Yet, when Gordon appeared, tuned his guitar and the opening percussion of “Dream Police” thundered through the audience, all my feelings of otherness from the crowd dissipated. We communed in the music and drifted back into the liminal sonic landscape of “Two Star.”
Gordon is a true rockstar. He took full advantage of the live setting to impart dynamism and raw emotion into his voice and electric guitar, working synergistically with bandmates Andrew Aged and Zach Sekoff, his preamps, pads, synth cabinet and the crowd to breathe new life into each song. Musical directions fluctuated on the fly, directed by his whims. The band’s vigorous live performance is a testament to their visceral connection to sound; it was a primal externalization of the band’s mutual soul.
The show’s highlight was “New Low”, a song which Gordon revamped by cranking up its noise and inserting distorted synths, urgent hi-hats and new exuberant counter-melodies with several of his signature screechy yelps to top it all off, sending the live loop to its climax. What was initially a modest album-opener priming “Two Star”’s soundscape transformed into a beastly flourish of aural trance, an overwhelming wrath of soundwaves that drowned the crowd with its confident self-affirmation of its peculiarity. This remix epitomizes my love for Mk.gee – he supplies his alienation from reality with audacious assuredness, fueling my determination to carve out my unique space in a world without suitable role models and identities to pick from.
The show’s ultimate gift to Minneapolis was “DNM”, played not once, not twice but a record-breaking thirteen times in one night. Before each repeating instance, Gordon deceived the audience with statements like “This is going to be a slow one” or stray soundbites like “It’s Britney B****”. The crowd understood that Gordon was not being self-indulgent or sadistic, ramping up its exhilaration all the way to the final instance. The shuffling drums of the track elevated our zeal, which then elevated our bodies as we hopped off the theater floor again and again. People around me eventually began pushing and shoving amidst their excitement, with neither discipline in their jumps nor stability on their feet. Once hopping to the beat wasn’t enough, some were lifted above the crowd, with everyone doing their part in their surf above sweaty heads and helpful arms. Gordon shared with the crowd timeless euphoria, unbounded by temporality, social etiquette or a concert setlist (he also shared several bottles of beer with some lucky audience members). “DNM” was an unruly disruptor that illuminated the true essence of living in the moment and embracing everything in that theater in the name of fun.
Gordon concluded the show with a mysterious new track, later revealed to be “ROCKMAN” when it was released on October 18th. It extends the low-fidelity mix of “Two Star”, yet alludes to a brand new atmosphere colored by its energetic groove and soaring vocals. With this banger and the anticipation for his collaboration with Justin Bieber, Gordon’s meteoric rise is imminent.
Leaving the portal of the Uptown Theater, my mind remained focused on “Two Star”’s motifs and world-building. Mk.gee does not leave you once you finish the album or leave the concert – the “Two Star” world is a fluid, liminal space that slips into reality in haphazard forms, complementing your daily sense of self and offering refuge in hard times.
