YACHT April 13, 2011

YACHT is a lot of things. It’s kind of a band, but it’s mostly a genre-and-media-spanning project founded and led by Jona Bechtolt. Bechtolt is a promiscuous genre-smasher, using his unique breed of beat-heavy laptop wizardry and grunge ethos to endless collaborations with west coast mainstays like Devendra Banhart, The Blow and Little Wings. YACHT’s heart is the shows: uncluttered, inspiring sessions of damaged dance moves and synchronized crowd-waving, backed by constantly changing elements -- PowerPoint presentations, audience Q&A sessions, and shamanistic video environments. Bechtolt and Claire Evans (now a full-time member) make anthemic power jams play them backwards and soak them in nearly-psychedelic cherry cola.