Caribou mastermind Dan Snaith is a math geek. It’s what he studied, apparently. And looking at him, before his gig at the Vogue Theatre in Vancouver, you’d know it too. With his big glasses and fiddling with the natural musical extension of mathematics – plugs and buttons on his Korg – the Canerdian looks like he’d make perfect robot music.

But Snaith (known both as Caribou and Manitoba, though hails from Ontario) makes electronic music imbued with blood, the 60s, the future, drums and drum-pad “whomps”, guitar and pedal effects. The beat’s got LIFE.

Caribou’s music is trancey but alive, wooshy and trippy but not sleepy, dancey and fun but still hipster enough to steam up the locals’ thick black-rimmed glasses.  The live set is made all the more betterer by the amazing Brad Weber on a tangled complexity of drums and full energy (Snaith also does double duty on a second set of drums), Enon/Braniac’s John Schmersal on bass and vocals and Ryan Smith on guitar, effects and knob-twiddling. It works. It’s wonderfuzz.

Caribou are on a mahoosive international tour. Go hear. For more info and dates, visit www.caribou.fm. All photos by Mikala Taylor, backstagerider.com