Last night, Mercury Lounge played host to early and somewhat rushed sets from Los Angeles' Fol Chen and Baths, both on the heels of two fantastic album releases, Part II: The New December and Cerulean, respectively.

Baths, a name that the one-man mastermind behind the music, Will Wiesenfeld, might not feel quite comfortable with, given that he had to spell it out, opened the set with glitched-out, heartfelt, beat-heavy bangers. He's getting a lot of positive attention for his mix of genres (chillwave triphop? whatever) and it comes through live, if only because the tones he chooses are so infectious, the beats so romp-ready.

But with only a laptop and an MPC, the greatness of what he's actually doing might be lost on those not schooled in the technicalities of all those little do-dads and sliders and pads he's twiddling with. Wiesenfeld's hands fly with surgical precision - those hands also seem to know the exact points in the songs ready to push his glasses back up on his face. With mutton chops and thick black frames, he looks like Chester A. Arthur mixed with Bruce Banner. And he sounds like a nerdy version of Flying Lotus, singing pleading love songs over his beats, at one point howling, "tell me that you need me." Unfortunately, he'd be the only one really dancing - I blame the 7 p.m. start time. At least he was very, very comfortable on stage. But then again, that's sort of what's endearing about him. Every little dance move he pulled wasn't hard to imagine him pulling as he composed his songs alone in his LA bedroom. Bottom line: it was a good set played too early with the excellent "Maximalist" and "Apologetic Shoulder Blades" closing the set.

Quickly, Fol Chen showed up as a six-piece, the secretive dark-pop sextet walking on stage in matching red button-down jumpsuits, black stripes down the arm. It recalled the earnestness of Kraftwerk, but also the silliness of the Cat in The Hat (Thing 1 and Thing 2, anyone?). But Fol Chen is a weird band. I'm not even sure of the names of any of them,

The set opened with The New December's "The Holograms," an excellent, beat-heavy romp through tales of miscommunication. The drummer, who I'm afraid to name for fear of getting it wrong (I told you, they are secretive) was an absolute animal on this number, the four part harmonies propelled by his loud breakbeats. This would be a coming and going common element - the whirligig mastermind of thedrum kit.Besides the excellent "In Ruins" (which in itself is a post-apocalyptic love tale that could always stand on its own) "The Holograms" would be the highlight of the set. Fol Chen is so all-over the place, there has to be a certain expectation of being taken for a ride across genres and song constructions and ideologies. They move from noisy, frenetic pop to dour, dark vocal/guitar duos with only a nod. On album, it's much, much easier to swallow. But after watching that opening song, with those incredible breaks and under-your-skin melody, the rest of the set went somewhat wanting. That's not to pass over Fol Chen's obvious work ethic - the band's new album came out of nowhere earlier last month, and they were obviously well-rehearsed, with a good energy.

It was still light out when they wrapped up.