On Saturday, February 27th, Los Angeles played host to two of contemporary music’s most iconic iconoclasts, David Longstreth and his band Dirty Projectors and Kieran Hebden, the maverick electronic-music maven better known as Four Tet.

Dirty Projectors’ appearance was notable for its unique venue: instead of a sweaty rock club like Spaceland, Longstreth and co. shared the stage with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the groundbreaking classical music group Alarm Will Sound (best known for playing and transforming unlikely sources like the music of Aphex Twin with classical instruments). The concert actually began with the L.A. Phil playing what one would assume were classical selection chosen in conjunction with Longstreth; they certainly shared aesthetic common ground. Two of the pieces in this program were for solo piano by the Eastern European composer Ligeti, whose irreverent, avant-garde compositions appeal to indie rockers with advanced compositional abilities like Radiohead and Dirty Projectors. The other selections were just as apt: a prelude from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde showed the melodic power and beauty inherent in such an individual composer. Conversely, the reading of Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite fit Dirty Projectors’ music to a “t,” but in a different way. Built of many interlocking suites and melodies, this Mother Goose, like Longstreth’s ambitious efforts, proved alternately playful, eerie, looming, eccentric, yet accessible. Ravel was probably the most mainstream establishment of these composers showcased, but this selection truly highlighted his unsung idiosyncratic genius.

After a brief intermission, the Dirty Projectors came on: Longstreth, along with vocalists/instrumentalists Amber Coffman, Angel Deradoorian, and Haley Dekle, entered the stage in multicolored hooded capes, ironically appearing as if they were ascetics hailing from the monastery of obscure indie rock. Collaborating with Alarm Will Sound’s orchestral lineup, the Dirty Projectors first attempted The Getty Address, a sprawling opera with a twisty, surreal Americana storyline; suffice to say, the main character’s name is Don Henley, and the official program reproduced a letter sent to the Eagles’ frontman when Getty was released as an album in 2005. If the absurdist narrative was hard to follow, the music proved wildly compelling. Longstreth managed a compellingly awkward, bouncy white-boy head nod as his deeply complex compositions were given a full orchestral treatment: textures of swing, free jazz, Wu-Tang-esque staccato hip-hop beats, and even beer bottles used as wind instruments brought the challenging time signatures, intergalactic harmonies, and almost early-Disney style melodies together. However “difficult” the piece might be, its sheer ambition proved intoxicating, as the passages displayed a quixotic, trance-like gorgeousness far outside pop music convention; in other words, the music was catchy and accessible, but via the most unexpected angles. Once Getty was completed, the Projectors performed an unplugged set featuring great tracks from the band’s incredible 2009 album Bitte Orca like “Temecula Sunrise,” along with a take on Bob Dylan’s “I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine.” The folkier, stripped-down instrumentation showed Longstreth’s voice to be a far more virtuosic and elastic instrument than on record, closer to the melodic gifts of Thom Yorke than the usual indie croak. Even more astonishing was Longstreth’s guitar playing, which came in deep focus in the stark arrangements: he’s often compared to African guitar greats like King Sunny Adé due to his fluid, uplifting melodic lines, but there was also something of the athletic beauty of Spanish guitar here, too. By the end, it seemed nearly every facet of this odd, kaleidoscopic genius was displayed, if not amplified. The standing “o” didn’t seem undeserved in the slightest.

Just a bit southeast, in L.A.’s indie-haven Echo Park neighborhood, Four Tet played his first Southern California show since releasing his acclaimed new album, There Is Love In You at the Echoplex. There Is Love In You is shaping up to be one of 2010’s most heralded releases: on it, Four Tet/Hebden merges the minimalist experimentalism and repetition of avant-garde classical, the fractured samples and endless delay channels of Intelligent Dance Music, the booming low end of dubstep, and straight up, four-on-the-floor dance music. There Is… is surprisingly accessible considering those influences, and Hebden’s recent previous releases, which were often terrible, somewhat incoherent collaborations with the jazz drummer Steve Reid. There is… finds Four Tet working in a surprisingly accessible mode without compromising his avant-garde approach at all: supposedly he road-tested the album’s songs in DJ sets throughout the past year, making sure they were dancefloor friendly. At the same time, innovation sprawls over tracks like “Angel Echoes” and the irresistible single “Love Cry”: these are haunting tracks pulsing with emotion, the hypnotic lure of the supple house beats and syncopated percussion drawing the listener/dancer to investigate their oddball, homemade charm even further.

On stage at the Echoplex, following a set by U.K. glitch wunderkind Nathan Fake, Four Tet played what on some level could be considered a traditional set. Largely focusing on There Is…, the performance definitely concentrated on Hebdan’s recent clubbier conversion, to the delight of the crowd, who grooved uproariously to every thundering kick drum. What separated Four Tet’s set from a conventional clubbing musical experience, however, was the sheer compositional intelligence and absolutely sublime, yet unpredictable, melodic sensibility Hebden brought to the proceedings. Unlike the rave multimedia backdrop of Nathan Fake, Four Tet’s visual presentation was fairly straightforward and light based—the evening’s psychedelic quotient stemmed from the music itself. His Afro turned purple from a black light, Hebden humbly tweaked a number of electronic devices on a simple table that could’ve come from Ikea’s kitchen department, layering sheets of bell-like echoes on top of each other, the relentless yet funky percussion holding the shifting shards of samples and sounds together like viscous cement. In an entertainingly post-modern move, Hebdan even started using his iPhone to add shimmering ambient twinkles that sounded suspiciously like the Brian Eno drone-tone app, “Bloom.” Sub bass booms, disembodied voices, plucked Asiatic melodies, and synthetic Moroder basslines rose in and out of focus from the dense soundscapes. It was a subtle yet thrilling, with Four Tet’s recent embrace of accessibility and danceable rhythm only making him seem more vanguard and adventurous—proof that, no matter what genre he attempts, Hebdan’s greatest skill is injecting the element of surprise,