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Lately, it seems like most of the touring musicians have been hitting the Bay Area on weeknights, which means I'm probably fast running out of my paid time off hours. Does a concert count as a family emergency, sickness, or personal necessity? For me, I'd have to say "personal necessity." Good thing I have coworkers willing to do the night shift while I'm off having fun.
This is the second concert I've been to with J9, and we had fun wandering around in the vicinity of the Rickshaw Stop before the show, watching the moon between the buildings, enjoying the crisp air, and discovering a cool little bookshop around the corner from the venue. I love that I've found a fellow wanderer to wander with.
Once inside the Rickshaw Stop, I had a vague feeling of deja vu. I don't think I've been there before, but it seemed familiar somehow. It's an interesting little space. The red velvet curtains on the walls serve to distract one from the fact that the ceiling looks like it's composed of old mattresses. The lighting is subdued. Actually, Marissa Nadler, once she arrived on stage, requested that the lighting become even more subdued because she's shy. She started out solo, her haunting voice ghosting through the room as her hypnotic, skeletal guitar playing provided a bed of sound for it to rest on (or should I say, "grave of sound"?). A few songs in, she was joined by a second guitarist and a bassist/percussionist. Percussion consisted of some cymbal rattling and a singing bowl (which was a little hard to hear, actually). The guitarist, despite being a little under the weather, sang backup here and there. My favorite moment was the full band Hole is Wide, which sounded even more beautiful than the recorded version on her latest cd, Little Hells. No mean feat that, since it's my favorite song on the cd. Sylvia was also up there near the top of my list. She also played, among others, Rosary, Little Hells, Salutations in the Dark, and Diamond Heart, every one of them hypnotic and beautiful. Later, when I complimented her during my trip to the merch table, she was self-effacing, mentioning that mistakes were made. That may be so, but they were beautiful mistakes. That said, I did kind of wonder about the mysterious banjo that nobody ever played. It would have been nice to hear a bit of banjo.
Alela Diane has only recently become a blip on my radar. The blip was created by her track on the wonderful Leaves of Life compilation - a version of the old folk standard, The Cuckoo. Coincidentally enough, the track also features Mariee Sioux, who played with Marissa Nadler the last time I saw her. Not too surprising I guess, because Alela Diane and Mariee Sioux both hail from Nevada City, which is beginning to sound like a real cultural hotspot. Before the show, I'd located and downloaded some of her songs over at Daytrotter, but hadn't gotten a chance to listen to them before leaving for the show, so other than quickly listening to the songs on her MySpace page, I hadn't heard much. Seeing her live remedied that, of course. Her voice is more earthy than Marissa Nadler's is, and her guitar playing warmer, more organic sounding. Marissa Nadler sounds like a woman with one foot in the spirit world, while Alela Diane sounds like she's firmly rooted in this one. All of her songs were at least good, and some were excellent. Of the ones with titles I can remember, White As Diamonds, and The Rifle were standouts. She was joined on stage by, of all people, her dad, who played guitar and mandolin, and sang backup. It seems that he was called in at the last minute as a replacement for her usual second band member, who was at home putting up "lost cat" flyers. Apparently, her cat objected to being left with a friend while Alela was on tour, and took it upon itself to vanish. Let's hope that particular story has a happy ending.
I did take some photos, but have deemed none of them fit for posting here. I blame the muted lighting. Just imagine it, why don't you?
To the best of my recollection, it has been about 10 years since I've seen Damon and Naomi play, the last time being at the San Francisco version of the Terrastock Festival back at the end of the last century. As for A Hawk And A Hacksaw, me being a new fan and all, I'd never seen them live before (which means you don't have to suffer through some sentimental reflection here about how I saw them years ago at some barely remembered venue in another city somewhere...).
Damon and Naomi have been quietly putting out cds for years now, with the more recent ones sometimes featuring Ghost guitarist Kurihara. I say "quietly" because, well, they are a pretty quiet sort of band, with a penchant for melancholy songs. This time out, it was just the two of them, with no Kurihara. Damon played acoustic guitar and sang. Naomi played keyboards and sang. Damon joked about how A Hawk And A Hacksaw would bring everybody up, but first Damon And Naomi were going to bring everybody down. They then proceeded to do just that, often singing in quiet harmony as they made their way through a set that included some new songs and a little sub-set of older ones at the back (they're currently touring in support of a new "best of'" cd called "The Sub Pop Years", which features a collection of older material). My favorite song of the night was a song about grizzled old homeless people living in a Japanese subway station (more or less Damon's words there) and inspired by a Japanese singer (Damon said his name, but I've forgotten it - possibly Mikami Kan, who is on the Damon And Naomi-curated "International Sad Hits" compilation). Also of note was their closing song - a cover version of Leonard Cohen's "Bird On A Wire". Very nicely done.
A Hawk And A Hacksaw were another experience entirely. They performed as a five-piece, wailing away on a diverse array of instruments, including bouzouki, violin, Stroh violin, accordion, drums (usually played my the multi-tasking accordion player), tuba, trumpet, and a few others. Their set included at least one Macedonian, song, and at least one Hungarian song. All of the other songs sounded like they could have originated in one of those countries as well, with frantic fiddle, staccato accordion, fluttery trumpet, and subsonic tuba rumbling. Not to mention frenzied bouzouki bashing (with semi apologies to Tintin creator Herge for upending one of Captain Haddock's favorite insults there...). The fiddler, Heather Trost, played what I think was a Stroh violin for a couple of songs. For one song, she appeared to be tugging a thread across the violin strings, creating a thin sound, which when amplified by the violin's trumpet, sounded like an old nineteen twenties recording.
For the most part, the songs were instrumental, with the one exception being "I am not a gambling man" from their most recent cd, "Delivrance". The song features the mirth-inducing lyric, "All the hunters have been poisoned, by an old deer".
We had spent Damon And Naomi's set seated at one of the club's few tables, with a great view of the stage. This great view was made possible by the fact that Damon And Naomi make everybody feel melancholy, and melancholy people tend to sit on the floor. Also, of course, the fashionably-late hipster contingent hadn't yet appeared. A Hawk And A Hacksaw, with their lightning speed gypsy ruckus, inspired considerably more standing up amongst the hitherto sedated crowed, which had a ripple effect on those of us seated at the tables. The end result was that we were standing at the back of the crowd. I mention this because, A Hawk And A Hacksaw, no doubt witnessing our plight, eventually abandoned the stage and walked through the audience until they were situated right in front of us. They finished out their set playing acoustically in a compact little circle a mere foot away. I found myself staring at my comically distorted reflection in the tuba while they played. They wandered away at the end of the set, and then resumed their positions on the floor for an encore.
Time well spent, I'd say!
I'm mildly surprised that this is the first time this year I've seen Faun Fables. It seems like I used to see them once a month or so, but now that they've moved out of Oakland they don't grace Bay Area stages as often as they used to. That's a pity.
Parking anywhere near the Uptown was not in the cards, since apparently MC Hammer was playing at the nearby Paramount Theater. It ended up working out for me though, because had I parked closer to the venue, I wouldn't have run into an old coworker of mine in a crosswalk several blocks away from the Uptown (she in a car, me walking towards the venue). We stopped there in the middle of the street and caught up for awhile. What are the odds of that? Especially if one considers that we worked together at a museum fifty miles away, and neither of us live anywhere near Oakland.
I'd never been to the Uptown before, and I found myself pleasantly surprised. It's actually a pretty nice venue. You have to walk past the bar and towards the back before making a u-turn into the performance area. The stage was just the right size, and well-lit. The sound was crystal clear - to the extent that both Nils and Dawn made reference to it several times during the Faun Fables set.
Emily Palin was on first. Her name sounded familiar, and it didn't take me long to remember that she'd played with Bonfire Madigan earlier this year. She took a single violin, and through the judicious use of effects, she looped her playing and accompanied herself, creating the illusion that there was a full band up on stage. She would tap the violin and loop the sound to create a beat, lay down a rhythm track of top of it, and embellish this with a melody. It reminded me of what I've heard/read about Matt Howden's (Sieben, Sol Invictus, etc.) solo sets. Quite ingenious, really. Unfortunately, her vocal and lyrical prowess didn't match her virtuosity on the violin. Her voice sounded off to me - to my ears it sounded kind of flat, and her lyrics sounded like they'd been written by a teen pop star. That said, she's young and she's got a long future ahead of her, during which I'm sure she'll improve in these departments. A friend pointed out (and I paraphrase here) that her set was a combination of interesting music and things that would normally make him vacate the room. Still, she got an enthusiastic response from the audience. I'd love to hear what she's doing in a few years.
Jesse Quattro actually did have a full band with her, which this time out included my brother, so I guess that makes this a biased review. Jesse sang and played acoustic guitar, with Miles Boisen accompanying her on electric guitar. My brother provided some backing sounds and served as narrator, reading some effective little bits of poetry written by Jesse and her dad. The band was rounded out with a bassist (Ross Sewage - great name!), a percussionist/backing vocalist, and a keyboardist/backing vocalist (whose names I've forgotten - sorry). How to describe the music? Slightly melancholy avant-garde pop? Damn, I hate labeling things. In some ways, it is hard to pigeonhole what Jesse does, and to my mind that's a good thing. I've always liked bands/musicians who manage to be genre-less. I'd like to get my hands on a recording of these songs, so I can let them properly sink in.
Faun Fables were a three piece for this show, with Cornelius Boots (of Edmund Welles fame) joining Dawn and Nils on... well, on whatever was needed - percussion, throat singing, flute, and a variety of other wind instruments, some of which resembled soo lings, but probably weren't. They opened their set with a newly worked out version of a song by Polish composer Zygmunta Koniezcyniego, and from there proceeded into a set consisting primarily of new material. The new songs were all definitely up to the high standards set by their older material, and I look forward to hearing them again. They played "With Words and Cake" from their most recent cd, "A Table Forgotten", and "Carousel With Madonnas" (by Koniezcyniego again) the beautiful "Roadkill" as an encore. I especially love the line "But one of these mornings you're gonna rise up singing a song that your grandfather knew, but your father forgot..." This, in some ways, encapsulates for me what Faun Fables is all about.
A week or two ago, Jean Smith from Mecca Normal contacted me and asked if she could use the photos I took at their gig at the Hemlock earlier this year. I said yes, of course. I just checked out their MySpace page and noticed that one of my photos is their default picture at the moment. Kind of flattering, really.
If you haven't checked this duo out, or their various side projects and solo efforts, do so. I have to mention their non-musical output as well - Jean Smith is an author, and David Lester has designed some nice shirts, as well as postcards, and the sobering "Gruesome Acts of Capitalism" booklet. He's working on a graphic novel too!
San Jose isn't the city I think of when I'm contemplating an evening out. Despite the fact that I live in the aforementioned city, I usually look elsewhere for my entertainment needs. That said, I do occasionally find myself in downtown San Jose, and it seems that every time I go, it looks more like a real city, with taller buildings and exponential neon sign multiplication. One such neon sign advertises the Voodoo Lounge, the venue that Hellhound, along with Skinlab, Silent Sinner, and A Thousand Kingdoms played at on this particular evening.
I had never heard the other three bands, and didn't even get around to checking to see if they had MySpace pages so I could get an idea of what they sounded like. Nothing really sounds good on MySpace anyway - I'm not sure why that is. Maybe it's because the sound quality isn't as good (although it's hugely better than the sound quality found on YouTube), or maybe it's because of the sheer volume of unheard music - something that inspires me to rush through the listening experience. Anyway, I approached this gig eighties-style, which I figured was appropriate. "Eighties-style" here means that I got there with no idea what the other bands would sound like. Sure, I knew they'd be metal, but beyond that...
I met Wayne, Chris, and various members of Hellhound outside, which is something I haven't done anywhere, outside or inside, in over a couple of decades. We're all sort of grown up now, although sometimes you wouldn't know it. When we finally made it inside, a band which must have been A Thousand Kingdoms were playing. They were actually pretty good, sounding raw and heavy, and featuring a singer who actually sang every once in awhile, trading off between the usual throat-tearing style so popular with many current metal bands, and some actual singing. I definitely enjoyed their set, although I'm not sure if I'd actually listen to their music much outside of a live context. Silent Sinner weren't quite as good, with the vocals being more high-pitched in that stereotypical way that people mimic when they're making fun of heavy metal. Chis opined that they occasionally sounded like old German speed metal band, Living Death. I heard a bit of Kreator in there too.
Hellhound ripped through a quick set, and fortunately the equipment problems that plagued their show in Alameda last month didn't come back for an encore. The guitars were upfront and crunchy, and played with great precision of course. This was my second time hearing the two new songs, and I have to say I prefer "The Bleeding Edge" to the other one (which I think is called "Circle of Trust", or something like that). The old songs are as familiar to me as any of the other music I listened to in my youth, and it's great to hear them performed live again - especially "Killing Spree" and "Repression of Life". The band got a great response from the crowd too. Hopefully this time around they'll get the recognition they deserve.
Like the old men that we are, we elected to leave before Skinlab played, so I still haven't heard them. I know, I'll go check them out on MySpace, and be underwhelmed. I'll be right back... Yep. Nothing new. I guess they get points for sheer aggression, at least.
Also, the guy who put the show together, working under the banner of Man Down Productions, is an old high school friend. People are just coming out of the woodwork all over the place lately. Now, why wasn't there a metal scene in San Jose back when I was a kid?
I love the beautiful feeling of anticipation when I hear about an upcoming concert or music release. Before I actually hear the music, the possibilities are endless and my imagination can run wild. This is what keeps me buying new music - that feeling of exploring the unknown and the potential for discovering a new collection of songs that might become new favorites, or might have an as-yet-unknown affect on me. Sometimes I prolong the anticipation by not slapping new purchases into the proper player right away.
For example, as I type, I'm sitting next to a pile of releases that have yet to grace my stereo. On top is Mia Doi Todd "La Ninja Amor: Amor and Other Dreams of Manzanita". I picked it up for cheap on Ebay. The majority of the songs on it are remixes, and there are two new (at the time of this release) originals and one Beatles cover (Norwegian Wood). Next in the pile is the new Birch Book cd, "A Hand Full of Days". I heard a few of the songs on this the last time B'ee played in San Francisco, but I'm still greatly anticipating listening to this because B'ee, whether he's playing/recording as In Gowan Ring or Birch Book, has long been one of my favorites. Underneath that is another remix cd, this time by Mari Boine - volume 2, actually, entitled "It Ain't Necessarily Evil". I'm also anticipating her new cd, which has just been released in Europe. I've also just gotten the Huun-Huur-Tu/Sainkho collaboration, "Mother-Earth! Father Sky!". These artists are among the first Tuvan musicians I heard, and it's great that they've done a cd together. There's also a cd by the Latvian band Ilgi, entitled Totari. It appears to be a collection of celebratory solstice songs. Finally, there's a 7" by the defunct Swedish metal band, Stillborn, featuring a couple of songs from their demo. Their first record (which is the only one with their original singer), is still one of my favorites in that particular genre.
What a beautiful feeling, having new music to listen to.
Due to a vague sense of ennui, I haven't been writing as much lately. That's the thing about trying to keep up with multiple blogs - sometimes burnout occurs. I wouldn't call it writer's block, because I do have things to write about. I just need to step away once in awhile. I need time to do nothing. Over the summer, I've been lazy, spending my time re-watching films, hiking with kids, and listening to music without feeling the need to write about it. I appreciate having the luxury of doing this, because over the last number of years, I haven't been able to. Over the past months, I have been rediscovering a lot of films and music from my youth, albeit with adult eyes and ears.
Sometimes you have to step back to move forward. I'm not sure if this counts as a midlife crisis or not. Maybe it just counts as an awkward sort of tango.
Speaking of stepping back, the last couple of gigs I've attended have featured bands who have roots reaching way back to the sparkling days of the mid to late eighties. I'm not going to format this as a "gig review" because once again I've waited until too long after the fact, and also because I have friends in these bands, which makes anything positive I have to say highly suspect. That said, I'm hard pressed to think of any friends who are in bands that I don't like. In fact, I'm fortunate to have friends in some really damn good bands.
First, I finally got to see my friend Devon's band, Conquest for Death. The last time they played, I took Willow along and she decided that (despite earplugs) punk shows were just too loud for six year old girls. On that occasion, we went to a doughnut shop instead. This time out, Willow didn't come. There were a lot of other bands on the bill. Capitalist Casualties, who were supposed to play, didn't. The other bands were all somewhere on the hardcore/grindcore spectrum. Send the Dogs, who opened, had dual male/female vocals, which is always a plus in my book. Their noise scared off the merch table cat though. Cats don't like punk. The other bands didn't really do much for me. I was excited when Conquest For Death finally arrived on stage. They play eighties-styled hardcore, more influenced by European bands than American ones. Short, fast, and loud, with precision leaps into the air thrown in to give their stage performance a visual dynamic. In fact, none of the band members seemed to stand still for a moment. Unfortunately, after only a handful of songs, their bass player, Robert, slipped and fell, doing something to his knee. Since he wasn't able to stand back up after his fall, the set ended. I think they might have played for ten minutes, if that. It's ironic that a band who has toured all over the world, traveling through countries that most bands never reach, without experiencing any show-stopping injuries, would have something like this happen so close to home. I guess it's better than having it happen in Zimbabwe or somewhere... Damn. Still, it was a fantastic ten minutes. Maybe next time I'll experience a whole set.
Next up was the return of Hellhound. I must have attended just about every show they did during the eighties, including house party and high school gigs. For many of those shows, I acted as roadie. During the eighties, I saw them perform with the likes of Megadeth, Anthrax, Slayer, and a number of other similar bands. Their last show was in Alameda, made memorable by the fact that I ended up with a very impressive black eye during their set. Somebody at the venue thought it would be cool to have disco-ball lighting while Hellhound played, which of course reduced visibility. Add to this a guy going the wrong way in the circle, and you have a collision. It was definitely a "you should have seen the other guy" moment though, because he ran off to the bathroom with his head in his hands and I didn't seem him again for the rest of the night. I had forgotten that this had been their last show though.
Coincidentally enough, their first show after reforming was also in Alameda, although at a different venue. Since I was relying on my mom to watch my daughter for the evening, I had planned an Umlaut-styled surgical strike, getting there just in time to see Hellhound and missing all the other bands.
I failed.
After navigating the darkened maze that is the industrial part of Alameda, I got there an hour after the start time to find that no bands had actually started playing yet. Typical. I can't even be late when I try to be late. I guess it was a bit naive of me to think that the show would actually start when it was supposed to . I sat around a bit until I started seeing some familiar faces, and then spent a bit of time catching up. The opening bands were flawed. The first band played old school thrash with hardcore-styled vocals which didn't gel well with the music. The second band had apparently recently lost their singer, so they performed as an instrumental band. Well, almost instrumental. They still sang the backing vocals, which sounded silly and out of context without a lead vocalist. Decent music though.
Next up was Hellhound. Back during the eighties, Hellhound only managed to record a couple of demos before breaking up. They were perfectionists though, so the demos were well-recorded and featured well written songs with impressive musicianship. Since then, the demos have been pressed onto cd twice, first on Maximum Metal in 1998, and then again last year on Stormspell records. Today, Hellhound still have four out of five original members, with only Steve the drummer being absent. The new guy seems to know what he's doing though.
The first thing I noticed was that Mike's voice had changed a bit. He doesn't hit the high notes anymore, but I quickly decided that it actually sounds better this way (I felt much the same way when I saw Angelwitch for the first time at Ruthie's Inn a number of years ago). They played a couple of new songs too, which is something I thought I'd never hear. We used to joke about how long it took them to write and endlessly polish songs before deeming them fit to perform. Of course, this perfectionism led to some damn fine songs at the end of the process. Unfortunately, Bob was having some equipment troubles, and the guitars seemed to be really low in the mix. Mike made a crack about how they were old school so their equipment was old too. The sound did improve a bit later on, and we were treated to most of my favorite songs from the demos, including Repression of Life, Killing Spree, From the Ruins of Yesterday, Ice Age, Flee the Bomb, and... maybe that was it. A pretty short set, actually. It was enough to remind me that they are better than the majority of similar-styled bands out there, remembering to combine aggression and melody rather than just merging aggression with more aggression. I guess this was kind of a soft opening for them, with the anticipated gig at the Voodoo Lounge in San Jose on September 17th being the real deal. I'm going to attempt to be there as well.
Then, just last weekend, at the long anticipated wedding of a couple of musical friends, I got to see a few other musicians/bands play. Kirana Peyton, who performs as Black Bird Stitches, sang a beautiful accapella song, accompanied by the wind and some nearby windchimes. Will Oldham, who usually performs as Bonny Prince Billy, sang a song which was constantly interrupted by the voices of children shouting, "LOOK MOM! IT'S A BAT!! IT'S RIGHT UP THERE!!! COOL!!!" That's what he gets for pointing out the bat, I guess. Next, he sang a sung with the newlywed Dawn McCarthy, which was beautiful, of course. A band called Lasher Keen played too, and they were new to me, playing a variety of instruments, including accordion, bodran, some sort of cigar box banjo, and others. It's good to see new bands playing with the kind of boundless creativity they exhibited.
It has been awhile since I've gone to more than one gig in a single day - this is only possible when the start times are radically different. In this case, the first one started at 1pm, and the second got going at around 5pm, thus enabling me to attend both, with time to visit Amoeba in between.
Penelope Houston and the Birdboys, at the Bottom of the Hill, S.F., 8/2/09
There were two other bands on the bill, with Penelope sandwiched in between the opener and the headliner, but we opted for a trip to Goat Hill Pizza during the former, and a trip to Amoeba during the latter.
It's strange being at the Bottom of the Hill during the day. Sunlight shines through the little window at the back of the stage, and generally speaking, fewer people are in attendance. This show was no exception, with the audience being a bit on the sparse side.
I've been listening to Penelope Houston for years, although I have to admit that I didn't become fully aware of her music until after The Avengers had split up and she had put out her first solo album, "Birdboys". During the nineties, in the midst of the East Bay indie rock explosion, I saw her play numerous times, but during my subsequent marriage I spent much less time haunting the club scene, and more time being responsible. Now that I'm divorced, I've reverted back to previous habits. That's some consolation, at least...
I figured that there was a good chance that she'd play songs from "Birdboys" since, after all, her band for this show was billed as "The Birdboys". I figured right. They hit the strangely daylit stage with Harry Dean (about Harry Dean Stanton, if you couldn't figure it out on your own), and followed it with Voices, Wild Mountain Thyme, and Summer of War, all from the aforementioned album. It was nice to see mandolin, contrabass, and occasional accordian up there on the stage, as well as the more traditional rock instrumentation. Penelope played the melodica and autoharp here and there as well. Summer of War and Voices have always been among my favorites, and "Birdboys" is still my favorite Penelope Houston release. Here more recent releases are more rock, and while there are some great songs on them, none of them have the same haunting feel of her debut.
Next up was a new song, which I believe was called Missouri Lounge. If I remember right, a week after the fact, it had a bit of a bluesy feel to it. They followed it with one of my favorite newer songs, Pale Green Girl. You've got to love a song with a chorus of "She's gonna burn down someone's house..." Then, it was back to "Birdboys", with Talking With You and Bed of Lies. For an encore, we got U.S.S.A., which was recorded as part of a soundtrack for a film (or TV show), the name of which now escapes me. They ended with If You're Willing, and we emerged back into the sunlight, blinking like cave dwellers.
It was great to hear those old songs live again, and not just for the sake of nostalgia. That said, I did feel like I'd been transported back to the eighties for awhile there. This revisiting of decades past wasn't over yet though, because after a trip to Amoeba, we went to see...
Hirax, Wehrmacht, Voetsek, Scarecrow, and Insanity at the DNA Lounge
When we got inside, Insanity were already playing. They've been around for decades, but haven't ever really been on my radar. What we got was very competently played death metal. I don't listen to a lot of straight-up death metal these days, but I found myself enjoying their set. There was a poignant moment when their singer dedicated the show to their fallen brothers - two band members have died over the last couple of decades - one way back when (heart disease, I think), and the other recently (cancer?),
Another thing that struck me was the crowd. There were a lot of the typical heavy metal costumes - denim jackets emblazoned with patches of band logos, studded wristbands and belts, leather, etc. Not to mention the shirts, many of them emblazoned with record covers of eighties releases. I saw the first two Kreator album covers on shirts, as well as many others. A few of the kids looked barely into their teens, and the denim jackets, despite being covered in band logos from decades past, looked brand new, like they'd just been sewn on last week.
It filled me with a strange kind of self love. It was like the ghost of metal past had taken me to visit my younger self. From my present temporal vantage point, I could relate with this new generation of social misfits. I could see the passion that drives them. I could see all the awkwardness of being a teen who is no doubt surrounded by people who just don't "get it." There was even this one skinny little bespectacled guy who ended up being the only stagediver of the night. He looked like he was about 12 or 13, and I wondered if this was the first time he'd ever stagedived. It made me think of the first time I ever stagedived, back at a Slayer/Exodus/Savage Grace show at the now defunct Wolfgang's not too far away from where I was now standing. It's hard to get all weepy with nostalgia at a metal show though...
Next up was Scarecrow, who played slightly more traditional sounding heavy metal. I recognized their bass player from PointsNorth, who opened for Uli Roth in Concord recently. A damn good bass player he is too. Again, the music was enjoyable, but not to the point where I felt like I had to own it on cd.
Voetsek were slightly more in the grindcore realm, and lyrically seemed to be a bit more humorous, although my idea of humor is different from theirs. The singer seemed to need to spit every few minutes too, which was a bit distracting.
The last time I saw the dubiously-named Wehrmacht was back in '87, up at the Phoenix Theater in Petaluma, with Condemned Attitude. They've only just recently gotten back together, and this was one of their first live gigs in over 20 years. That said, it has probably been around 20 years since I last listened to them too. Wehrmacht play what I guess could be termed speedcore, mixing lightning-quick metal riffing with an irreverent punk attitude and spastic drumming. Fast forward to '09, and not much has changed. Sure, the band members are in their forties now, but in every other way, they're not much different from how I remember them back in the eighties. Their set didn't make me want to revisit their recorded output, but it was fun to see them again, if only for the sake of nostalgia. They are to be commended for their ripping version of Accept's "Fast As A Shark" though.
Finally, it was time for Hirax. In my opinion, they've improved with age. I was of two minds about them back in the eighties, never fully getting into their sound. Back then, I preferred the growly vocalists. Hirax vocalist Katon DePena had more of a high, clean, traditional metal sound to his voice. At the time, that was their selling point - fast, almost hardcore riffing with Katon's atypical vocal approach. Hirax disbanded at some point, and Katon resurfaced with Phantasm, featuring original Metallica bassist Ron McGovney. I saw Phantasm someplace in Oakland (I think it was Oakland - I just remember it was at a venue I hadn't been to before - or since) back in the late eighties or early nineties. Eventually, Hirax reformed, and after seeing them last year at the Tidalwave Festival, I found myself liking their current incarnation better than their eighties one. A lot of that has to do with Katon, who just exudes positive energy. This show confirmed the opinion I formed at Tidalwave. The band is tight, and Katon obviously enjoys the hell out of what he is doing. That said, they probably could have fit in two or three more songs if he'd refrained from spending so much time thanking people between songs, although I guess this helped foster a real feeling of cameraderie amongst the crowd during their set. Inspired by all of this positive energy, nostalgia, and raging, unapolagetic METAL, I left with a big smile on my face.
It has been awhile since the kids chimed in with any of their musical opinions, so I'm taking a moment to write down a quick cd review done by the boys (followed by some thoughts of my own). Of course, they don't know that their irritated griping is being sent out to the world here, but I think unsolicited opinions are more interesting than what I could have gotten if I had asked them.
Rosebud "Bite by Bite" cd (Corporate Pork Records, 2009)
Alex (after I turn the cd off): "Thanks for shutting her up!"
Nate: mumbles something about "vegetarian bitch", and goes on to say, "the next time you play that in the van, I'm going to throw it out the window and over a cliff!"
I never know when the music I play while driving is going to strike a nerve, but this cd sure did. Rosebud has been singing in bands (Night Soil Man, Bug Guts, Salty the Pocketknife, Leather Muffin) since the eighties, with this new release being her second solo cd (the first being "Thundermug Honeypot"). I saw Night Soil Man at Gilman St. during the eighties, and quite enjoyed them. Animal rights is a recurring theme in everything Rosebud has recorded, and the entirety of "Bite by Bite" is devoted to the subject. Musically, it's a lot gentler than most of her back catalog, sounding like quirky country folk, but with Rosebud's unique voice and no-holds-barred lyrics driving home a message of kindness and respect for animals. It has more in common with the most recent Bug Guts cd than it does with her last solo cd. The first two Bugs Guts cds were abrasive, avant garde affairs, while the most recent one is gentle and relatively peaceful sounding (that said, the lyrics have lost none of their bite), as if recorded in happier surroundings, perhaps on the back porch of a farmhouse with a nice view of mountains in the distance. I wonder if the change in style coincided with Rosebud moving from San Diego to rural Northern California. Hmmm. If I had to pick a favorite after listening to it a couple of times (one time with the kids griping at me), I'd have to say Stop the Line, a song about a slaughterhouse worker being driven insane by the contagious fear of the animals he's killing.
I think it made the boys feel guilty about eating meat, and kids their age tend to react negatively to opposing points of view. That's sometimes a problem with cds like this - musicians either end up preaching to the already converted or irritating the unrepentant animal eaters. As for me, I'm vegetarian, but not vegan, so I'm kind of in the middle of the spectrum. Still, I love any music done with passion and conviction, In fact, the main reason I'm vegetarian is because of music - all of those vegetarian/vegan punk bands from the eighties won me over back when I was barely twenty, and I haven't looked back since.
Pentagram have been around, in one form or another, since I was a kindergartener. It wasn't until the mid-eighties that I actually stumbled across them, in the form of their first, self-titled, lp in the records bins at the now-defunct Tower Records. The cover of the lp is black, with the band's logo, in purple and white, positioned at an angle on the front. Back in those days, there was no internet to provide me with instant information and sound samples, so I tended to buy music based on what I could glean from record covers. The spartan cover and song titles like Dying World and The Ghoul pushed this one over the top and convinced me to part with the 7 or 8 dollars needed to make it mine.
I was rewarded with a sludgy, Sabbathy morass of chugging goodness. The icing on this particular cake came in the form of Bobby Leibling's sneering Ozzyish vocals. Sometime afterwards, I picked up their second album, "Day of Reckoning", at the late, lamented Record Vault. $7.98, plus tax. The sticker is still on it. This time out, some of the rough edges had been smoothed away, and Liebling's vocal mannerisms aped Ozzy's to an even greater degree. He even utters the line, "all right now/won't you listen?" during one song. Pretty blatant. Still, it's a very listenable record, with the massive Burning Savior still holding a special place in my heart.
Since then, several Pentagram cds featuring Bobby Liebling and drummer Joe Hasselvander have seen the light of day (with Hasselvander playing all of the instruments), not to mention a couple of compilations of early works. Hasselvander has kept himself busy with other projects as well. Liebling, it appears, has kept himself busy with the type of self-destuctive behaviors most often associated with rock musicians. There's even a documentary on his life coming out sometime soon. Not to mention the song he wrote based on one of his suicide notes.
Last year, I saw Raven for the first time in a quarter century, with none other than Joe Hasselvander drumming for them. This year, I was surprised to hear that Pentagram were touring. On July 2nd, they rolled into town for a show at the DNA Lounge in S.F., and I left work in a rush to be there in time. Justin and I got there too late to see Orchid (who I've since heard good things about) and Hammers of Misfortune (too bad - I've been wanting to see them). Nachmystium were band number three, and they steamrolled through a set of Bathory-influenced metal. Kind of black metal. Kind of not. Throat tearing vocals over pummeling metal with epic overtones. Decent, but I'd rather be listening to Bathory.
I didn't bring my camera in because it said "no cameras" on the ticket confirmation page. Of course, once inside, I saw cameras everywhere. Damn. I guess it is kind of hard to enforce that rule now that camera phones are the norm.
Pentagram is now just Bobby Liebling, with a much younger backing band. A search around the internet seems to suggest that there is some bad blood between Liebling and Hasselvander at the moment, but I'm just guessing. The set proved to be a mixture of old and new. I have a couple of the newer cds, but they're not cemented into my memory like some of the songs off the first couple of records are. There was even a brand new song called "Last Rites", which will appear on the forthcoming cd of the same name. As for the songs I recognized, they played All Your Sins (covered nicely by Cathedral on their "Echoes of Dirges from the Nave" live lp), Sign of the Wolf, 20 Buck Spin, When the Screams Come, and maybe one or two others (this is what happens when I wait a week or two to write things down).
As for Liebling, various sources have described his appearance "wretched looking". Said sources have then gone on to half-jokingly question how much longer he would be alive. I'd have to agree that he does look much older than his 55 (I think) years, resembling for all the world some wizened wizard, complete with grey hair at his temples and hooked nose. With a flowing black robe and a pointed hat, he'd truly be scary. However, he soon showed the audience that he has the energy of a twenty year old, joking around (often incoherently), making faces, grabbing his crotch, dancing, and sometimes entirely disappearing from view (I was towards the back). Once, I looked up as all I could see was one of his feet sticking straight up into the air next to the guitarist. As for his voice, it seems to have suffered a bit over the years(he made reference to it, using the word "scratchy", so maybe he had a cold or something), but that's okay because it made him sound less like Ozzy. The songs, both old and new, have that heavy, sludgy, seventies groove, and the packed club lapped it up. The music just oozed atmosphere, creating a weird time warp and dragging us all back several decades. Liebling's seventies-style outfit reinforced this illusion. At one point, Liebling thanked the audience for their continued dedication, and laid to rest a recent internet rumor about him being caught in an airport in France with crack cocaine sewn into his socks. Or at least I think he did. It was often hard to understand what the hell he was talking about.
All in all, I think it was a damn good show. I've been listening to Pentagram for 25 years now (although, truth be told, sometimes years go by without a Pentagram record gracing my turntable), and there's just something about those old bands - maybe it's simply the fact that way back then, there weren't so damn many songs floating around in my head, so each new song I heard was more significant. It might also be that since I didn't have so many records then, I tended to replay them more often. Whatever the reason, seeing these songs performed live for the first time after all of these years was pretty special.
Check them out on Myspace and Wikipedia.
