Another Night at Kimos

This show was free, since I still had the wristband from the night before. My conscience didn't put up too much of a fight. I am a cheap bastard.

Going to this place on your own, if you're seeking to enjoy the music and not socialize, is a bit awkward. I gotta say, this place attracts some colorful characters, and not all of them are the types you want to talk to, but avoiding contact with them in a place this small? Not the easiest thing in the world. Still, no one was really threatening and it was relatively simple to set up a base camp where you could keep watch over your stuff and still check out the music.

It was a four-band night but I missed the first act. The last three were serrial nightmares, in ways both good and bad.

I am perceptive when it comes to art. I can usually read an artist's intention and subtext with reliable accuracy. JEALOUSY, the group, clearly operates on some level I simply cannot grasp.
One relatively-normal looking musician guy in a hat, playing with delay and reverb and a whole plate of effects pedals, doing some spoken-word thing so heavily echoed that I couldn't make out any of it, backed up by a woman in a 1950s style polka-dotted dress, red nylons, and some 1920s-1960s era porn projected on the wall upside down. That was their backdrop. A tall blond girl was also apparently part of the band?... She was so drunk she couldn't stand up straight, she almost fell on me while I crouched to get a better look at the spectacle onstage, offered me a sip of her drink as an appology, walked onstage, collapsed against the wall and, it looked like...fell asleep? Then got up, wandered over to the guy playing the effects-bass, threw her arms around him and warbled into his microphone. I assume she was..part...of...the show? I'm not sure. And there was a lanky drag queen in colorful cleft-palate style make up eating bananas while posing elegantly on a folding chair right there in front, right onstage. The bananas had been painted black. That was all he did. It was all very...artistic? Yeah. I don't even know. After that I hoped the next act would be a bit more straightforward.

It was, but only a bit. Aunt Dracula are a Philadelphia psychadelic band that suffers from a severe lack of a rhythem section. Two guitarists, one pale and red-headed with a striped polo shirt, the other with a silver plaid shirt and a hat that matched, and a long-haired guy who'd qualify as a giant bent over a PC clicking a mouse to produce bursts of drum noises. Guys.... you're great with the effects. It's all very trippy, but without a real rhythem section, the whole thing feels rootless. Not a very memorable set.

I gotta say this about The New Thrill Parade: they were memorable. They were also the most serreal nightmarish brood of the night. Think CAKE's rythems and diverse instrumentation, but with the tempo slowed to a funeral march and a singer who spends each song sobbing and begging and sucking on his microphone. That was when he wasn't wearing his pink pig gimp-mask. This whole line-up looked like the cast of some dark Wonderland type fable. The big percussionist on the floor, banging out on a pair of cymbols and a drum, actually rocked back in forth, miming like he was sobbing his heart out, dressed in a flesh-tone apron criss-crossed with strips of color, like some sort of color butcher throwing a tantrum. the saxaphonist was a girl in a hoody wearing what looked like a net made of torn gray sheets and a full-face gorrilla mask. A huge bass player had a fringed cape and a round old-man bubble mask. The keyboardist/violenist wore a cardigan and a steady expression, looking like a cousin of Steve from Blue's Clues and just as unphased about his unreal surroundings. The Guitarist stood out just because he was a guy in a t-shirt and jeans.

Guys, either everyone in the band should wear the crazy, or no one in the band should wear the crazy. When one guy is wearing homemade overalls and fashing his nipples while begging for his life through a pig gimp-mask, and one guy looks totally normal, it just dysrupts the band visual synch, and you SHOULD be visually in synch. Figure out the cast of characters you want and stick to it.

That said, this group will haunt me. I'm not even sure if I liked them or not, but I know they unsettled me. Which might have been their aim.

I gotta get better at this art thing, maybe.

A Night at the Kimo

Not the worst five bucks I've ever spent.

Kimos has a reputation as a dive full of shady characters, so bring a friend to keep tabs on you. Besides, you'll enjoy it more if you've got a sidekick.

The upstairs room is low and narrow, the walls painted red and adorned with bills. The bar will give you ice with your free tap water. The doors open at 9, relatively late, but the actual show didn't start until almost an hour after that. The stage was so small that the lights, rather then the edge, seemed to dictate it's real parameters: you stayed out of the band's light, and you stayed out of their space. It takes someone with real guts to enter that sphere, which a friend of mine did: gutsy, but gutsy is what listening to the Ferocious Few makes you, so I didn't blame him.

The Ferocious Few are a two-piece southern-rock/Rockabilly group, getting street-famous for gate-crashing other people's big gigs and poaching several hundred members of the audience for themselves. There's always more then a few converts after a Ferocious onslaught: they were the single best group I saw at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, and they weren't even formally booked there. Even on a formal stage you can see what makes this pair special: they play like every eye has to be won, that they could get kicked out at any moment, and everything depends on playing with everything they've got NOW. Their drummer is a madman with a tiny drumset, a stone-wall pout and a tamborine. The singer has a dark, brooding presense, a southern twang in his voice, and a really loud amp. This is an expression of hope and a kind of faith: at a time when the music industry doesn't know how to make stars anymore, these two won't stop until THEY'RE as big as the people they poach their audiences from. You catch these guys once and you don't forget them. Check them out here. As is often the case with this band, they were the best set of the night.

Rollar Coaster was up next: a three peice consisting of a bassist with a tattooed neck, a lot of sinew, and a back leather leather cap; a drummer with a long John Kerry type chin and a strawberry goatee, and a singer with authentic British vowels, a green military-style jacket, an orange slab of a guitar, and a vendetta against microphones. Really: he threw his to the ground not once but twice. All my friend and I could figure was that that must have been a really good move at some other show, but in the Real World when you throw your microphone to the ground, and your hands are occupied with your guitar, you gotta fumble to get it in position again before you can again sing into it. I can understand mistaking this once I guess, but twice? The rhythem section were pros about it and played right their their frontman's fumbles, so there's no way the song was going to fall appart, but there are quite a few kinks to work out in this live show. They were good musicians, and they've got some catchy tunes with some meaty riffs, and the finale with the twin feedback squeels between the bass and the guitar were pretty classic, but they've got some ways to go before they're a tight rocking unit.

The Revealers are probably big White Stripes fans. I can't think of why I'd say that except their frontman's androgenous bangs, white face and scarlet eye-shadow and all-black garb. He strutted the stage, but sensitively and delicately. He was the first of the night to leave the stage, turn his back to the audience, servay his bandmates and then walk back. A keyboard filled the bass's part and lead vocals were handed off between the guitarist and the keyboardist. It didn't matter though: they have the same sort of pure young-man type voices, and the mix or the mic or the reverb or something was so bad that no one could understand a word of the lyrics no matter what happened. My friend called them bluesy; I say their songs were interchangable and ran one into the next. They were also good musicians, especially for dudes who looked as young as they were (I swear that frontman has BRACES!) but they didn't grab me. They'd be worth a look though.

Three bands for five bucks and none of them stunk. Not bad, not bad at all.

Three Things I love

There are three things I love about this video.

1. Colbert's six lapel pins. That'll show that hippie Jeff Tweedy to try to Out-American HIM!

By the way, if you think it was cool of Wilco to poke fun at one of the more pathetic non-scandal scandals of the election cycle, you are forgetting that Wilco gave away a song for free. That makes them commies. No wonder their favorite candidate is Obama.

2. They brought their Grammy to counter Colbert's Emmy, and just happened to leave it on the piano where everyone could see it. Real subtle. Nice try guys, but he's got a Peabody too. Got an answer for that one?

3. Curse you Nels Cline! The Obama buttons the whole band was wearing so liberally were small enough for the cameras not to catch them, but you just HAD to put that "HOPE" sticker right on your amp, RIGHT where the camera would catch it when you went to work the feedback. Clever, Cline. Very clever. You win this round.

......

Can we have Wilco back on Colbert please? They fit right in.

Burn, Hollywood, Burn

This is why the Music Industry deserves to die.

It screws over it's artists.

It sues it's own customers.

And the music it's currently promoting is crap.

So die faster, Music Biz. Go down in flames please. What we get in the end will be better, I hope.

Current Favorite Myspace Find

If Alice Cooper knocked up Britney Spears in the catacomb mazes under Paris and their child grew up toying with the skeletons and finally ventured out into the world to get her revenge, she'd sound like this.

What a voice. Innocent, haunted, full of ghosts, and delivered with a sneer. I love it. Love it too.

Hall of Shame

This was one crazy election. Just for fun, I'm going to preserve for posterity my favorite bits of election-inspired comedic madness.

Of course there's the classic Tina Fay - Palin skits. The thing about these is that Fay, of all people, was possibly the first to land a solid blow on the public image of the surprise VP pick.

Speaking of Palin, she inspired not one but TWO adorable devotee polkas. And the occational ballad. And whatever this is.

And some of this stuff. Wow there's a lot of them. Did everyone (someone really has a good tonal ear!) and their mom literally make a parody song about this lady?

There are more. I'm not going to find them though.

And her "I can see Russia from my house" comment, Russia can see her right back! Some UK guys sang the best song though.

And singing Hockey Moms.

Ya know what, I've been wrong about Sarah Palin. She's been a gift to world comedy.

Even though this one scared me.

History's Soundtrack

Barack Obama was actually elected. It actually happened.

Motherfucker. Talk about an opportunity for dancing in the streets. Or singing, as the case may be.

Now the biggest question on my mind is:

Who will play the Inaugural?

My hope is Chicago country blues-rockers Wilco.

Come on, I know the Black-Eyed Peas have been stumping for Obama for a while, but Wilco actually asked first.

Come on, I know Jay Z is Obama's favorite, and the Boss himself might be releasing an album to cooincide with the inauguration, but Wilco's got first dibs, right?

I've never in my life been so happy to be American.

UPDATE: THIS has become one of my favorite videos ever. The perfect drumroll and the spontaneous (random?) electric guitar notes that punctuated the announcement, followed by Stipe singing with his whole heart, even though he can't really believe it? It WAS an unbelievable moment. I had snuck into a democratic rally at a hotel in downtown SF, and believe me, we all felt like singing.

Also, everyone in the entire UNIVERSE has been reporting that Beyonce volunteered to play Obama's inaugural. She didn't. What she actually said was that she was ready and willing to volunteer: whether that be singing or some other capacity. Anything that she can do. She's a multi-millionare superstar who could be doing anything in the world she wants to right now, and she's heard the call to civic duty? It boggles the mind.

They say JFK had the uncanny ability to draft people into civil service from all walks of life. Caroline and Edward Kennedy have said Obama reminds them of their lost relative. Are they right?....

Exciting time to be alive, that's for sure.

Dragonforce at the Grand Ballroom, Sutter St.

Dragonforce are loud.

Stunning I know. But they are so loud, so overwhelmingly loud, that the setlist really could have said anything: they weren't songs so much as they were collections of solos, choruses, and thrashing on all parties. I feel for that singer, I really do: he's a tenor of remarkable power and sustain and his belted lyrics might as well have been in Finnish for as much as I could understand them. The volume of his microphone just could not compete with those roaring guitars. He must be used to this though, and devoted most the never-ending solo time to hamming it up for the cameras and dumping water bottles on the crowd. He worked up the croud like an expert and strutted the stage like king of the hill, but no one really came for him. Everyone came for those two guitarists.

And whoa. Those guitarists. They thrash, ok? They thrash hard. Their shtick is to act nonchalant and try and one-up eachother in the solos, and their stage-yawns and casual gestures are endearing but not convincing. They clearly take their thrashing very, very seriously, and virtuosic though they are, damned if they don't start sounding the same after a while. Or maybe that was just my ear drums dying a slow death. This band is all about it's guitarists. Though that keyboard player is a close second for the simple reason that the man is able to play a two-level keyboard AND do high kicks at the same time. That's pretty impressive stuff.

Dragonforce doesn't lend itself well to detailed scrutiny. There were beers with straws in them taped to the mic stands, there was thrashing, there was 3-man synchronized jumping, there were many water-bottles emptied onto heads, there was a mosh-pit half the size of the room, there was a keyboard solo and the bassist grabbing one of the guitars in the interest of proving HE can shred as well as anyone else (he's kind of right), and there was a lot of screaming. Devil-horns were thrown. Photos were snapped. My limbs feel like rubber and my voice is gone. I'm exhausted.

What more can you ask for from a rock show?

Tom Morello at the Fillmore

Pardon my gushing but this show simply rocked. Part acoustic, part electric, ALL FACE MELTING AWESOME!

This review is a challenge from me to me: lets see if I can finish writing it before my ears stop ringing.

The intro act was a tiny black guy with fierce muttonchops. He is a rapper. Not a bling-bling bitches and hoes kind of rapper, an Oakland rapper and his stuff was all political. He also possessed easy, crisp diction, which immediately endears him to ME since I'm of the opinion the mush-mouth "yo, ganstas in da hood yo!" Timbaspeak of most rappers is a shortcut for dudes who can't be bothered to actually find words that rhyme. This guy could definitely rhyme. He played with his voice too: going high and low, almost like singing but not quite.

A recurring theme of the night was "it's the first show of the tour," with all the pros and cons that come with that. The rapper forgot his words a few times, and commented at one point about how he's used to having a whole band backing him up. Instead he had this one blond, If-Kurt-Cobain-Were-A-Biker-Guy acoustic guitarist supplying the "backing beats," a very basic set up, but hey, they made it work. And Boots Reilly has charisma. He reminded me of a cat: all cool, slow grace with sleepy eyes and wild edges. It was good, but I gotta admit, even when it's well done, rap is just not my thing, and while I admire the guy for fearlessly facing a new set up and clearly having buckets of talent, I was ready for the main event by the time his set was done. Too bad we had to wait some more while more people fuddled around with the gear. It seemed to take them forever.

At last, finally... they killed every light in the place. And when the lights came up again, there was that giant Negative Stars and Stripes up there. How it got up there so fast, I've got no clue, but I gotta say, that thing, full-sized, appearing out of nowhere does put a nice chill in the bones. Nice priming for the Nightwatchman's entrance: all in black with that baseball cap casting dark shadows on his face, suspenders hanging at his sides, and huge mirrored aviator sunglasses giving him a menacing kind of anonimity. Like or hate it, the Nightwatchman in full regalia, backed by that spooky flag, IS a pretty imposing image that Morello's kept pretty consistent ever since he began his solo exploits, but it doesn't always blend with Tom's actual, de-sunglassed stage persona: conversational, upbeat, and a full of a kind of crackling energy that might have been optimism. His knack for refering both himself and "the Nightwatchman" in the third person creates a kind of ironic seperation too: sometimes Tom Morello IS the Nightwatchman, and sometimes he's just telling us about his folk-rock creation. I forgive him because the Nightwatchman, real or fake, is an interesting character, and since there's irony anyway in a Stadium-Rock Guitar God like Morello masquarading as a shadowy, underground folk hero, the storytelling/fantasy element works just fine. Both Morellos, the real and the invented, are compelling personalities, and both of them rock pretty damn hard.

Tom seemed to enjoy letting us all know that this was the very FIRST show on the Fabled City tour, how he was originally going to start the tour in LA (cue the boos) but he remembered how much he loved San Francisco (cue the cheers). He remembered how he'd been performing at that very theater back in 2003 when the US first invaded Iraq, and how after the show he'd marched downtown in the anti-war protests. So he's got history with San Francisco, and this was clearly his crowd: both artistically and politically. This was clearly his crowd: if the T-shirts weren't Rage Against the Machine or Audioslave, they were The Nation or Cindy Sheehan for Congress or "Arrest Chaney First." Unlike Cornell, he didn't comment on the sharp smell of weed in the air.

He went through a few songs on his own, then brought out what he called The Freedom Fighter Orchestra, revealing the source of that Kurt Cobain look-alike. He was back and he had this black, old-looking electric, and I remember looking at him and thinking: damn, that's gotta be intimidating, playing electric guitar in a band with Tom Morello in it. The guy was decent through: sounded nice and big and fuzzed out and was in fact the ONLY electric guitar on the couple songs before Tom put down "Whatever it Takes"...... and picked up his infamous customized electric "Arm the Homeless."

"Well well, what have we here?" he said. And the crowd went crazy.

And that was the meat of the show. Plugged-in versions of songs off the first Nightwatchman record like "One Man Revolution," newer songs like "Whatever it Takes," a harrowing cover of the Ghost of Tom Joad, and even the heart-stopping into to "Bulls on Parade," which almost turned the crowd into a giant mosh-pit right then and there. It was a night big on emotional highs and lows: one minute you're leaping around, pumping your fist in time to thunderous electric rock and the next minute everyone's dead silent, listening to Tom strum quietly and sing without his mic. There was even a surprising RATM cover "Geurilla Radio" which, acoustic and sung in Tom's thoughtful, gravelly barratone, acquired a fascinatingly different kind of weight. The scratching solos were classic Morello, there were at least five mid-air splits, and he brought the house lights up so that he could watch us all sing (and jump) along to "This Land is Your Land." He told an awkward story about some 5-year old's mother asking him if they made stuffed animals of him, for her kid. He put down a guitar entirely for the verses of one particular song and it's odd seeing him onstage without one: he clung to the microphone with what looked like white-knuckles. The new stuff still had the edge of experimentation, and none of it was boring.

But it was also, again, their first show of the tour. Hell, the Freedom Fighter Orchestra uniform shirts still had their sharp fold-lines, and there were a few technical difficulties. I pity that poor unknown, hardworking guitar tech: every two minutes or so it seemed he had to rush out from the wings and tweak something or other. Tom broke a harmonica holder and needed to duck out of a song's chorus entirely to grab his back up. Something was wrong with Arm the Homeless in the middle of a song and THAT had to be fixed. All members of the band save the drummer gestured at the sound guy at some point with problems with the mix, and the band were jostling with each other onstage over who was supposed to go where... It's a testament to Morello and his band's stagecraft that he didn't let any of these shinanagans took you out of the moment for too long. After all, this is the first show, and clearly some edges are going to need ironing before they're a tight rocking unit. Didn't stop the show from being throughly enjoyable.

It was a long show. I won't lie, I was exhausted by the time it was over. But goddamn, if it wasn't great fun. It ended two hours ago, and finally the adrenaline is wearing off.

Si Ce Puede. Viva le Nightwatchman!

Rage in Vain

This fucking broke my heart.

Using their music this way? Them, of all bands? All I can say is the people in charge of Gitmo don't get irony.

For the record: torture is an absolute evil and by engaging in it, USA has relinquished any claim they had to the moral high ground.

And James Hatfield, you're an asshole.

For more information on music as torture, check out the list that "broke" this story here (playlist here), and this very well thought out Guardian article about it here.

P.S I know this news is over a month old, making it obsolete in blogger terms. Too bad. I'm still upset about it so deal.

Edit: better article about it here. Good ol' brits doing our job for us.

Politics and Music

It's a fundamental fact: music is great when the government sucks.

In that vein, I'll miss W. I'll miss how he became a barometer for an artist's progressive integrity. I'll miss how he rejuvenated flagging careers. I'll miss how he made art relevant as the frustrated and horrified found their voices.

If McCain pulls off the upset he's been promising, then things will stay the same. A President Obama wouldn't inspire nearly the same kind of eloquent, powerful venom.

So everyone stock up on your protest songs now, before they become dated.

This whole blog point basically stolen from here. Read it, know it.