The Mathletes

Saturday night had some pretty decent options.  Bummerfest looked like a hoot but I ended up deciding to go to Fitz for the Mathletes album release just because, as it should be apparent from my two-part interview last week with Joe Mathlete, I’m pretty enamoured by the new album, Excalibur.  I got there pretty early just after the doors opened and found these two guys in the back…

Preparing for a second night at Fitz!

I was sitting back, talking with a few people about stuff like how B L A C K I EE’s amp caught fire at Friday night’s show and these two dudes just sat there with their head on that table for at least 30 minutes.  When they walked by I said, “Man, you dudes don’t look to good.”

“Oh, uhhh.  It’s our second night at Fitz.  We were here last night.”

AWESOME!  Now that is dedication! 

FISHBOY

Round 1 - Fishboy Vs. Kanye West. Kanye, a no show.

Can your keyboardist do THIS?

First up was Denton’s Fishboy.  Fun, quirky indie pop with a vocalist who sings with this nerdy nasally voice.  The thing that stunned me is how, despite the fun upbeat songs, nobody was dancing.  That’s OK, the keyboardist made up for everyones chill.  Someone called them, in a complimentary tone, Joe Mathlete Junior.  I think that is a pretty apt comparison given the songs about robots and goofy stuff like that, plus the bassist liked like the son of Alan Moore and Jaron Lanier which is a pretty awesome look.  The band’s set, being billed at Fishboy VS. Kanye West,  also had the best running joke of the evening:

“ Ladies and Gentlemen, Kanye West.  Ummm, Kanye West….where’s Kanye?”

“Oh he said he’s running late.”

Of course Kanye never showed and his spokespeople never replied to our request for an explanation.  I think we know who won that showdown.

WHIT STRIPS

Jack Vs. Meg... errr Chris Cascio VS Hearts of Animals (Mlee Marie)

OK it was more Chris vs his effects, vs his cables, vs the microphone....

The Whit Strips (the Chris Cascio & Mlee Marie White Stripes cover band) was billed as a Chris Cascio Vs. Hearts of Animals but it was more Chris Cascio vs. the world.  The set was pretty awesome ( I mean c’mon it’s a whole set of awesome White Stripes tunes) and Mlee’s drums sounded like John Bonham heavy (kudos to the sound lady on emphasizing the kick drum) but the show was dominated by Chris’s bratty stage persona.  Watch as Chris gets flustered with his cables.  Oh my god, is that Mic stand too loose?  What will he do?  Why is the world against him?  Marvel as Mlee keeps a steady beat to try to get Chris back on track.  It’s pretty bratty stuff that I find hilarious.  Some small little detail that nobody would else even care about and Chris just goes into his best early career Nicholas Cage freak out.  I know this was just a small part of the entire set but all I am saying someone should collect these and release a compilation of Chris stage freaks out and contact Ecstatic Peace to release it.  It would be awesome like that Venom 7″ they put out years ago with all the stage banter of “YOU GUYS ARE WILD! WIIIILD!!!” except it would be two sides of all “UGH!”, “STUPID CABLES!”, ”GAAAAAHHHH!’, and the like. Just sayin’.

 WIGGINS VS. B L A C K I E

I will defeat you B L A C K I E

Wiggins, I will fuck your shit up!

Foolish B L A C K I E, I have Giant Princess under my control! Colin Dispose of him!

NOOOO!!!!!

B L A C K I E is free! Rise my friends! Defeat the Wiggins!

You won this round B L A C K I E, but I'll be back! Bwahaha!

OK, maybe it didn’t go down like that but it was a pretty awesome Vs. set with Wiggin’s fucked up crazy indie pop vs. the balls-out aggression of B L A C K I E.  At one point I said, “Man, can’t Michael show some mercy to John and just take it down a notch.  It just doesn’t feel fair.”

“I’ve known him since the third grade; he can never take anything down a notch but I think John can hold his own.”

 Tru dat and sure enough John did.  In fact the juxtaposition of the two sets perfectly complimented each other with this push of B L A C K I E and the pull of the Wiggins going back and forth, giving each a dynamic that neither would normally have alone.  Winner of this round, the audience.

GIANT PRINCESS VS. BABYSHOWERS

Giant Princess - never has there been a truer slacker band

Babyshowers of awesome indie rock.

Giant Princess seconds before they exploded on stage.

Babyshower/Woozy Helmet's Jay Crossley - too much man for just one band.

The next Vs. was pretty awesome.  Giant Princess was in fine form and and Jay Crossley’s newest project Babyshowers was rip-roarin good. Unfortunately, it was here that I realized that I had the wrong (smaller) SD card in my camera and I was maxed out on pics.  So I spent most of this set, deleting pictures to make space on the card and then, trying to figure out where I misplaced my phone.  

HE THAT WILL NOT BE NAMED

KTRU to the Rescue!!!!

Wasting the Giant Princess/Babyshowers set with my camera and my phone issues was made even more lame because the next set was….well let’s just not name names and say that it was obviously something that was going for the “so bad, it’s great” aesthetic but just stayed in the bad and never changed course for the entire set.    It was one of those sets where you felt you were “on the clock” as a music writer.  At one point, though, I realized it wasn’t going to get any better – it was just going to be bad, and stay bad.  It was the kind of bad that is so bad that it hurts your feelings.  It’s the kind of bad that makes you count every second of your life being stolen.  If you could imagine Hell’s worst community theatre troupe, they would be entirely watchable in comparison to this.  It’s the kind of bad that leaves you like a deer int he headlights until you remember you have the free will to just walk away from it all and escape to the KTRU DJ’s upstairs.   Thank you KTRU!

THE MATHLETES

Joe Mathlete getting all rock and roll!

Sheri Jennings, Joe Mathletes newest Mathletic foil.

It's not a Mathletes show without a gaggle of people on stage.

Goodnight Mathletes, you done good.

The Mathletes closed out pretty damn well. Playing as a four piece for half and an expanded six-piece for the second half, the band tore through material from the new album as well as older material.  Old songs like Pinnochiobot were a gas to hear and the band played it like they were on fire but I have to admit, I always think that song benefitted best from the crazy Mathletes “orchestra” days; back when Joe had a full on horn section to really drive that riff home.  Yet, I found myself driving home humming “Da    DaDa   DaDaDaDaDa   Da   Dee  Da” so don’t take that as anything more than a minor quibble.  Kudos to Joe’s newest female foil, Sheri Jennings, who’s keyboards and vocals really were a perfect compliment to Joe’s.  Also, Mlee Marie’s contributions on vocals (the excellent “I’ll be your shoe”), keyboards, sax, and guitar couldn’t be ignored.  I’ve always liked the fact that Joe has always been smart enough to have strong women musicians in the Mathletes and generous enough to not hog the spotlight.  That is way cool in my book.  The set closed with my favorite of the album, “Elephants and Hummingbirds” and with its upbeat melody, heartfelt lyrics, and the band at full force, it was a great way to end the evening.  Well done Mathletes.  Well done Joe.

(You can see more pictures from the show here.)

Joe Mathlete

Yesterday, Joe Mathlete took us through Side 1 of the new Mathletes album Excalibur (Link to Part 1). Today we conclude as he takes us through side 2.

FPH –OK, so I’m Your Shoe.  This, Elephants, and Culture, are my three favorite songs on the record.  I love Mlee’s guitar tone too.

Joe – That’s me.

FPH – Wow, you stole the Hearts of Animals guitar tone?

Joe – (shrugs and smiles) Yeah. No amp; just a guitar into a fuzz pedal then straight into the input. Mlee and Chris [Cascio] used to live above me; we and a few other people used to do this thing, ICS… I forget what it stands for, there are groups like it all over the country but basically we’d get together every week or two and show each other recordings we’d made. This was an instrumental I wrote for that, to give to someone else to do vocals on… I didn’t think it’d end up being a Mathletes song but Mlee’s been in the band on and off for awhile and I loved what she did. I did the same thing, added vocals to one of her instrumentals, and it became the Hearts of Animals song “Versus.” So that’s how I joined Hearts of Animals.

Maybe it’s because I co-wrote it with someone else but this may be my favorite song on the album. Just a nice, sweet love song. There’s a decent amount of weirdness and frustration on the album but things can be simple and lovely too. Mlee’s voice is incredible, her and Jenny’s songs make a good case that I shouldn’t be the vocalist in my band.

FPH – Iowa

Excalibur

Joe – Yeah, weirdness and frustration. This began life on my four-track as kind of a folk song thing, and somewhere along the line it turned into this odd beepy thing. In a world where I had 36 hours in a day and better recording equipment and software I’d love to produce a Fat Tony album or something but I don’t know. Everything I recorded was on Fruityloops 3.56 and CoolEdit / Adobe Audition. I’ve been using the same software for about a decade now. Also one microphone. That’s why most of the drums sound like that.

It’s a song about communication. I don’t want to… I was about to say I don’t want to over-explain it, which I guess would suit a song about communication… But I have a hard time relating to people most of the time, and when it comes to relationships I feel like a robot, or somebody who doesn’t speak the language, trying to … Just waiting for one of us to get frustrated and walk away, no matter how much love or… whatever there is.

I misunderstood the first line of a Vic Chesnutt song and took it from there… his was about a dog on a trampoline. I mean, I thought it was. I don’t remember.

FPH – Reasonable

This is a very Houston breakup song. Pretty brief sorta interlude-y thing between the two beepy songs. I like schizophrenic albums where every song sounds different, the Wowie Zowies and White Albums… So here’s the Blackbird, or the… We Dance, I guess. Probably more direct than a lot of the other songs, lyrically. “We’re done but we’re not children. We don’t need to be friends but let’s not be enemies.”

FPH – What makes this a “very Houston” song, specifically? I don’t hear that so much…

Joe – Oh… Well, it’s more just a breakup song for any small town. Houston’s a big city but a lot of the time it seems like a small town to me. “You know I’m gonna see you again, and I know you’re gonna see me again…” Nothing’s ever over when you keep running into the same people and the same stories and the same history over and over again. Not a bad thing necessarily, just something to be aware of. Also I tried to make it sound like August: hazy and thick and humid. But thankfully a lot shorter.

FPH – Hopscotch

Joe - This one’s an old, old, old old old song… It tells a little story I guess. I have little movies for all these songs in my head, but this one’s the most vivid probably. There’s a guy and a girl at a party, everybody’s dressed really fancy and the girl’s drunk and spilling wine and talking about all the guys who want to fuck her, and the guy’s just looking straight ahead and gritting his teeth and not saying anything. There’s a lot of dancing. I make a lot of movies in my head every day, and there’s usually a lot of dancing.

There’s a point I think a lot of people have to face in their lives, like an exact instant where you realize the person you’re in love with and thought maybe you’d be with forever, like a soul mate or whatever for people who believe in that kind of love… There’s a point where you realize that person is just a person. And maybe you don’t know what you’ve been doing. But for awhile you’ve still got to process that, so you kind of limp along until… You know what, I guess maybe this is a breakup album.

FPH – OK and the last song on the album, Wish Right Thru U

Joe – This is my Prince homage… Mostly just in the title, misspelling things. Prince is the patron saint of home recorders… I don’t know as much of his stuff as I ought to, I only have a couple records, but anybody who records music on their own should have a picture of Prince hung over their four track or computer or whatever.

I have a lot of unrequited love songs, this is one of those. You can wish at somebody as hard as you like but if you don’t do anything about it… Wishes don’t do shit, you know? And the more you run things over in your head the more they crumble and disintegrate into this shitty, sad, confused mush. This started out as a strummy folk song but i remade it as what I imagine chillwave might sound like.

FPH – Well, it’s a great album.  You should be pretty proud of it.

Joe – I don’t think this is an album most people would be into; that’s why we didn’t make many copies. It’s clumsy and scattered and if you’re not already into sort of navel-gazing bedroom pop you might never be. But I wanted to make a record I would’ve loved, something to explore and listen to on headphones and mythologize and stare at the artwork and make me want to make my own music and all that. I met a bit of resistance at first from people who wondered about the song selection, why I wasn’t including more of “the hits” or whatever, but I’m proud of this album. And I’m excited about the next one. I’m always excited about the next one.

Fin.

Saturday, August 13 – The Mathletes vs. Houston Record Release Show, featuring The Mathletes, Giant Princess vs. Babyshowers, B L A C K I E vs. The Wiggins, Keith Reynolds vs. The Sparkle Ponies, Hearts of Animals vs. Christopher Cascio, & Fishboy @ Fitzgerald’s

Good morning folks, I’ve gotta get packing for just got into Austin but I figured I’d let y’all know how the Deer Tick show went last night over at Rudyard’s. Yes, I know I missed Jana Hunter and Beach House over at The Orange show but hey, I’ll be seeing Jana with Tara Jane O’Neil at Domy Books on Friday so we’ll catch up on our beloved miss Hunter then.

Anyhow, let me jump to the penultimate band of the evening – Oklahoma City’s Stardeath And White Dwarfs. I want you to take a good look at these photographs…

…and I know what you are thinking. This looks pretty bad-ass. And you are right in that they had a spectacular light show. The set up was amazing with multi-colored lights flashing to the music under a haze of fog. There was only one problem – that’s all they brought with them. Let’s break it down. The light show was spectacular but their performance and songs were neither here nor there. And this problem was evident from the start. Their choice of opener – a note for note cover of the Butthole Surfers Sweat Loaf. That’s right this band starts off with a cover of the Butthole Surfers covering Black Sabbath complete with the piped in intro. Hey, I can hear that album at home guys! NEXT! The second song was actually OK but from there it was downhill: an entire set of cool lights and no content. I mean look, I caught Hearts of Animals play the Mink on Monday night – just one woman with a guitar and a voice – and she blew these clowns away. OH wait, she bothered to write songs! Oh wait, she actually has talent! Oh wait, she doesn’t need to hide behind a wall of lights to hold people’s attention! It’s like the juxtaposition of Celine Dione and Elliot Smith at the Oscars: one, a hollow artifice hiding behind flash and glitz and , the other, a lone individual doing nothing more than simply saying what they need to say without ornament or frills – where the work speaks for itself. Take your pick but I’ll take Hearts over Stardeath anytime, thank you.

The evening closed with Deer Tick which was really my reason for going because Deer Tick’s John McCauley is also one to lay his soul bare through his music. If you saw him a long while back at Sound Exchange perform sitting on the floor with only his voice and his guitar you saw a phenomenal performance – one that left everyone in the room in awe. That night McCauley demanded your attention both because of his beautifully crafted songs as well as the pure unrestrained emotion. So having seen him perform that show, last year’s SXSW, and my endless admiration for his debut on Feow records a few years ago, I had some pretty high expectations. Unfortunately, to my disappointment this performance, while fair, lacked any of the spark an immediacy of his prior performances. It was almost as if the band was going through the motions performing few new songs and losing any momentum with a flat rendition of a Lightning Hopkins song that seemed endless. That may sound harsh and likely makes it sound worse than it was. I mean, I had a fine time and I can’t say it was a terrible performance but it just was a long way from that young kid belting his soul out on the Sound Exchange floor.

OK! Time to hit the streets of our capital. See y’all soon.

More Pics on my Flickr (Link)

Links:
A few more pics over at my flickr (link)

Sleeping In The Aviary on Myspace (link)
Dizzy Pilot on Myspace (Link)
Hearts of Animals on Myspace (Link)

You know I’ve been anticipating this when my reaction to seeing this in my hands is to literally jump in the air and say “WOW!” then proceed to drop it in my I-tunes and put it on an infinite loop. On the quick here, there are lots of great instrumentals like the spacey where’s-my-bong of The Next Day, the lovely sax harmonies of the unlisted final song, or the cheeky retro 80’s dance floor of Pillow Fight but, for my money, it’s the songs that are like manna from heaven. Suprean’s gift for melody, phrasing, and lyrics are all here. Drain Me (easily the highlight for me) is HOA at her lyrical best – wrenching stop the world on its axis stuff – and, without giving anything away, the way the song ends is nothing short of brilliant. Sister Stories has a sweet chorus that is nothing short of intoxicating. The pretty and melancholy Sad Dancing sounds like the sad counter part to ABBA. Sit Right Here shares themes of longing and anxiety that were a hallmark of best of the songs from Lemming Baby. The biggest curve ball is a guest vocal by Joe Mathlete on Versus which sounds like Suprean and Mathlete doing some fucked-up version Berlin era Bowie. But yadda yadda yadda, I need to get back to editing these photos for tomorrow’s Jameson & Lonestar but I just had to share my excitement. Woo!

Well a few things to report this weekend.

First off, it was announced today the classic post-punk band The Mydolls will be playing Noise and Smoke II on November 15th. Awesomeness!

In other news Born Liars have a fan in Little Steven who has played the band quite a bit on his Underground Garage radio show. Bill Fool’s a bit matter of fact about it all saying ” We have been played a bunch on the Underground Garage station and last week Little Steven’s assistant e-mailed me saying Little Steven loves us and wants everything we have to play it on the national show.” Neat that this band is getting some well deserved national recognition.

Speaking of Born Liars. Ditchwater zine is expanding into the realm of 7″s in the form of Ditchwater Records and the inaugural release (which has been sent off to the pressing plant) will be by Born Liars. If that isn’t cool enough the second release will be a reissue of the classic lost Gay Marriage EP (previously unreleased except via a few CDRs) with additional tracks. If you aren’t familiar with Gay Marriage here is a review I did of their EP a few years back (Link). Look for the band possibly reuniting for the record release towards the end of the year. That logo was created by none other than the great Daniel Shaw.

Artstorm is also getting into the music release game and it seems that Hearts of Animals is finally looking to release some new material on Artstorm Records. In addition to HOA, the label has plans for other releases including music from Ironic Bong.

Artstorm is located within Caroline Collective which will be the location of a music conference of sorts called BandCamp (Link) later this year. Ian Wells of the KTRU Local Show/ Revelry Report contacted me about it:

“Matt Wettergreen, Phillip Beck (also from KTRU, great guy), and myself are organizing an event at Caroline Collective in late October, called Band Camp. Essentially, we’d like to get everyone in Houston who makes music together at Caroline and have a day-long “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Making Music but were too Afraid to Ask” collaborative session/hang-out/bbq/whatever.”

Well here it is, Monday, and not only did I survive the Hootenanny (link) but I also survived the Houston Press Music Awards. Having these two things back to back, admittedly, is pretty rough. So Sunday, being a bit worse for wear, I stayed away from the free booze and stuck to the vitamin water. One thing I have to say about the HPMAs this year is that the venues seemed farther apart than in previous years. Whereas last year you could step out of the Rice Hotel and immediately walk across to see say Insect Warfare, this year you had to walk a few blocks to get between venues. That may not seem like a lot but, if you try to navigate at 8PM between say The Poor Dumb Bastards at Rocbar then run over to see Hearts of Animals at NOTSUOH then run down to see Buxton at Butterfly High, that’s quite a little run and you can forget catching any more than two songs per band. So, I wonder what’s at play here. Did a lot of the venues on Main close or did many of them just not want any of the riff-raff that attended last year? I don’t know. The second thing that I didn’t see as much of was the hustle and bustle of music fans on Main that I saw in previous HPMAs. Was it the heat, the distances between venues, or something else that made the streets seem relatively barren this year? Again, I’m not sure. Nevertheless, these issues aside, it was still a good time for all performers and attendees so why worry.

Me? I arrived in time to see The Wild Moccasins who somehow still had a ton of energy even after their Hootenanny set. What I love about the Wild Moccasins is that they just put it all out there – they go for it with every beat and note – and it makes for electrifying and fun shows. This show was no different- tops! 7 O’clock hour was a nutters triple shot dash. Over at Venue, The Tontons sounded simply massive. Kudos to the venue with it’s weird over the top stage and sound and the Tontons wore it well by completely commanding the stage. The Born Liars over at Butterfly High are somewhat analogous to The Wild Moccasins’ in terms of energy except that while the Moccasins have a fresh youthful energy, the Born Liars have the energy of drunken sailors who are on shore leave and don’t give a fuck who gets in the way. Then you’ve got The Wiggins (at Deans) whose personae is akin to that black sheep weirdo cool uncle in the family whom the older family members wince at in disdain publicly but secretly envy. One woman at the bar, who clearly didn’t know what to make of it, had the best fish out of water look of confuddlement I’d ever seen. Awesome!

The 8 O’clock hour was the afore mentioned race. Now, the reason I went out of my way to Rocbar was because of the Brian’s Johnston story. To paraphrase, Brian’s Johnson played Rocbar just after Whorehound. Toward the end of the set, the band played “Have a Drink on Me” and made a joke about free drinks at the bar. Then Jeff said “This is the first gay bar we’ve ever played – the Cockbar.” Well that didn’t endear them to the venue and the band was told “That’s it, you’re done!” Some person saying that they were the GM, expressing his displeasure at being called the Cockbar and a gay bar, told them that they were probably disqualified while big gorilla bouncers got in the bands’ face. No amount of “Hey, it’s a joke!” would suffice and the band was forced to leave via the back exit. Naturally, when some place called the Rocbar – whose idea of rock and roll is (well to borrow from a review in the Houston Press) as rebellious as Applebee’s – gets their panties in a wad it’s asking to get fucked with. And perhaps smelling blood in the water Byron of the Poor Dumb Bastards said “Ohhhh! Game On!” upon hearing the story! So, of course, we were hoping that Byron would pull this year’s Insect Warfare show and give this bourge venue a show they wouldn’t forget. As Steven Garcia put it, “If they don’t get shut down in five minutes, I’m gonna be so disappointed.” Of course, this raised the bar and while the Bastards did put on the punk rock side show we’ve all come to expect – which is always great – it never reached the level of challenging the Rocbar’s management and staff. Total psych out!

From there it was a quick run to Notsuoh to see Hearts of Animals (Thanks Dan Castillo for the suggested short cut through the car park). I only caught two songs but it was exactly what you’d expect from Mlee – the distorted guitar, the loud beats, and the nuanced vocals. In other words, worth the run that left me dripping in sweat. But from there it was off to see Buxton over at Butterfly High whose musicianship and emotive vocals are always a joy. One of the high points for me was when Sergio Trevino suddenly said, “Hey, here’s a little song about Transformers.” and then proceeded to sing this hilarious and sweet song about how much cooler the world would be if were were all Transformers. It had this off-the-cuff Daniel Johnson kind of innocence and, while obviously done with a sense of humor, it never stopped to the level of being smug or smarmy. Later Trevino told me (seeming somewhat embarrassed) “I wasn’t sure if that was going to work or not.” to which I replied, “It’s a song about Transformers! How could it not!” It’s always fun to see a band (especially one as impressive as Buxton) not worry about being the cool kid on the block and let their goofy side out. Probably my favorite small moment of the night.

Finally, the 9 O’clock hour came on and I was going to go for 4 bands in one hour. This started with Sharks and Sailors at Notsuoh which was, for me, hilarious. See, I kept wanting to leave but they would play another song that would leave me shouting “Gawdamnmit! Now I have to stay!” So one song turned to two, which turned to three and, by the third one, I knew to leave before the first note rang of the fourth one. Phil, Mike and Melissa are just unrivaled as a powerhouse and…well, you can read my description of a show at Rudyards in this August’s issue and you’ll get the idea. From there, it was off to see Bring Back the Guns next door at Dean’s but the door was a too crowded to make out much. Still, the band seemed to be doing what they do best – spazzing out. Well, Matt Brownlie was spazzing out. That’s not a put-down, that’s a compliment as, when Matt Brownlie spazzes, it’s high art. From there, it was off to see the Young Mammals which probably had the biggest crowd I’d seen all night. It was pretty hard to get up front but I eventually snaked my way up to see Iram playing like the brilliant drummer he is. I’m not sure if this or the upcoming Saturday Secret Show Fest is going to be his last show but I cannot stress enough how great a drummer he is and how the Mammals are a world class act. Again, most of Houston ignores bands like this while some writers complain about the state of the scene. To all you who will have missed the Young Mammals with Iram, all I can say “You missed out!” and you will get no sympathy from me. Go pay for your $8 beer for some big label crap at the Woodlands – you deserve it.

In that light, the night for me closed with the oddest pairing of the showcase – Indian Jewelry at the Hard Rock Cafe. You could just smell the incongruity of the band and the venue. Sitting eating their hamburgers were couples and families who seemed oblivious to the fact that Indian Jewelry was there playing a strobed-out set of brilliance. It was as if on stage stood a portal between two parallel universes – one strobed and noisy and the other milquetoast and orderly. I couldn’t imagine a more perfect analogy to Houston’s indifference to the amazing music that grows in its own backyard. Perfect!

(Thank you Chris Gray and the Houston press for the passes. Very Much Appreciated.)

And now, photos (more on my Flickr)

The Wild Moccasins still alive after Hootenanny!
“…And so the bouncer gets in our face like this!”
Trevi Biles of Whorehound gives his
account of Brian’s Johnson vs. The Rocbar.

The massive stage couldn’t
dwarf the Tontons’ talent.

The Born Liars – making sure that
Rock and Roll never gets respectable.

Death to poser humorless bars.
Jeff of Brian’s Johnston may have lost
the battle at the Rocbar but he left
with the best story of the evening.

Hearts of Animals
Can I have a more jarring juxtaposition of images?

Fuck yeah, Buxton!
You fly that Transformers flag with pride!

Sharks and Sailors -
Try to leave during one of their sets. I dare you!

Bring Back the Guns -
Ben Murphy (left) ponders
the awesomeness of Matt Brownlie’s ass shakin’!
Indian Jewelry playing in a parallel world
while the Hard Rock Cafe goes
about it’s business unawares.

Well, that’s quite the news to get in the afternoon. Hands Up Houston announced that Frightened Rabbit had canceled their performance due to their van breaking down. That was a shame as I really love this Scottish band’s droll and energetic Sing The Grays album and it sounded like they might translate pretty well live and possibly give the Dimes a run for their money. The upside though was that the always solid Hearts of Animals was called-in to pinch-hit at the last minute – you couldn’t have ask for a better resolution.

Now, I don’t know about you but when I drove up I was immediately overwhelmed by a swarm of headlights ahead of me and behind me! I thought, “What the fuck is with the traffic on Washington Avenue?” Then, when I turned the corner, I saw the unspeakable. A sight as frightening and improbable as turning that same corner and seeing Big Foot and Fulad-zereh fucking on the street while Abraham Lincoln stood watching and smoking a fattie. There, running back towards Washington Avenue with slicked hair and a pristine white shirt, was a valet! Yes, you got that – a fucking valet on Washington Avenue! I then rounded the block and it turned out everyone was just as confused as I because the carpark in front of Walters had open spots. Incredible! Then as I got out of my car some dude on his cellphone asked, “Is this valet parking here?” Somehow, between thinking “Are you fucking with me?!!” and “If you have to ask…”, I mustered a cranky “If you’re looking for valet parking you want douche-central across the street.” I’m sure the bouge motherfuckers who constantly harass Walters with noise complaints are more than happy with the new desirable clientèle at the Pearl but, for the rest of us, all we can do is shake our heads and think poor poor Washington Avenue.

Thankfully, inside the doors, Hearts of Animals had already taken the stage. Over the PA, beats and backing tracks from Mlee’s Powerbook pumped while her guitar layered lovely finger-picked notes above them and suddenly the gentrification convention outside didn’t matter anymore. The familiar melodies of her older songs (as well as that new one that I love with Cley of the Young Mammals) are always welcome sounds and the performance was exactly what you’d expect – inspiring. The excited voices of some new-to-HOA women standing in line to the bathroom seemed to confirm that summation. The Superunison folks couldn’t have been smarter in picking her to fill-in.

The Dimes followed and after a few “Let’s go team!” hand slapping they proceeded to slash and hack through their set in that fashion we’re so used to seeing and likely take for granted here in Houston. It’s the Dimes: Iram pounding the drums while stealing the spotlight from behind the kit with his charming impish performance, Cley dancing with his guitar in a manner suggesting he’d do a good job of wrestling a giant rubber snake in some crazy B movie, and Carlos (all smiles) leading the charge with his voice while his rhythm guitar, along with Jose’s bass, keep it all from sprawling into chaos. They are a world-class live band and the new songs just show great and unique they are as a band. This is one Houston band that – high gas prices or not – needs to get on the road, take it to the people, and show them how it’s done.

Closing it all was Brooklyn’s French Kicks. The performance was sharp, the sound was crisp, and the harmonies and instrumentation were gorgeous. And while some songs are wonderful and will make you break-out in an uncontrolled admiring smile, the simple fact remains that the French Kicks are a very good band. I have been spinning their new album and enjoying some of its songs quite a bit but, here is the rub, both the Young Mammals and Hearts of Animals are better and more consistent songwriters and, when it comes to a live show, the electrifying Young Mammals energy is unbeatable. The latter may not be particularly fair to French Kicks given what they do but, honestly, as their performance continued, I did get that “OK got it!” feeling by the last third. God, that sounds awful because it makes them sound as if they were bad but they weren’t; the bar had simply been raised so high that even a band of their talents simply couldn’t overshadow what had preceded. But that was just me as everyone else in the packed crowd clearly loved it from the first note to the last. So, ne vous inquiétez pas French Kicks – it’s not about who doesn’t salute, it’s about who does.

The Young Mammals
Breakin’ out in a Cold Sweat The French Kicks

Links:
Frightened Rabbit (Link)
Hearts of Animals (Link)
Young Mammals (Link)
French Kicks (Link)

More pictures on my Flickr (Link)

Yes Houston Indie kids, this week we will discuss your lack of Metal worthiness but first let’s have a recap of this weekend’s shows eh?

Friday Evening

Ahhhh, did you smell that too? The animal may have been an unrecognizable blob of fur but the smell was not – that was the smell of fresh roadkill. So, as I walked my way over to the Orange Show, I kissed away any appetite I might have had earlier. Mercifully, I wasn’t really coming down for the loose meat sandwiches or even the fabulous art cars for that matter (don’t get me wrong the art cars were a hoot especially the one that shot the flames 30 yards into the air) but I was here for the music – the cool evening and the art cars were simply a bonus.

Hearts of Animals opened with an excellent set – no surprise there. I hadn’t heard these songs live since the Casiotone show so Friday it was as welcome as the cool breeze blowing that evening. The big kick was hearing that new song that Mlee performed two shows ago enhanced by Cley Miller’s guitar work. The song had previously used that Trio Da Da Da Casio beat but this night Cley took Mlee’s pre-written parts and added his unique style that gave the song this additional level of interplay and warmth that wasn’t there in the previous performance. Cley may not be a shredder but he has a feel for the instrument that is enviable. His contribution here was a testament to that and a great compliment to Mlee’s skills as a writer.

Young Mammals followed with their first set since the Block Party and the band was at its most playful and energetic. They ripped through familiar songs with all the verve you’d expect then, out of nowhere, they threw in two new songs. Both songs were great but the first had an added treat – Mlee Suprean guesting on guitar and lead vocals. The song was great and it was funny how well Mlee and YM meshed. While the music was clearly classic YM, the vocal melody was all Mlee which only highlighted how gifted she is with pulling melodies out of the air. I couldn’t make out her lyrics but it didn’t matter, her voice and phrasing are always a kick. To hear her writing new material is always thrilling and collaborating with YM shows just how nimble she can be. The other new song was also a blast with Iram leading the charge. If a band is defined by their drummer then Iram certainly sets the tone for the band with a scrappy playfulness that is irresistible. At one point, Carlos leaned over to Iram to say something along the lines of “This feels weird.” Iram smiled, leaned over, touched the tip of his drumstick to Carlo’s teeth, gave him a quick flick, and laughed. That jovial gesture pretty much summed up their set.

Wicked Poseur closed the evening and their set also delivered in spades. Arthur Bates was in fine form; he’s the sweetest drunken smart-ass you’ll ever meet. Earlier in the evening, Arthur was rambling and riffing on anything and everything and during the set he was no different causing Chris Cascio to start begging Arthur to “Just Play!” even as he was laughing. All Tom foolery aside, the songs and the two guitar attack was a blast. Earlier this month, Ben Murphy made a point about solid state amps and how tubes may get all the love but anyone with a good ear who knows how to put it to good use can make any amp sing. Even as a devoted fan of tubes, I had to concede his point; he not only won the discussion, he won it decisively. As if to rub my nose in it, Chris, with my most reviled solid state amp (a freaking Peavy), was ripping it up with sounds that couldn’t have been more perfect for the material. It’s funny but for all the electronic aspects of Wicked Poseur, the guitar work is what makes it rip like Led Zeppelin doing Can. Arthur’ vocals were at their brattiest while Chris’ danced, swayed, and moved like his life depended on it. Great band, great songs, and a great performance – pretty par for the evening.

Saturday Night
The Jonx, Golden Axe, & Awake
at The Mink Backroom
I have to apologize for missing Awake. Last time I saw them, they played an inspiring set. I wish I could say that I had a damn good reason for shirking my journalistic duties but the truth of the matter is I was drinking whiskey and chilling at a friend’s house and time just kind of got away from me. Chris Gray would later comment that I seemed in good spirits. Yeah, after three glasses of whiskey, I’d better be!

When I arrived, Golden Axe had just started and the crowd was eating it up…well eating it up in the way Houston Indie rock kids do. If you were looking for heavy metal parking lot – this wasn’t that crowd. [See epilogue for a fuller discussion of what I mean.] But all teasing the crowd aside, my favorite thing about Golden Axe is how they take something that is so riddled with clinches and make it work. If you don’t think Metal is capable of intelligence and wit, you clearly have never heard Golden Axe. There is no other band in Houston that can make me laugh out loud without uttering a word. Warren Hatfield and James Love make Metal that’s droll without a hint of a nudge nudge or a wink wink – theirs is a metal guitar led assault that makes no apologies. I grew up with so many amazing metal guitarists who could run circles around most mortals but their Achilles heel was that their compositional skills were never on the same level. Warren has such a sharp sense of composition atop of his fretwork skills that it should make people like Yngwie Malmsteen and their followers hand their heads in shame. Long live the The Axe!

The Jonx closed the night and reminded me just how wonderful a trio they are. The trio plays music like a drunken mathematician raving about a favorite theorem. Yet, for all its mathrock qualities, the Jonx music is never cold – it drips with feeling. Stuart Smith’s guitar is as capable of crunching out dissonance as it is capable of throwing out a lovely melody, Trey Levigne’s bass work is always aggressive and muscular, while Danny Mee’s drumming is ever nimble and powerful. Together they interact in the same manner as one of those Japanese animae robots where various robots combine their powers into one super-robot. Appropriately, all before them were crushed into submission. I’m so glad that Danny Mee’s move to Austin didn’t mean the end of the Jonx.

EPILOGUE
(Due to the limits of our template’s layout – please, click on image)

PICTURES

LINKS & CREDITS:

Bloodstock photo by John Ashby
(Check out his flickr page – amazing stuff)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnashby/

More pictures on my Flickr Page:
Hearts Of Animals, Young Mammals, and Wicked Poseur (Link)
The Jonx and Golden Axe (Link)

Band Links
Hearts of Animals

Young Mammals

Wicked Poseur

Awake

Golden Axe

The Jonx

Sunday was just one of those nights where you had two very good choices from which to choose. On the one hand you had the International Noise Conference over at the Jet Lounge while The Mink Backroom had Casiotone and HOA. I’d actually considered trying to catch both but then realized how club hooping is generally a recipe for disaster and simply staked my claim with the show at the Backroom.

Opening was Hearts of Animals who I’ve seen so many times that it would generally seem pointless and redundant to catch yet another performance but everyonce in a while you catch one performance like this and you remember what’s so particularly special about HOA. Sunday night saw HOA perform under some dodgy circumstances: a Mac with its battery nigh dead, an odd little drum machine whose signal never fed properly to the board, and pre-amp tubes that weren’t cooperating thus refusing her the crunchy distortion that we have come associate with HOA. But after a futile request for a distortion box, HOA simply forged ahead and, the thing was, I never missed the distortion. Perhaps because she had to fight the circumstances somewhat and knowing that her Powerbook could go at any moment, this HOA performance had a little but of the sass that had been missing from her SXSW performance. The clean guitar was actually quite enjoyable as the clear ringing notes had nothing to hide behind and, being a fan of her simple yet effective finger picking style, it was nice to hear that unfiltered and pure. That being said, despite the excellent performance, one thing kept ruining the music for me and that was the dude who was writhing on the floor, bumping into the microphone, and engaging other generally annoying behavior that would a suggest a person who clearly is desperate for attention. First off, I am still shocked that dude was not on drugs but more importantly the question that should be posed to people like this is “Did I just pay 8 bucks to watch you make an ass of yourself or did I pay 8 bucks to see someone play some songs that they worked pretty damn hard to perfect?” followed by the inevitable “No dude, that is a rhetorical question.”

Clue to Kalo followed with a pretty shaky set. Don’t get me wrong Clue to Kalo have their share of good solid songs (check out Love Check Music Game on their myspace for a lovely example of the band at their best) yet, there was something that never quite took off. You could argue that the sound didn’t do much for the type of clean poppy instrumentation and harmonies in which the band prefers to tread and sure, they came off as pleasant, charming, and droll enough but the set never really left me engaged beyond a shrug of pleasantness. Perhaps this is a band better left to the controlled and precise world the studio which, by the way, is no dis.

Closing the evening was Casiotone for the Painfully Alone who played a sweet set. Now, I’ve been pretty shaky on his voice on his recordings (perhaps because he at times employs some good vocalists to share duties) but in a live perfoemance his voice is charming, sincere, and endearing. Now don’t get me wrong with these qualifiers for his vocals, Owen Ashworth’s main strength lies in his ability to write lovely little personal pop songs and arrange them with some lovely keyboards that at times give me the same fun kick I’d gotten when I’d first heard latter day Kraftwerk. His is all about the beauty of simplicity and Sunday’s performance was appropriately ungilded; he simply laid out those songs and charmed the audience with his low key and humble stage personae. The oddest and funniest bit of banter came when he explained to the audience how the legs on muppets freak him out which may seem a bit of a shaggy dog but it pretty much captured the spirit of the evening which was simply a bunch of people sitting together listening to some songs and enjoying each others company. Now how much more pleasant a Sunday night would you want?