Slothrust at The Knitting Factory

Why do they always turn the lights way down when I try to take pictures of this band? Ugh.

Anyway, Slothrust call themselves a "blues-influenced grunge" band. They do bring back vague memories of the 90s so I'm buying the grunge part, but I'm not so sure about the blues part. The singing often sounds like plain-old talking, which if anything seems closer to the folk tradition than blues. What it really reminds me of though is Beat Happening. If you can imagine the music of, say, L7 paired with a singing style which alternates between L7 (or 7 Year Bitch?) and Beat Happening (or the Minutemen?) then I think you've got it.

Posted: 10/6/2013 at 6:14pm     Tags: red  Slothrust  The Knitting Factory 

The V!brators at Trash Bar

Apparently my web hosting company will not let me call this band by their real name. I'm not kidding! They don't like the word "Vibrators". I had to trick it into letting me type that word in this comment right here and it won't accept it at all as a tag name. Some sort of weird anti-porn filter? Oh well, I guess I have to call them "The V!brators" from now on. Just pretend that exclamation point is picture of a little vibrator.

Posted: 10/6/2013 at 4:36pm     Tags: The V!brators  Trash Bar 

Fucked Up at le Poisson Rouge

Strangely I don't feel the need to write much about this band. They started with a 10+ minute artsy-hard rock song which seemed to catch the audience off guard a bit. Then 45 minutes or so of the chaos pictured above. Dang, my knees took a week to recover from this one.

Posted: 9/29/2013 at 8:53pm     Tags: Fucked Up  le Poisson Rouge 

Dope Body at le Poisson Rouge

Once in a while you run into a band whose lead singer just dominates the stage. Screaming, contorting, jumping around and spraying sweat everywhere. Dope Body has one of those lead singers. The rest of the band sounds great, but I bet everyone there was staring at the Johnny Rotten/Iggy Pop type in front.

Posted: 9/29/2013 at 2:25pm     Tags: Dope Body  le Poisson Rouge 

Cosmic Psychos at Cake Shop

Do I need to comment on a bunch of farmers from Australia who have been playing punk rock for thirty years and are touring the world?  Sounds like the plot of the 70's childrens cartoon they were too scared to make, but in fact they are complete badasses. Speaking of which I decided not to post the photos of them mooning the audience. Yes, I am merciful.

Posted: 9/22/2013 at 4:01pm     Tags: Cake Shop  Cosmic Psychos