Friday, March 11, 2005
The Future Of Head, Or Why OJ Is Sadly Mistaken
Explain to me why you don't like these guys. I'm not saying that I can't fathom how anyone couldn't like something I like (a la Hillary!), but I've known your musical tastes for eight years and it would seem to me like you would be totally down.
Saw 'em last night. Let me get the only negative thing I can think of out of the way- they need to fire their roadie. The dude tuned every guitar three or four times before they played and I was getting pretty fucking bored. But here's the real offense: the dude even tuned all the guitars for the encore! Good god. I have never seen that before, or at least I've never noticed it. It kind of defeats the purpose of people clapping and cheering trying to get the band to come back out of a roadie's up there tuning all the guitars.
These dudes can jam. I don't mean "play good", but they actually jammed a lot, and most of jamming was done with their mouths. Four part harmony jams. "Let's just riff on this chord for a while and jam some sort of barber shop shit." Did it. Being in a band that actually did have four vocalists singing at once every once in a while, I can tell you that it's nearly impossible to do, especially when everyone is playing an instrument at the same time. These guys were incredible at singing. And these harmonies are happening for the vast majority of every song.
The drummer was easily the best singing drummer I've ever seen, and that includes Georgia Hubley. Georgia is one of my favorite vocalists, but she is not singing the fourth part of a four part harmony while playing all these fast songs with tons of weird fills and shit. She's a pretty straight forward drummer. The guy also felt the need to make noises every once in a while. Usually they were yips and squeaks, but one time to end a song he made a low "BRRRRRRRRRK!" noise. I was like "what the fuck was that? did the PA break?". And then the guitarist said, looking at the drummer, "what the fuck was that?" "I was trying to make an evil sounding noise." "It sounded like a duck dying." "I know. It didn't work out. I won't be trying it again." "Well, it sounded okay..." "I'm fine with it."
They certainly talked a ton, usually to make fun of each other, but they were just "having a laugh" because they'd hug each other and whisper to each other mid song. The longest talking came at the best part of the show, where they draw an imaginary line down the middle of the audience and teach one side to sing the 2nd guitarist's vocal part, and the other side was taught the bassist's vocal part. This quickly degenerated into a popularity contest between the 2nd guitarist and the bassist, with the bassist clearly winning and the 2nd guitarist getting mock-pissed. They were talking serious shit about each other, and the guitarist cut it off eventually, starting the song. The whole crowd attempted the vocal parts, with the other guy singing the main vocals over this, and it was fucking awesome. The song was Hounds Of Love.
The shit-talking elevated into the band members actually sabotaging each other's songs, or parts of songs. The next time the 2nd guitarist was the featured vocalist, the bassist sabotaged him by talking shit about him WHILE HE WAS SINGING HIS PART, IN MID-SONG. Awesome. These guys know how to impress me. Then later during the encore they covered a great Television Personalities song (they have great taste, too), the 2nd guitarist totally sabotaged the other guitarist during the quiet beginning. I thought for sure they would start over, considering the guy quit singing the part and starting talking shit back, but he kept playing the chords and they broke into the song once he was finished berating his bandmate.
Oh yeah, the last song in the regular set was called "Piece of Crap". It reminded me of Crewsin' For A Brewsin' and was a pretty good song. Go see these guys if you can. They really know how to do it.
Explain to me why you don't like these guys. I'm not saying that I can't fathom how anyone couldn't like something I like (a la Hillary!), but I've known your musical tastes for eight years and it would seem to me like you would be totally down.
Saw 'em last night. Let me get the only negative thing I can think of out of the way- they need to fire their roadie. The dude tuned every guitar three or four times before they played and I was getting pretty fucking bored. But here's the real offense: the dude even tuned all the guitars for the encore! Good god. I have never seen that before, or at least I've never noticed it. It kind of defeats the purpose of people clapping and cheering trying to get the band to come back out of a roadie's up there tuning all the guitars.
These dudes can jam. I don't mean "play good", but they actually jammed a lot, and most of jamming was done with their mouths. Four part harmony jams. "Let's just riff on this chord for a while and jam some sort of barber shop shit." Did it. Being in a band that actually did have four vocalists singing at once every once in a while, I can tell you that it's nearly impossible to do, especially when everyone is playing an instrument at the same time. These guys were incredible at singing. And these harmonies are happening for the vast majority of every song.
The drummer was easily the best singing drummer I've ever seen, and that includes Georgia Hubley. Georgia is one of my favorite vocalists, but she is not singing the fourth part of a four part harmony while playing all these fast songs with tons of weird fills and shit. She's a pretty straight forward drummer. The guy also felt the need to make noises every once in a while. Usually they were yips and squeaks, but one time to end a song he made a low "BRRRRRRRRRK!" noise. I was like "what the fuck was that? did the PA break?". And then the guitarist said, looking at the drummer, "what the fuck was that?" "I was trying to make an evil sounding noise." "It sounded like a duck dying." "I know. It didn't work out. I won't be trying it again." "Well, it sounded okay..." "I'm fine with it."
They certainly talked a ton, usually to make fun of each other, but they were just "having a laugh" because they'd hug each other and whisper to each other mid song. The longest talking came at the best part of the show, where they draw an imaginary line down the middle of the audience and teach one side to sing the 2nd guitarist's vocal part, and the other side was taught the bassist's vocal part. This quickly degenerated into a popularity contest between the 2nd guitarist and the bassist, with the bassist clearly winning and the 2nd guitarist getting mock-pissed. They were talking serious shit about each other, and the guitarist cut it off eventually, starting the song. The whole crowd attempted the vocal parts, with the other guy singing the main vocals over this, and it was fucking awesome. The song was Hounds Of Love.
The shit-talking elevated into the band members actually sabotaging each other's songs, or parts of songs. The next time the 2nd guitarist was the featured vocalist, the bassist sabotaged him by talking shit about him WHILE HE WAS SINGING HIS PART, IN MID-SONG. Awesome. These guys know how to impress me. Then later during the encore they covered a great Television Personalities song (they have great taste, too), the 2nd guitarist totally sabotaged the other guitarist during the quiet beginning. I thought for sure they would start over, considering the guy quit singing the part and starting talking shit back, but he kept playing the chords and they broke into the song once he was finished berating his bandmate.
Oh yeah, the last song in the regular set was called "Piece of Crap". It reminded me of Crewsin' For A Brewsin' and was a pretty good song. Go see these guys if you can. They really know how to do it.
