Links:
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

Hailing from San Francisco, and out in support of their self-title debut full-length on Virgin Records, BRMC is Peter Hayes (guitar/vocals), Robert Turner (bass/vocals), and Nick Jago (drums). And while their debut is fine testament to their righteous sound, live is where the band's sound is best felt. Drawing inspiration from diverse musical well springs, BRMC are tight, talented, and well in control of what they are trying to achieve with their sound. The end result is something uniquely their won. My ears buzzed with pleasure as I strained to listen to Turner's bass riffs chase drum rolls, and for the first part of their set I thought for certain they had an extra guitarist in tow as Peter's playing filled the club with multiple layers of delay and distortion. Swapping vocal duties, Robert and Peter (who's a dead ringer for Syd Barrett) carefully measured out the music in controlled fits of dirty, sweaty, bluesy, sexy psychedelia. Tempering the lust with supple melody--working songs like "Spread Your Love" and "Whatever Happened to My Rock 'n' Roll (Punk Song)" into a frenzied bliss. Think if Love and Rockets dropped the electronics and samples and just jammed, letting the dark magic work itself out.

In my misfit circle of diverse musical tastes, I can't think of one friend who would've walked away disappointed from the show tonight. And it's one of the few Seattle shows I've been to in a long while where the entire crowd seemed completely enthralled with what they were experiencing, instead of just standing back with that patented disaffected look of boredom on their faces. The uninspiring set from openers The Turn Ons (think of a late '70s David Bowie imitation) only added to BRMC's welcomed pay off. If there's one band to add to your shopping list this month, it's Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. So stop reading this and go out and find their music already!

-Craig Young
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Hog Molly
@
Bottom of the Hill
July 26, 2001
San Francisco, CA

I dunno...maybe you needed to be there, but it sounded damn funny at the time, and it was something that openers All About Evil and Dirty Power could've learned something from. Fast, furious, low-strung music is best served tongue-in-cheek. All about Evil, who sound like a crippled Zeke, and who played songs like "Don't Fuck with Me" ("This one is about a roommate who tried to kill me."), and Dirty Power, who came off like a greaser version of Lynyrd Skynyrd, ended up becoming less-than-humorous parodies of themselves by night's end. I mean, it's hard to take Dirty Power's singer seriously when--looking like Nuerosis' Steve Von Till's ugly cousin--he sings, "Yeah, baby, when you sleep at night I know you think of me." Really? You think?

Now take Hog Molly's "Alcohog" during their set. Screaming out over the unrepentantly heavy crush of guitar distortion, Doyle sings (if you wanna call it that): "I feel like getting scrappy / Don't want to wait in line / Gonna make my way to the front / I need a drink right now [...] Don't give me none of your Kung-Fu cocktail grip / I know your style and I can kick your ass...Master." Or "Russian Mafia," off of their most excellent Kung-Fu Cocktail Grip: "Seems like things are going insane / Seems like things always heading that way / Going to see Betty Betty / Going to see Betty / Going to see Betty Betty / It's all ready gone." You see...beautiful.

So while All about Evil and Dirty Power puffed their chests and slugged it out on stage, I was holed up in the back room of Bottom of the Hill playing South Park pinball, winning free games, and patiently waiting for Doyle et al to do their comedy routine. And even though they weren't looking to teach any old dogs new tricks, what they played was tried and true; something worthy of Tad's (the band) better days, and definitely something much heavier and much better than anything else I heard that night.

-Craig Young
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Links:
The Mermen
That 1 Guy

I missed their swing through Seattle sometime thereafter (where I heard Peter Buck sat in with the band), and then 1996 brought the release of Songs of the Cows--a simply sublime EP recorded over three days while the band was on tour. I found this short take even more amazing than their previous release, and was kicking myself for what I had missed live. Stepping away from the "surf" sound on most of the numbers, the band was exploring more atmospheric sounds and sirens. Songs like "A Heart with Paper Walls" and "Brain Wash" left indelible impressions on me that no tide could pull back out to sea. A four year hiatus then ensued, and finally last year found the band remerging from the depths to release The Amazing California Health and Happiness Road Show. A slight move away from the singular drive of their previous releases towards a more lush studio affair, the album still contains all of the essentials, and was still drive enough to keep me checking, checking, and rechecking the band's website to see when, oh when, I would ever get a chance to see them live.

Which brings us to Friday, July 27, 2001, and into the large, yet strangely intimate, confines of Slim's in San Francisco. My last night of a week-long stay in the city and I was finally going to get to see the Mermen play. Other than catching the Raymond Pettibon display at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (What? Pettinbon in a museum? Yup...and it was amazing!), this was the other highlight of my week, and I'd been waiting a long time for this show... Years, even.

Solo sensation That 1 Guy opened the night up. I have no idea what the hell that thing is Mike Silverman plays, but it looks as if he's been spending years trying to crossbreed Home Depot plumbing supplies with all sorts of music gear. With no visible strings, and (while at rest) shaped like a harp, with the collection of pipes and joints he has fitted together Silverman laid down some of the funkiest drum 'n' bass grooves I've heard in some time. At times plucking it like a stand up bass, at others monkey-fisting it like man possessed, Silverman and his device--like Flecktones percussionist Futureman and his home built electronic "drum set"--looked like they walked straight of a Dr. Seuss story.

Local jazz funksters Mushroom then took the stage and played a mostly inspired set of tunes that fell somewhere between Grateful Dead jamming and Miles Davis' latter-day electronic jazz noodlings. Things itched to take off, but strapped securely under a 4/4 beat the set stayed to the far right lane of the groove highway. Of course, The man wearing the baseball cap and Phil Lesh and Friends t-shirt playing air guitar, and who also looked suspiciously like political satirist Michael Moore, only added to my general feeling of malaise during the set. What would you expect?

Then, after a set break long enough to work through the better part of two gin and tonics, The Mermen finally took the stage and played a set that made my six year wait worth every moment. With That 1 Guy adding extra oomph on stage left, and with the lovely Jennifer Burnes replacing Allen Whitman on bass and Tony Prince (I believe Jim introduced him as such) sitting in on drums, the band began, spending the first two songs setting a mood of hushed ambience, slowly wrapping the crowd up in their other-worldly, aquatic sounds. Third song in, the band revved things up with a surf-inflected number, with the drummer playing a double-kickdrum fill going into the chorus. It is the only time I've ever heard a double-kickdrum used in a way that actually accentuates the beat in a manner other than simply doubling the beat for that "extra aggression." Metal drummers take note, dammit!

The set slipped across the band's career. Whether up-tempo surf or quiet exploratory musical ruminations, songs that I thought I recognized were transformed into entirely new entities. Backed by rack after rack of effects and gear, and with ample genius and passion to with which to work its magic, Thomas and the rest of his submariner crew opened up an amazing world and kindly invited us all in for a swim. The night's highlight had to have been the band's take on Duke Ellington's "Blue Pepper." With Burnes working a tight groove on her bass, Thomas took the song to an entirely different place with his guitar. "Mr. Ellington, meet surf...Mermen style."

Who woulda thought such a thing could work? After hearing The Mermen, who could think otherwise? Step on to Poseidon's back and let The Mermen take you for a ride to musical depths you're not soon to forget.

-Craig Young
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