Here are reviews from the first part of October.
Here is my Desert Daze review.
As for the rest of October, here is my unedited thoughts as posted elsewhere, if you are interested, please do read!
October 13:
I have a thing where a band can kind of blow you away the first time you see them, but maybe they just caught you the right way or got lucky or you fell for their shtick. Second time, less likely so, but if a band knocks you out on the 3rd viewing, that’s legit diggin’ it. Caught my 3rd Mildlife show ever/of the year on Thursday night and I can attest that they passed the Third Time’s a Charm test and are currently and strongly on my dig it list. The show was at Elsewhere after catching them at Baby’s All Right and then just a few weeks ago at Desert Daze. I was pretty psyched for this one and they totally delivered in front of a comfortably packed house.
For the unfamiliar, these guys are from Australia. Not all good music these days is coming from Down Under, but damn, it sure does feel like it sometimes (you’re a fool if you skip Friday’s King Gizzard show). They’re a total party band, super groovy, deepfunkin’, try-not-to-dance kind of shit, but there’s something also very unique about their sound to me. Thursday it kind of struck me that their sound is as if Pink Floyd had decided to play disco music instead of psychedelicblues meltdown. Once this notion clicked for me Thursday I was able to map almost every song they played to an equivalent track on The Wall, which was fun. The band is kind of, by sight, a standard guitar/keys/bass/drums quartet, but another realization Thursday was that the guitar player is just kind of, well, bonkers in what he’s doing to bring their sound out. There is a lot of sound that I might have previously attributed to the keyboard player that’s actually the guitar player doing somewhat synthy/keyboard-y effects. He also shredded straight up jammy style guitar, went capital-F funky, did little vocoder scatting (sounds pretty good actually) and also brought out a freakin’ flute for a couple songs. Everything melodic passed through this dude and he kind of killed it all. The rest of the band just whooping up pure danceclub energy behind him and it was a no-time-to-rest, boogie-down affair from start to finish. They played about 70 minutes which felt like about 120, took a minimal ovation break and then came back and played like a 30 minute encore or something. I was eyes a-glazed bowled over and danced out by the end. Holy shit, these guys are good and I can’t imagine even the stodgiest, least-fun-having amongst us not having an absolute blast seeing Mildlife. Maybe they’ll be smart enough to go next time they come Stateside. Absolute highest recommendation. Looking forward to the 4th time!
October 15:
We were up in Syracuse to visit the kid for Parents Weekend and my brother had tickets he wasn’t using for Clem Snide at this new venue in town and had just missed this show in NYC last week, so why not?? The room is called 443 Social Club or something like that. It’s in an industrial part of the city but once inside it kind of had the feel of a quirkily-decorated dining room in an old school bed and breakfast. Kind of a weird juxtaposition, but the vibe was homey and nice. Crowd felt older than what I was expecting for some reason.
Opener was Jill Andrews, singer songwriter, perfectly fine.
Eef Barzalay/Clem Snide played solo as well, as he did when we saw him a year or two back at City Winery Loft. I think he’s kind of one of the more underrated songwriters out there, or was in the 00’s at least. He played a great set of material from his career, even mentioning how Clem Snide used to be a band and how everyone in the band (including someone from Syracuse) resented him because he wrote all the songs so he made more money. Brutal honesty. His songs and his storytelling kind of mesh into a single thing, a very unique voice, honesty and beauty and a shade of harsh observationalism mixed with absurdist storytelling. He told an anecdote before every song and many were of the is-this-really-true variety, but who could make up some ridiculousness. Just a super interesting human with a quirky point of view that you could listen to play and sing and storytell for hours. I hadn’t heard him play the song “Ballad of Bitter Honey” in quite a while and it was always a favorite, so I was glad to hear it. It was all wonderful even if it was similar to the last time I saw him. The songs he played to start the encore were kind of brutal in their observations about mortality, one called “Roger Ebert” about his supposed last words which is just a something-else kind of song, and then another one he wrote as part of a pandemic project of taking people’s stories and turning them into songs. I can’t even relate the longish story he told beforehand, it was so touching and painful, but suffice it to say, he’s not sure the guy he wrote the song for ever got to hear it. The crowd just kept going “one more” and he obliged for like 2 or 3 more which was fun. Just a treat to see someone like that play, deep and shallow all at once.
October 16:
Saw Broken Social Scene play last night. Words can’t do justice to how good this show was. Been seeing them for a long time, they kind of trace a particular arc of my music listening through this century and are as important to me as any other band over the last two decades. Just pure joy to see them play as good as ever and just deliver the healthy wallop of positive energy and just nail every song off You Forgot It In People. I remember when someone (on this list!) told me to listen to that album and just how it knocked my socks off, unlike anything I was listening to at the time and how it just rejiggered what I believed music could do and do for me at the time. And then waiting to see them live for the first time and a few of us from this list went to see them play for students at NYU and there were like 50 people there and we were the oldest people there, and not only the oldest people there by a good margin (at 30 years old), but Sasha was terrifically pregnant at this show with the same kid I just visited up in Syracuse this weekend. (the even more unknown Dirty Projectors opened this show, btw). One of my favorite livemusic memories was that show, just again being knocked-the-fuck-out by what live music could do, a big step away from my boring everything-must-jam mentality. Broken Social Scene literally shoved me into new ways of listening and new ways of conceiving and eliciting joy from music.
So, yeah, it was AWESOME to celebrate 20 years of the album with them last night. It was AWESOME the way they brought it with the same energy and element of surprise they did back then at NYU. It was AWESOME how they played songs I hadn’t heard in years and just crushed it all. It was AWESOME to remember how awesome they are and were and will always be. Just a great fucking show. And also Meryl Streep came out at the end. And Tracey Ullman. Total, beautiful chaos every time.
My review of the show is here.
October 17:
The night after we attended the previously-reviewed Broken Social Scene show at Webster (Meryl Streep was there!) we headed to the Owl in Prospect Lefferts Gardens to see one of the BSS longtime members, Charles Spearin play. I had no idea what this was going to be about. Spearin is one of these many-hats kind of guys, he’s a regular in BSS, but plays bass, guitar, trumpet, sings, etc. He’s also in Do Make Say Think which is an amazing instrumental postrock outfit that is just, well, amazing. He’s also put out his own solo stuff including a rather remarkable record called The Happiness Project which, if you haven’t heard or heard of it, you really should check it out. Ahead of its time and also just perfect in conception and execution. We listened to that album A LOT when it came out and parts of it give me the chills just to think about it. One of my all-time favorites. So the possibilities for this show were kind of all over. It was also one of these shows with 4 different acts on the bill, so also no clue… I also had no idea if this was going to be the kind of thing that was hard to get into or totally empty and it turned out that we showed up early and pretty much everyone there was either performing or maybe related to one of the performers. If you’ve never been to the Owl before (full name: the Owl Music Parlor, um, perfect much?), a) you really should and b) it’s a wonderfully intimate, out-of-the-way space that’s kind of well-suited to the cozy-but-weird acts I’ve caught there.
So, we’re kind of milling about and there’s this little girl (maybe she was 7 or 8?) bouncing around and about 7:55 (show was billed at 8), this girl kind of announces to the everyone to come inside, the show’s about to start. I think more shows should get kicked off with a little girl imploring everyone to come in and sit down. Beats the flickering lights? The reason why she was so impatient about it was that it turns out that she, herself, was the first performer and her bedtime was impending, potentially cutting into her repertoire. I am pretty sure this little girl was Shahzad Ismaily’s daughter, he joined her on drums as she sang a spooky Halloween song (I think it was called “There Was an Old Lady All Skin and Bones”?) Then she’s like “I’m just going to make one up” and improvised a similarly spooky song. Totes cute.
The next short set was by this guy David Pedinotti who sang some songs (couple Neil Young covers, couple Bonnie Raitt tunes, couple originals), backed by his daughter who goes by the name Lip Talk. Kind of nice? The third set was Lip Talk and Shahzad doing an improvisational set, doing the furthest thing from folk/blues/country covers, but that was the kind of mixed bag evening we were now well into. This was a cool just-fucking-around kind of thing, Ismaily is really an underrated, he’s-everywhere kind of guy, plays seemingly every instrument and just is involved in things that are good. Like if Shahzad is there, you know it’s going to be good. Maybe it’ll be weird as fuck, maybe funky, maybe beautiful, maybe straight-up, maybe off-the-planet experimental, but he’s just there for all of it. The guy just making it happen.
Which comes to the final set which was Spearin with a bunch of different musicians, primarily a woman Josefin Runsteen. Spearin explained that he and her had participated in a kind of improvisers workshop with (who else!?!) Shahzad and he had taken the opportunity of being in NYC for the BSS show to get back together and do this set. The first piece was all improvised, CS playing this Swedish harp thing that was kind of like a cross between a violin (he bowed the thing) and a dulcimer, I guess? It was a kind of lovely-but-super-haunting sound, while Runsteen played violin. Just super beautiful, interesting, engaging music perfectly matched to a small room called the Owl Music Parlor. Also, you don’t often see an indie-rock guy like Spearin improvise like that. He’s pretty awesome. Karen Ng joined on saxophone for much of the rest off the set, Runsteen hopped to piano and to drums (what’s with these super talented multi-instrumentalists??). Ng did one of the songs from the Happiness Project (they’re songs about being happy! They’re so good!) which was really great and made me appreciate once again how innovative and difficult those pieces are as music. He played a long recorded piece that I thought was a bit too long, but whatever. Was just a really wonderful evening of unexpected collaborations and improvisation. Only in NYC!
October 18:
Started the night by getting to Jalopy in time for the very end of the first of (thankfully) two sets from Jake Blount. Jalopy, yet another, cozy, room perfectly matched to the music you see there. In this case, Blount, a rising star in the Americana/folk/old-time/traditional music genre. He is as much a student of the music, and in turn a teacher of the music, as he is a performer. And so each piece he plays feels extra personal and also extra generalizable, global. He’s very much in the Rhiannon Giddens vein, someone who contextualizes the music into a history that has not always been kind to black musicians and blacks more generally. His latest album, he explained, is a “climate change” record of sorts, which gave everything he played an extra weight.
Still, in the end, it’s just the music first and the music was quite awesome. Blount has an excellent band, fiddle/guitar/bass and he rotated on banjo, fiddle, etc. His voice is great, the songs are great, the band is great, his banter and storytelling is all just major value add. I do not think he’ll be playing in rooms the size of Jalopy much longer. At one point he said\, in discussion about the origins of rock and roll music: “fuck Elvis Presley today and every day” and that is still making me smile one week later.
From there we headed — could it be?!?!? — to Astoria! Wait, Astoria as the second stop on a Tuesday night? Feels familiar, but it had been a while… but yes! upon arrival to the Letlove Inn, the crowd of usual suspects was loitering outside, that certain look on their faces that told me all I needed to know: Subtonics were back! Lo! And they are. Playing in somewhat traditional bass-free format, the second set we caught was just-like-old-times magic of improvisation the likes of which you can’t really find much of in NYC these days. If someone is going to have the market cornered, let it be Costas and whomever he gets to play with him, because a summer of gigging in Greece has him playing as sharp as ever. Subtonics as the genre that transcends genre was on full display last week, Marius van der Brink on keys playing particularly, deceptively sweetly, each hand contributing its own thing to the whole, low end groove with the left, color commentary with the right. Costas was clearly feeling it, feeling the love and reflecting it right back, a healthy crowd savoring it and he in turn savoring their savoring. I’ve seen him play in that room dozens of times, and never have I regretted the schlep or the sleep missed. Looking forward to the return.
October 20:
Thursday was a night of many options and we ended up doing something a little different, catching the young-un’s Melt at Webster Hall. This was my second time seeing them after catching a set at Peach this summer, but I just found myself enjoying the hell out of the show front to back. Just a very good energy and a talented band playing good songs. Marlo on guitar is a total shredder, enough so that even though the band isn’t a guitar-shreddy band, she turns them into one every so often and it feels totally natural. They don’t have an album out but the room was packed and everyone was way into it. And because the band’s parents were there I didn’t feel like the oldest person there. Bonus!
My full review of the Melt show is here.
October 21:
Again, lots and lots of options, but on Friday there was only one “right” choice. King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. Either you were there and you know or you weren’t and you missed it. If you’re asking me, this is the thing going right now. If you had asked me before I would have said so and now a few days removed from this show, a set derived almost entirely from brand new materials, (by all accounts a great show, but probably not the best KGLW show played this tour), I will say it once again. It’s King Gizzard and then everyone else as far as I’m concerned. Holy shit, this show was a monster and the more I think about the two Lizard Wizard shows I saw this year (9 overall in the past 8 years), the more I’m blown away. Layers and layers of genius of the no-one’s-doing-this kind, a feeling really only one other band has ever given me before. Yes.
My full review of the King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard show is here.
October 22:
Saturday was an all-day affair. First stop was the Brooklyn Folk Fest held at St Ann’s Church in Brooklyn Heights. I think this is my 3rd or 4th year going and even though I was only there for a few afternoon Saturday sets this year, I still got that warm, fuzzy feeling this fest gives me. It truly is a FOLK festival, true to the genre, but often stretching it beyond American folk music in inventive, but true-to-Brooklyn fashion. I caught parts of four sets, with a Bill-Carney-less Bill Carney’s Jug Addicts, Clinton Davis , and Jacob Wysoski. The festival is truly one of those don’t-matter-who-plays deals, it’s really about the vibe in that church, seeing a dude play banjo with that stained glass behind him or whatever. It’s just a very special little festival, hand-curated, built and maintained out of love for the music, keeping it going, giving the people in Brooklyn a place to come see it. I’ve discovered plenty of acts there in the few years I’ve gone, I trust the organizers completely. Things I’m glad are still with us. Looking forward to next year.
From there it was a long-for-me bike ride to Ridgewood to this artist studio space called Outpost Artists Resources for a benefit for Fire Over Heaven. I am going to be honest and tell you that I have no freakin clue who Fire Over Heaven is, but the all-day lineup was attractive and it worked out perfectly to stop by for a stretch mid-afternoon. I got there as 75 Dollar Bill Little Big Band was playing a soundcheck song. It really was just a large artists studio (literally tables with paints and shit on ’em) with folding chairs set up and people standing in the back. I was mostly interested in 75 Dollar Bill so my timing was perfect (natch!). I used to be more partial to the og duo version of $75, but I’ve come around fully to the mesmerizing magic of the big version which seems to mutate based on gig. Saturday it felt extra large: two guitars, two percussion, violin, viola, reeds, bass, etc. This is really a band that is an order of magnitude greater than its individual parts, all the instruments combining into an intoxicating buzzzzzz that seems to go into and out of focus, flipping sinusoidally between rhythm and melody, an ever-changing superposition of both. It’s such a unique musical drug and it’s fascinating to feel like it is at once completely formless and yet seems so rooted in pattern and direction. I’ve seen these guys a bunch and this set felt especially next level to me. For the last number, they brought up William Parker and others of the day’s performers and did a singalong version of Ornette’s “Friends and Neighbors.” So worth the schlep! The next set was William Parker solo and it was sort of half playing solo bass, half telling stories/philosophy and it was really engaging and hilarious and thoughtful, even if a bit self-admittedly rambling. I enjoyed his set, but also there’s only so much solo bass I can take. Stayed for some of the next set which was noisy and out there, guitar/clarinet/drums.
Final stop on Saturday was LPR for Sam Amidon and Marc Ribot. I feel like the theme of the day was kind of “where jazz and folk meet” and so this was a perfect culmination for a long day of livemusic. I am such a huge fan of both these guys that I felt like I had to be at this show even though (once again!) there were many, many great options Saturday night. I’ve written a bunch about Sam Amidon whom I’ve seen a number of times, he’s really born to be an expert purveyor of old school Appalachian folk, but deep down inside he wants to be a jazz musician and so he’s constantly shape shifting and finding collaborators to rectify this tension. I’ve seen him front a big jazz band, I’ve seen him play with Bill Frisell and Shahzad Ismaily (Shahazad, you everywhere, man!), and before with Ribot in a larger group. I didn’t know exactly what this would be like, so many directions these two could take together. In the end, they really kind of did ALL of them! There were songs that were more like “Sam” songs, old school folk tunes that he sings in his signature voice, but then Ribot kind of doing this sick, melodic soloing over the top of it. Those tunes were probably the best of the night. Then there were Marc Ribot songs! He writes these weird little songs and the ones they played had a folky vibe to them, with some warm humor and also his strain of angry-as-fuck running through.
Example: he opens this song by saying “this is about the Empire State Building” and sings this song that’s kind of funny and cute and warm about the ESB and includes his own personal stories in there of going there when he was a kid and then the song moves ot how it’s the symbol of American progress and by the end the last line is almost literally “and that’s why everyone hates us.” I’m dying laughing thinking about it. Marc Ribot contains multitudes, my god, does he. Sam sang a Ribot original about Noah’s Ark that worked better than if Marc had sang it, they did a Carter Family tune, some instrumental stuff, some weirdo jazz-out shit. It all, I mean ALL worked. The permutations between Sam playing fiddle, guitar, and banjo, and Ribot playing acoustic, electric and… ukulele(!) (I don’t know if I’ve ever seen him play a uke before, but it was quite nice!) and the trading of vocals and weaving of instrumental passages in between brought so much texture to a duo show, I could have stood there and listened forever. You’ll never guess who came out for the last song! If you guessed the ubiquitous Shahzad Ismaily, you have been paying attention, good job!1!1!! I was a little worried I was going to FOMO my Saturday night and with A+++++ reports from MSG and Bowery Ballroom, that was in play, but for my taste and energy level Saturday night, I am very, very happy with my choice!
October 23:
Sunday was Freaks Day Out, except inside. I thought the music and the vibe and the space and the crowd were fucking awesome. Thanks for coming if you did.
October 25:
Early James @ Union Pool. I’ve really enjoyed the James studio work and saw him at Newport two NFF’s ago so I was totally looking forward to this one at Union Pool. He opened with a couple songs “acoustic” — he on acoustic guitar and his bassist on upright. He broke a string and had to end that part prematurely (one or two songs), but it was a nice way to open the show. The stuff with the rest of the band was pretty killer though. I’d categorize his music as “southern rock” in that it’s rooted in rock. blues, and country and has a healthy groove, two guitars/bass/drums for this tour, at least, but it’s a pretty updated version of the genre… I mean, the band sounds nothing like the Allmans or any classic southern rock bands, they sound like themselves and are better for it. James has a voice that just fits the music perfectly in the John Bell/Gregg Allman growl-meets-grit vein. Played most of the songs off his new album and a few off the previous one and it was all pretty solid or better than solid. The band is fromm Birmingham, Alabama and there was a pace to the banter and the show that was just we’re taking our own sweet time, with painfully goofy jokes in between songs and a ho-hum energy that I thought kind of dragged things out a little more than necessary, but what can you do? Hope he comes back sometime soon! Check out Early James if you haven’t yet. Opted not to head to LetLove Inn and maybe that was the right choice?
October 26:
Up to Webster Hall for Kevin Morby who put on another characteristically amazing show for a sold out crowd. I feel like I’ve written a bit about Morby and I will try not to repeat things I’ve said before, but he is just a master songwriter that kind of operates on another level from most of his contemporaries. Every time I see him I’m kind of blown away to the point of wondering if I’m imagining his genius or if everyone else is hearing what I’m hearing. I’ve spoken very very often of his use of repetition and I am constantly drawn to what I was thinking of as “echoes” in his music, within a phrase, a verse, a song, a set, a tour, a career. It’s just such a pleasure to bask in the mastery of his craft, but also he just puts on a killer rock and roll show. His band this tour is (as usually is the case) very killer and there were these echoes within the band itself bouncing themes back and forth or doubling up at the right time as if to italicize certain moments or phrases.
The set drew largely from the new album This is a Photograph which was fine by me, I had only seen this material in the stripped down record release show at Rough Trade earlier this year. Was great to see it get the big, full band, full-energy Morby treatment. Then the dip into the old material which was largely the old new material and not the old old material. He sung the praises of NYC several times, “City Music” and then in the killer three-song encore which featured Hamilton Leithauser coming out to sing that song they wrote together and then “Beautiful Stranger” and “Harlem River.” If you can put on a sick ass show that stands up a sick ass on its own and then have those two songs left in your pocket to close, well… that’s pretty fucking sick ass. Great, great show. If you don’t love Kevin Morby and do everything you can to see him every time he comes to town, you are definitely doing it wrong.
October 27:
Started at this place in Ridgewood where James Buckley was playing with Jonathan Goldberger and Jeremy Gustin. This is like 2/3 of Jeff Rum Trio with Goldberger subbing in for Ryan Dugre and, like, yeah, sure I’m way into that. The room was Sundown Bar and it was basically the downstairs of this small bar, which opened into a nice sized room of the “how come I’ve never heard about this place before?” type. Seriously, people should be booking more shows here! (although parking sucked in the neighborhood). The music was all jams and totally killer. Buckley laid down a groove, Gustin kind of selected a rhythmic feel and Goldberger just worked the guitar magic. I think they did 3 or 4 pieces and each was totally different and interesting and groovy and awesome. Gustin may very well the best drummer in the city that’s not on anyone’s “best drummers in the city” list, he is just a delight of melodic drumming and a total joy to watch and listen to, constantly feels like he’s the lead instrument without ever feeling like he’s anywhere close to playing a drum solo. He’s the magic behind Jeff Rum and he was the magic Thursday. Goldberger is a similar unassuming, silent assassin. This was a great, great band. Living in a city where this is happening on a random weeknight in the strangest of places and like no one knows or cares or whatever… what a fucking city!
From there I bounced to Union Pool and got there right when Chris Forsyth was starting up. I feel the same way about the dudes in this band as I did in the previous one and jokingly tweeted it out that way. Like everything I said about Gustin you can say about Ryan Jewell who is just an awesome drummer who puts a smile on your face every time you watch him play. The type of musician who is getting extreme joy out of making music, does it really fucking well, and is undeniably infectious in every way. Anyway, this set was another total Forsyth burner, if you know you know.
October 28:
One of the treasures of early Fridays in BK is the 5:30 set at Barbes, which is reserved for the weekly residency of Oscar Noriega’s Crooked Quartet. I’ve seen them a bunch of times, it’s a perfect way to kick off the weekend, and while there’s a core band, the musicians kind of rotate around pending availability, I assume. But the regular piano player is Marta Sanchez and in my book she’s the reason to go see the Quartet, as good as everyone he gets is. Sanchez is something special and occasionally when Noriega can’t make it or whatever, she takes the Friday early slot and those are the ones to hit. As it so happens, this was the case this Friday, Sanchez playing in a trio with Chris Tordini on bass (he’s a Crooked Quartet regular) and Savannah Harris on drums. They were playing “new music” written by Sanchez and it was all just so darn great. Intellectually stimulating compositions that were both easy and challenging at the same time, executed quite well by the trio. How is it you can just hop into a little dingy room like Barbes on a Friday at 6pm and see music this good played at this level? Pretty amazing! The real standout to me was Harris. Have I seen her play before? I couldn’t recall, but I feel like I’d remember if I had because she kind of blew me away. Won’t be the last, that’s for sure!
Sanchez is a young pianist worth keeping an eye on, she’s totally mesmerizing every time I see her, leading her own stuff or in the sideman role. Catch her now and you can say you saw her when!
October 29:
Saturday was another full day in Brooklyn.
Organ Monk Trio at Industry City. If you’ve never seen these guys, they do Thelonious Monk material as groovy organ trio music and it’s pretty great. Amazing to see the Monk stuff fit in so well in this format. The funny thing was that they’re playing these Monk tunes and maybe another cover or so and then organist Greg Lewis is like “we’re gonna play an original” and the instinct is to groan a little, because just play these awesome Thelonious tunes! But the original (called Invasion of the Booty Snatchers) was by far the best thing they played, a rather intense bit of organ groove with a deep repeating line and the best guitar and organ solos of the day, drummer absolutely holding the pocket steady. Damn, that was good. These guys play Lunatico and places like that regularly, they are great, you should check them out.
Back to Barbes for Sonny Singh who is in Red Baraat, playing with the aforementioned Goldberger on guitar plus a bassist and drummer. This wasn’t my favorite set of the week, something felt a little bit off to me, but when they got going it was quite good. Singh tied ever song to Sikh teachings (eternal optimism ftw!) or political messaging or other spiritual lessons and I enjoyed it all quite a bit for its universalism. Would see again. Goldberger is an underrated treasure, there was a slower song that he played one of the more intensely beautiful solos I’’ve seen in a while.
Cleared the room and got a drink and returned for the Halloween set from Habbina Habbina. Room was bouncing, the band was scintillating, this was just pure joy on a Saturday night. I really suggest you go see these guys play! So fucking good. Saturday they had a violin player with them and the expansion to quartet was a good one. I’m a bit of a guitar-bass-drum purist when it comes down to it, you really need to have serious value add to get in there and mess with that format perfection, and this guy definitely was, taking some great solos, fitting into the sound wonderfully, and adding just the right counter to Amit Pelled’s guitar playing. The band was in very high spirits, wearing wigs and sunglasses, handing out candy and glow sticks, and characteristically moving into the middle of the packed room to take solos and jam and whatnot. They did a cover of You Only Live Twice which I love and shredded pretty much everything they played. This was one of those nights where that midnight Barbes curfew got in the way of a party that felt like it was just getting going, but rather have that than no Barbes, so I’ll be happy with what we got which was plenty.
October 31:
Finally, returned to Barbes (dang) for my 300th show of the year (had to sneak it in before the end of the month) for a special Halloween version of the Monday night Tropical Vortex. For the unaware, every Monday Barbes hosts a kind of Latin party with “tropical” bands playing, DJ’s, etc. It’s always packed, it’s always a good time, they rotate through a bunch of bands that play a range of styles from a range of different countries, but it’s always amazing. Last night they had Locobeach who are veterans of the series but apparently hadn’t played the room in 3+ years. Well, it was like they had been playing every week for years the way they went last night, just pure funkified fun. I think Locobeach is one of my favorites of the Tropical Vortex bands and they reminded me why last night. Guitar/keys + bass + percussion, just feels like no-fucking-around-ness of the highest order. Weird covers (the Cure!?) and a commitment to the groove, a great sound. Locobeach is a treasure, Monday nights at Barbes are a pleasure. Do it!
