Gonerfest Day
Sep. 28th, 2024 11:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ateolfWe spent a long amount of time at Gonerfest yesterday. We skipped the first several and didn't show up til later in the afternoon, but then stayed til the end. It was raining (with the outer leavings of the big hurricane), so fortunately my replacement jacket happened to show up in the mail before we left! Perfect timing! Also because it was raining, the music was moved to the indoors stage. Wasn't sure if there'd be enough room, I mean, it's a big area, but not as big as the outdoors. But there probably was, we managed to get in and get right to the front so we ended up camped out there the whole time. And most of what we caught was good. First up was Thee Retail Simps and they were good: garage rock but done with just enough noisiness in the guitars to be interesting. Then it was Tube Alloys who had a pretty post-punk tinged hard rock sound. Next it was Sleeveens who replaced Bailter Space after they dropped, and they weren't good but if everything had gone as planned, it just shows what a good run yesterday would have had! They're described as "pub rock" and that fits pretty well. They did have a few songs bringing heavy Ramones vibes, for at least part of it, and those parts were at least okay, but generally pretty boring rock stuff. Next was Pypy with some more post-punk kinda stuff. The singer does lots of theatrics (in a kind of Devo style) and a good bit of audience interaction (you know, in that Devo style). They were also good. At one point she did a thing where she spread a big tarp out over the audience and had them waving it and stuff and at another point she'd get down off the stage and go amongst the crowd, sometimes directing the people directly in front of her to sit down or move to the side or whatever. Anyway, fun set. Next was Cheater Slicks and they were very good. (I'm going to be honest again about my stupidity, for the longest time I kept going, yeah, I'd like to see them and they're pretty good, I have one of their albums...well, it wasn't until AFTER the shows last night that I realized that I was getting them mixed up with another band: Country Teasers...I do not have any Cheater Slicks!) They had a good garagey sound with a whole ton of distortion and just the right amount of skewed weirdness to make it really good. And the biggest surprise was to see Bobb Hatt playing saxophone with them for most of the set! Well then, small world after all! So that was doubly awesome. And at one point they did a cover of "1970" and I almost didn't even recognize it til it was almost over, but it ruled of course. Then it was Gee Tee and they were pretty straight ahead punk rock. They had all the kids into it and there was a lot of crowd pushing and stage diving. I did my best to hold steady and keep everyone from pushing into Mary Beth (didn't always succeed, but succeeded more than not!). Otherwise their music would have been pretty inoffensively not-bad but not-too-interesting but the crowd detracted a little more from it. Oh, but a couple of semi-amusing stage diving moments from their set. At one point when a lot of people were stage diving, this one bigger guy got up and did it and he pretty much went straight down (slow motion falling right to the floor). Most of the diving was not in our corner (partially because of a keyboard that formed a barrier on the sage) but this one gal came up to our corner towards the end and dove off the speaker right next to me. Well, she didn't really go out but just kinda went down right where she was and she almost started to go down too. I'm an old curmudgeon and not into that shit so I wasn't doing anything, especially thinking she should have been past me anyways, but her legs went down right next to me so when it looked like she was falling I finally helped push her back up. Last was Jon Spencer. A few years ago he came to town with The Hitmakers and I skipped it but people posted videos of it and it was really good, Bob Bert was drumming and it was a bit in the style of Pussy Galore (not as abrasive and with a broodier atmosphere, but more back in that ballpark), and I regretted skipping that show. This one was straight on Blues Explosion (I don't think it was billed as Blues Explosion, just Jon Spencer, but that's what it was, never really delved into them, but I did recognize a few of the hits). While, the one I missed is more up my alley and still the one I wish I'd seen, Jon Spencer in Blues Explosion mode was still really good live. His band (just bassist and drummer) were fucking killer awesome. There were barely any pauses between songs. For the most part the songs would change straight away as if it was the same song with a drastic tempo shift (I mean, they had so many abrupt tempo changes without even stopped and staying together right on the dime). Jon and the bassist also did a thing a lot where the bassist would take over like a lead guitarist and then the guitar would be playing a bass line, and that was pretty cool. And I don't know how the drummer kept it up with so much nonstop energy. And Jon Spencer and crew had way more energy than the band before them, but since they appeal more to older people than younger, the crowd was way more tame (I mean that in a positive, not negative sense), though towards the end a couple of the more obnoxious perpetrators were trying to start things up, it didn't really take. And when I say they were more energetic, I don't just mean that the musicians were bringing more energy, but also the music itself was more energetic (also more dynamic and more interesting, but that's neither here nor there). I mean that one band did have an energetic punk sound, but it was a pretty flat and static sort of energy that, more taking on the form of energetic music than actually having its own energy (and not that it was completely empty, just that Jon Spencer and crew had more...also, I'm blathering on way more about this than I'd intended and way more than it's worth...it was more just a casual observation, but I'm rambling on probably because it's harder to articulate, so I should just stop now!).
After that show was over, we went to the Hi Tone for a Gonerfest afterparty. This was upstairs. It was also a little weird because it was mostly bands we'd just seen, playing songs we'd just heard but in a different setting. It got pretty packed too, a lot of the Gonerfest crowd I believe. There was a local band on the bill too and I think they probably played first and we missed them (either that or they played last but we left before that, but I think first is more likely). But the first ones we saw were Tube Alloys again. Then it was RMFC (which stands for Rock Music Fan Club...and really?), who we heard on Thursday though we were far away from the stage the whole time and didn't actually SEE them with our eyes. They're the ones who I thought were almost good, but had a bit of an uncanny valley thing with actual good music. They were definitely not bad, but sort of making post-punk a little blander. Well, now we got to actually SEE them. My opinion was about the same. One funny thing is we discovered that the saxophone player was the stage diver that almost went down next to me (an aside, but the saxophone is one of the most disappointing things about this band, mostly just playing these clean-sounding whole notes following the guitar chords...really shying away from all of the instrument's best qualities). Last it was Pypy again and they were good again. Some similar but different crowd interactions. This time the singer at one point had someone in the crowd carry her on his shoulders over to the bar and she sat and sang on the bar for a little bit then he carried her back. They also had people get up on the stage and dance for one song. Okay, and we got home real late and I'm up real early to catch someone playing early today. And my feet were so sore last night after standing for so long (the sleep I got helped them recover just a little). So...ugh! Yeah!
After that show was over, we went to the Hi Tone for a Gonerfest afterparty. This was upstairs. It was also a little weird because it was mostly bands we'd just seen, playing songs we'd just heard but in a different setting. It got pretty packed too, a lot of the Gonerfest crowd I believe. There was a local band on the bill too and I think they probably played first and we missed them (either that or they played last but we left before that, but I think first is more likely). But the first ones we saw were Tube Alloys again. Then it was RMFC (which stands for Rock Music Fan Club...and really?), who we heard on Thursday though we were far away from the stage the whole time and didn't actually SEE them with our eyes. They're the ones who I thought were almost good, but had a bit of an uncanny valley thing with actual good music. They were definitely not bad, but sort of making post-punk a little blander. Well, now we got to actually SEE them. My opinion was about the same. One funny thing is we discovered that the saxophone player was the stage diver that almost went down next to me (an aside, but the saxophone is one of the most disappointing things about this band, mostly just playing these clean-sounding whole notes following the guitar chords...really shying away from all of the instrument's best qualities). Last it was Pypy again and they were good again. Some similar but different crowd interactions. This time the singer at one point had someone in the crowd carry her on his shoulders over to the bar and she sat and sang on the bar for a little bit then he carried her back. They also had people get up on the stage and dance for one song. Okay, and we got home real late and I'm up real early to catch someone playing early today. And my feet were so sore last night after standing for so long (the sleep I got helped them recover just a little). So...ugh! Yeah!
