Not long ago I sent an e-mail to a friend extolling the virtues of Bay Area skateboarding legend and solo musician Tommy Guerrero. I’m a big fan of Guerrero’s From The Soil To The Soul and Return Of The Bastard albums, and had suggested them as reference material in the art of making dynamic (mostly) solo music. Not 20 minutes after sending that e-mail, I received an e-mail from another friend (Ovipositor bandmate Mark) insisting that I seek out a band called Lord Newborn & The Magic Skulls, featuring none other than Tommy Guerrero, with keyboard legend Money Mark Ramos-Nishita and musician / producer Shawn Lee. The group put one album, on Ubiquity, in September of ‘09.
It took a split second to find this trio on the interwebs, even less time for me to decide that I like what they’re doing. Most of the songs on the record ride on amazingly dope bass lines — fat and juicy, effortlessly funky, addictively head-nodding, tastefully and deftly accented — with dynamic yet mystic, almost murky percussion and super funky organs and synths. The general vibe is rare groove, but there’s also a whimsical, slightly Stevie Wonder-esque pop-soul tune, as well as stuff rooted in more experimental sounds and left-of-center songwriting approaches. The music is informed by a mash of styles (soul, rock, pop, electro, punk, hip-hop, etc.) but it’s the subtlety and nuance through which those elements are applied that makes it work — a canned percussive element straight from a groove box drum machine stereotypical of classic hip-hop, a fuzz pedal added to bass line to take it from lowdown and dirty to shaggy and nasty, the punctuation of a few precisely placed scratches, horn stabs, percussive accents or weird synth washes. There’s a lot to dig into, but nothing is done to death on this record, and the result is a collection of great songs that beg for repeated attention.
Lord Newborn & The Magic Skulls’ debut is an infinitely hip record, endearingly odd and supremely funky, and masterfully produced. Frankly, I’m a little surprised that this came out back in September of ‘09 and I wasn’t aware of it — it surely would have made my Best of ‘09 list — but, hey, these things happen. I’m just glad to know about it now.
You can (and should) cop this album from AmazonMP3, iTunes or Ubiquity Direct (where I picked up the 2x vinyl LP). While you wait for your purchase to arrive or finish downloading, check out this video for the album’s lead track, “A Phase Shifter I’m Going Through”…
Cartographer guitarist Ben Adrian is in a handful of local bands and an ace mastering engineer (he mastered our last record at Mr. Toad’s in SF), and Chris Bolig is an amazing drummer. Check out this madness, captured at The Hemlock in SF, back in September ‘09 at a show they played with Generalissimo and us (Ovipositor)…I love this band / song / video:
Every year in January, the Anaheim convention center in the heart of Orange County, CA is overrun with pro audio nerds, guitar and bass shredders, drum geeks, marching bands, producers and engineers, mad scientists, music store buyers and instrument distributors, musical instrument manufacturers, advertising and sales people, an army of media personnel and tons of others I can only describe as culture victims. Amid the throngs of girls dressed like ’80s hair metal music video vixens, 40-year-old dudes with 14-year-old-boy haircuts in leather pants, mullets, skullets, crappy Misfits tattoos, rock stars, wanna be rock stars and has-been rock stars (mostly the last two), there’s a musical instruments trade show going on. NAMM.
I’m afforded access to the show — which is trade only and not open to the general public — through the auspices of my day job, and I usually spend all four days of the show in the company of sales people and editors explaining to clients, prospective clients and instrument product managers the benefits of marketing musical instruments to buyers through the internet. This year, however, though I received a badge through work, I was not on the clock, and I was only there for two days, which, though I felt a bit of a rush to get through it all (it’s a big show), was nice because I’m usually ready to start killing people half way through the third day.
Since I was in it for strictly personal reasons this year, I spent my time hunting for stuff that I’m personally interested in: bass gear, effects pedals, drum machines and analog synths, and, to a lesser extent, software. I was hoping to have my mind blown by some of the new stuff at the show and that didn’t really happen, but through all the random silliness and standard faire, I did find a few things that I’d like to add to my collection of noise making devices…
MTD Kingston P-Style Bass. I noticed a show-wide design trend in most of the new basses on display: Body types are sleeker, thinner and narrower, lots of 5- and 6-, even 7- and 8-string basses, with lots of tone shaping options (i.e. a lotta knobs) — just a general move away from what constitutes the classic design and construction aesthetic. I’m all for progress and evolution, and to be fair, some of these new basses play really nicely, but personally, I just can’t get down with them. Call me a traditionalist, but I like four strings (in standard tuning), one or two pickups and one or two knobs. Simple. Which is why I sorta fell in love with a MTD Precision-style bass (top of the rack in the photo) that I saw at the booth of retail distributor Dana B. Good. The tobacco sunburst body, central humbucking pickup configuration and basic controls (volume / tone) is exactly what I like. Because this particular model was on display at the DBG distributor booth and not at the MTD booth, I assume this is one of Mike Tobias’ Korean-made models, but I don’t care. The action and intonation were spot-on, and Mike’s really high-end hand-made stuff isn’t my cup of tea anyway (too many strings, exotic woods, tone controls I don’t need / want, etc.). I’d like to spend a little more time test driving this bass, but I’m already considering picking one up.
Dwarfcraft Devices. One of the coolest manufacturers and displays of gear I encountered this year was downstairs in Hall E, the “Freak Hall” area of NAMM where the bootstrapping indie companies, mad scientists, left-of-center luthiers, and Chinese bulk manufacturers show off their wares. Colin (Ovipositor singer / guitarist) alerted me to the presence of Dwarfcraft Devices (via a post they made to the Electrical forums), and I made a point of checking them out. What I found was two guys, a bass and a guitar, a Fender Bassman amp, and a folding card table full of interesting effects pedals sporting cool art, nonstandard interfaces (like joysticks), and, most importantly, awesome sounds. We talked for a few minutes, I explained a little about my seemingly eternal struggle for the “right” distortion pedal, and they let come behind the table and plug the bass they had into a pedal called the Eau Claire Thunder. I was totally blown away. In fact, I’ve been obsessing on the pedal since I left Anaheim, and bought one the other day. I’ll try to post a full report on the device when I get it and can run my own bass through it into my own rig, but just to give you an idea of what it sounds like (awesomely fucked up), check out the demo on YouTube.
Some Other Effects Pedals. As far as effects go, I generally tried to avoid the usual suspects — Electro-Harmonix, Boss, etc. — in favor of more boutique manufacturers, or stuff I thought was weird / cool / extra special. The Z. Vex booth, for example, had a ton of really cool looking pedals on display (pictured), nothing I was personally interested in, but Zachary Vex was hunched over his work bench throughout the show, where he announced a new direction for this pedal shop: open source. He’s going to start selling the schematics with every pedal, and he introduced a pedal kit that allows tinkerers to get into and fiddle with his designs to come up with their own mods on these unique effects (which has been happening for years without his official consent, so…). And though they’re not a boutique manufacturer (they are, however, independent in every sense of the term), I was also pretty impressed by a new pedal that Tech21 will be releasing in May 2010, the Red Ripper: a distortion pedal with a built-in envelope-style filter that controls the amount distortion based on attack, and a low-pass filter to cut the annoying buzz that can accompany bass distortion in the higher register, especially in use with an amp that has a horn. Cool concept, nice execution, good dirty sounds, clean bypass — pretty much everything you want out of a distortion pedal, with a little something extra.
Teenage Engineering OP-1. Easily the most fun toy I played with at this year’s NAMM show, this little rectangular device is a sampler, looper, synth, drum machine and more, all housed in the frame of a digital four-track recorder. It’s got a mic, a line-in and a USB port, so there are a variety of ways to get samples in to it, and once they’re there, a variety of ways to manipulate the samples: change tempo and pitch, apply a number of effects, etc. Once everything sounds the way you want it to, simply hit the record button to capture loops one track at a time, bounce multiple tracks down to a single track and keep building — pretty much how an analog four-track works. I really had fun with this thing, and I’m going to have a hard time staying away from it once it’s released sometime closer to summer 2010. The guy at the booth told me the price point was going to be somewhere between $500 and $1000, and I think that if they can keep it closer to $500, it’s sure to be a hit.
Dave Smith Instruments. I love Dave, and — full disclosure here — my good friend Joanne and her awesome husband Andrew work at Dave Smith Instruments, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that I’m inclined to say nice things about their stuff (I can be a real asshole like that). However, as an owner of an original MoPho synth, which I love, I’m always interested in what’s next from Dave’s shop, and I’m never disappointed. This time, it was the Tetra synth, which was released a few months ago, but which I had not had the chance to get up-close and personal with; and the MoPho keyboard (pictured), which was unveiled at the show and has since caused quite a stir among synth nerds. The Tetra is a lot like the original Mopho — all analog, hand-made, and housed in a similarly sized small box with similar controls — but rather than a single voice (“MoPho” comes from “monophonic”) the Tetra has four voices. I played one hooked up to a Akai MPK25 MIDI controller keyboard, and it was everything I expected: Dope. The MoPho keyboard, as the name suggests, is a MoPho in keyboard form, with more dedicated controls, nicely weighted reactive keyboard interface, and a generally work-friendly control surface. Added bonus: chain up the Tetra and the MoPho keyboard as a controller and command a total of five synth voices. Polychained multitimbral madness! Synth-nerd-tastic!
There was a ton of other stuff at the show I was mildly interested in, slightly enamored by, or found downright stupid or ridiculous, so I took a bunch of photos…see if you can tell which is what (you can click over to the gallery on Flickr to see them in all their full-sized NAMM glory):
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I usually do 10 best-of’s in an annual list, along with another 10 runners up. I’d like to say that I decided on nine for 2009 because it sounds more poetic and clever and whatnot, but that’s bullshit. Truthfully, I had a hard time finding 10 records to put on the list this year, and Nine for ‘09 sounded pretty good so I just left it at that. I’m sure I could have found at least one more, if not 11 more records that I really liked in 2009 — the year can definitely claim its fair share of good music — but this list is composed of the nine albums that never really left my rotation once they hit. So there you go.
In no particular order, I give you my list of the year’s best albums: Nine for ‘09…
One of the most revered and solidly talented MCs from the Wu Tang Clan, Raekwon released this sequel to his ‘95 solo debut the same day that Jay-Z’s blockbuster Blueprint 3 came out, and Linx Pt. 2 stands in stark contrast to Jay’s high-polish example of the pop sub-genre that most mainstream rap has become. There’s nothing here targeted at MTV, nothing for your teenaged daughter, and nothing that the Grammys are going to be interested in. This is rap music for rap fans. Rae revisits the subject matter that he does best, the stuff that put Wu on the map, criminal theme songs and stories from the street that ring as equal parts pulp fiction and urban reportage — a.k.a. storytelling, an increasingly rare and highly impactful style. With production from RZA, J. Dilla (this record has been in the works since 2005, before Dilla passed), Eric Sermon, Pete Rock, Dr. Dre, Marly Marl and more; and gust spots from Wu founders RZA, Ghostface, Method Man, Inspectah Deck, Cappadonna and GZA, as well as Jadakiss, Beanie Segal, Slick Rick and more, there’s not a single throwaway track on this record. It’s as close to an instant classic as rap is gonna offer at this point in the game.
Raekwon, “New Wu” feat. Ghostface Method Man, Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt. 2
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Pissed Jeans’ brand of punk rock foregoes the fashion accessories and cookie cutter songwriting format that have become synonymous with the genre and focuses instead on music that’s dark, brooding, ominous and unpredictable. Screaming feedback and a drunken, growling caterwaul provide the musical punctuation throughout this album, and the songwriting is far more interesting than most of what’s considered punk rock these days. Passages of heavily lumbering bass lines explode into flat out riffage, if only momentarily; interesting timings wrap around unexpected starts and stops; and non-standard choruses signify a seemingly intentional aversion to anything overtly catchy. Yet something familiar and attractable unmistakably shines through the left-of-center approach — a rhythmic pulse and bottom-ended groove that represents a common trait of all good rock music: It just feels right.
Pissed Jeans, “R-Rated Movie,” King Of Jeans
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On this debut LP Obits displays a new blueprint for contemporary Americana rock music. This Brooklyn, NYC based quartet, boasts guitarists / vocals Rick Froberg (Drive Like Jehu, Hot Snakes) and Sohrab Habibio (Edsel)…and at the risk (if not the direct intention) of revealing a slight bias here, all anyone had to tell me about this group before this album was released was that it was a Froberg project. There’s a lot of giddyup in this music (it’s mostly up-tempo) but the overall tone is classic and wide open; driving riffs — equal parts clean and slightly distorted guitar — are underpinned by thumping yet melodically hooky bass lines and dead-on drum parts. The strength and demand behind Froberg’s scratchy scream resonates a little more strongly than Habibio’s smoother croon, but the two work well on different songs here, and the overall impact is solid all the way through this record. The sound is open, bright, harsh and exposed, yet invitingly picturesque.
Obits, “Two Headed Coin,” I Blame You
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This noise rock duo has long been heralded as having one of the most engaging live shows on the indie tour circuit, often foregoing a venue’s stage to set up and play on the floor, with the audience packed in tightly around them. Earthly Delights, the band’s fifth release, offers some sense of what that must feel like. There is, of course, no substitute for the live experience, but there’s a frenetic, in-your-face immediacy to this music that evokes an undeniably visceral reaction, like something big and ugly is coming around the corner to mow you down, and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. Bassist Brian Gibson weaves deeply fuzzed out, rhythmically swelling and sonically rotund bass riffs while drummer Brian Chippendale fills every nook and cranny of the remaining space with unrelenting yet precise drum patterns and vocals slathered in so much reverb they sound like cryptic rantings in an unintelligible language. As close to controlled chaos in musical form as it gets, Earthly Delights is not a casual or even entirely comfortable listening experience, but that kinda seems like the point. This shit will peel your cap back.
Lightning Bolt, “The Sublime Freak,” Earthly Lights
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Exile Radio
Plug Research
Released February 24, ‘09
Recycling is at the core of hip-hop music. From the earliest days of the genre, DJs and producers have created music by sampling and manipulating audio from various sources, and 2009’s finest example of music made from found sounds is Exile’s Radio, which is built entirely on samples he captured from the frequency dial in the greater Los Angeles area. Naturally there’s a fair amount of vocal cuts — everything from political punditry to religious fervor, DJ request call-in, on-air chatter, promotional cart samples and everything in between — but it’s assembled amid a pastiche of musical samples (or samples freaked to sound musical), drums of all flavors, horn and string section stabs, synth runs, sirens, and myriad other rhythmic and melodic elements culled from the airwaves. The result is a timely and fresh, oddly hip head-nodder all the way through.
Exile, “It’s Coming Down,” Radio
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Big Business — Jared Warren (Karp, The Whip, Melvins) on bass / vocals, and Coady Willis (Murder City Devils, Melvins) on drums — added guitar player Toshi Kasai (Altamont) to the lineup and became the only three-piece duo in existence. See, even though the addition of guitar adds a consistent high-end to the music, it’s still very much about the chemistry of the rhythm section. Jared is a full-spectrum bass player who lays down massive low end, hammering though chords and splitting his signal for high and low frequencies, while Coady fills the space within, around and over the bass with some of the best drumming in the game. Of course, that’s not to say that Mind The Drift doesn’t benefit from the addition of the guitar layer. It definitely does. This third layer lends itself to the continuing evolution of the band, allows for more ambitious songwriting and just brings the thunder that much more. Plus, Toshi’s backup screaming nicely complements Jared’s uncanny ability to scream in key. This is a huge sounding record.
Big Business, “I Got It Online,” Mind The Drift
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It’s a little eerie to hear Pimp C. say, “Back from the dead…” in the intro of UGK 4 Life UGK. Before the MC’s untimely death in 2008, he and UGK partner-in-rhyme Bun B held it down for Texas rap for years, consistently releasing excellent records, deftly riding the line that separates independent credibility and mainstream success, and Pimp’s swan song release solidifies UGK as one of the greatest rap groups of all time. Lyrically, this record covers the standard faire — women, cars, Port Arthur and Houston, Texas, pimpin’, weed, the finer things in life and the getting thereof, etc. — and it’s what Pimp and Bun do best, especially backed by veterans like Snoop Dogg, Too Short, E-40 and B. Legit. From heavy-hitting to synthed-out, light and bouncy to Deep South funk and soul, this record is so good, even a horrible guest spot from Autotune crooner Akon (the record’s one notable low point) couldn’t knock it outta my favorite nine of ‘09. RIP Pimp C.
UGK, “Everybody Wanna Ball,” UGK 4 Life
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There’s plenty of heaviness here, but there’s also plenty of room in Baroness’ brand of rock for catchy, smart melodies. So while giant riffs tower among requisite metal elements like screaming dual guitar solos and lilting, at times acoustic, intros and interludes that explode into massive anthemic movements, this record also has hooks in the all the right places. It’s a rare thing for metal to contain as much pop sensibility, and even rarer that it works well within the boundaries of what actually constitutes metal. But here you have it: the kind of heavy metal that adheres to the classic tenets of pentatonic madness, yet offers up more than enough infectious melodies and choruses. The deluxe edition of the CD contains a second disc of live material, which is a nice way for the band to prove that, on stage, they’re everything this album promises and more.
Baroness, “Jake Leg,” Blue Record
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There was a fair amount of buzz around this record, but I’m surprised I didn’t hear more about it in the music press. Then again, I’m not all that surprised. As much as Finale stands for straight up working man’s hip-hop, that’s not generally what music press (especially most hip-hop press) is interested in. But determined honesty, good music and skill on the mic is a winning combination every time, and Finale’s got plenty of all of the above. Eschewing the lines that divide the subgenres of hip-hop (commercial, underground, backpack, etc., etc.), this former auto mechanic from Detroit represents his city and his state of being more than anything else. There are no club bangers on A Pipe Dream and a Promise, no gangster songs and no R&B ballad numbers, instead this record is full of dope, organic sounding mid-tempo jams lyrically populated with reality. Finale’s debut is refreshingly straight forward and immaculately produced, it’s familiar, classic and accessible without being a thoughtless golden-era throwback, and it’s contemporary and fresh without an iota of feigned “next level” effort.
Finale, “Style,” A Pipe Dream and a Promise
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It’s been about two months since this tour happened. I suppose that’s more than ample time to digest, brain-dump, edit, reform, re-edit, reconsider and re-re-edit the experience in writing. We haven’t played together since, but we’re getting together next week to blow off the cobwebs, so I figured it was now or never. And at this point, fuck it, I just want to get it out of my head and out into the world…
What follows is a collection of thoughts, observations and anecdotes from the Ovipositor / Generalissimo Fall 2009 Northwest tour, which landed at venues in Chico, California; Portland, Oregon; and Bellingham & Seattle, Washington between September 30 and October 3, 2009.
Ovipositor is Colin Frangos (guitar/vocals), Mark Pino (drums/vocals) and Max Sidman (bass).
Generalissimo is General Zikovich (guitar/lead vocals), General Little (guitar/vocals), General Meyer (Guitar/vocals), General Brubaker (bass/vocals), and General Iannacito (drums).
Ovipositor Rocktober ‘09 Tour, Part 1: Chico, CA
The venue, LaSalle’s, is the kind of vaunted Chico college establishment that typically caters more to dance club DJ night and jam band / nu-metal / top-40 type acts (a.k.a. money-makers), which Ovipositor and tour mates Generalissimo are definitely not. Because of the four-band bill, each band was allotted a half-hour set, with strict 15-minute between-set times. Cool. It meant a 20-minute set for us. And 15-minutes is damn near an eternity for us to break down and load off stage. We’re efficient like that.
It was a disparate collection of bands:
Ana Lucia, apparently relatively new on the local Chico scene, I can only describe as occupying the space somewhere between Dave Matthews Band and Nirvana. Take from that statement what you will. They displayed a good degree of technical proficiency offset drastically by an annoying stage presence (typical rock faces and cliched moves) and music that I found blandly repulsive. To make things worse, the house sound was dialed in so the vocals were way above everything else, to ear-jarring levels. It was a rough 30 minutes, which I spent on the back patio catching up with an old friend.
I think Generalissimo treated this show as more of a practice / warmup, but they killed it nonetheless, in front of a crowd that was largely indifferent to their music and their schtick, both of which I really enjoy. It’s always unfortunate when a conceptually and musically interesting band with the chops to back it up is deemed unworthy of interest simply because of unfamiliarity. There were a few folks who genuinely seemed to enjoy them and “get it” but the general sense of apathy that permeated the club’s atmosphere during first three bands was most noticeable during the Generals’ set. Shame.
We played third, I butchered the shit out of an older Ovipositor song that I’d recently learned, and obviously hadn’t practiced enough before we hit the road (I thought I knew it…guess not). Otherwise it was a tight, short set that I didn’t deign to record…which I sort of now regret. But fuck it. Like the Generals, we looked at the Chico show as a warm up, and I wasn’t really interested in capturing it for posterity. I was told by several people that the sound in the room was good, but the sound on stage sucked, a muddy mash of searing, toneless guitar fuzz and muffled, wooly bass, and the only thing coming through the monitors were vocals and kick drum. Frankly, with stage sound like that, I’d rather go without a monitor feed.
Cold Blue Mountain was the headlining act, it was their EP release party. I generally like the kind of music they play — I’m a fan of Isis, Pelican, et al…that super big, wide swooping flavor-of-the-month instru-metal. Problem is, CBM hasn’t really developed their own sound or found their own niche, so in the end their music lacked dynamic and kinda came off as just in the style of those other bands. I took the free EP, though, and I do like it. They sounded pretty good live, and most of the people in attendance were definitely feeling it, more so than the rest of us, so…shows you what I know.
We managed to snag a comped room at the Holiday Inn thanks to a sympathetic old friend at a local weekly magazine that had some trade on the books. Regardless of the playing situation, a clean bed and hot shower are always a nice way to start off a tour.
Ovipositor Rocktober ‘09 Tour, Part 2: Portland, OR
It’s a longer drive than I remembered from Chico to Portland, and when we arrived in the Emerald City I was actually happy to hear that Travelocity had screwed up our reservation at the Governor, a swanky downtown hotel that Colin had gotten us relatively cheap rates for. Instead of a single and a double, they booked us two singles. I like Mark just fine, but there’s no way I was going to risk having a Trains, Planes & Automobiles moment with our drummer (“THOSE AREN’T PILLOWS!”). After a minor amount of chatter from behind the front desk, we were told that Mark and I would be sharing a penthouse suite for our trouble (and a minor upgrade fee). Score.
A note about the rock ‘n’ roll-ness of staying in a place like the Governor: Under no circumstances should you assume that Ovipositor is balling like that. We have very few fans, we make honest but largely incongruous and often times uncomfortable rock music, and we never, ever turn a profit. That’s not why we do this. It’s artistic expression, it’s more for us than for you, and above all else, it’s fun. It just so happens that we all work for a living, and though none of us is a millionaire, we all do well enough to afford cheap deals on decent rooms through discount travel web sites when a couch or floor doesn’t avail itself to us on a tour stop. And when said discount travel site fucks up the reservation, we’re more than happy to reap the benefits of their apologies. I know, it’s not very rock ‘n’ roll, it definitely doesn’t go with the whole ethos of pulling off a week-long Northwest van tour…and I don’t care. I slept in a king sized bed that night, in front of a 60″ flat screen TV and a fireplace that turned on with a switch. All for a little more than the price of a basic double room on discount. If you have a problem reconciling that with any ill-perceived notions of indie rock credibility, you can bring it up to me in person, or otherwise go fuck yourself.
Ovipositor, “Theme From Ouch” Live at Kelly’s Olympian, Portland:
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The Portland show was right downtown, a few blocks from the hotel, at a bar called Kelly’s Olympian. Nice stage, a good sound system, and a friendly and capable sound guy. All of our gear was miked with a classic live setup (57s on the cabinets, I didn’t see what was on the drums), which is a level of on-stage professionalism we’re not necessarily used to, so that was nice. As soon as we arrived at the venue, loaded in and set up — we played first — I ran headlong into some amp troubles, which I ended up fixing by pulling one of the cabinets, the 2×10″, out of my setup, reducing my rig down to a lone 1×15 cabinet. Luckily, we’re not that loud of band, and since the speaker was mic’d and running though the house system, I think it all worked out okay.
The Portland show, despite my amp troubles, was a good time. I felt pretty good about the set we played, I think Colin was particularly on that night, and despite the fact that there were very few people there, it was still a good crowd, thanks largely to the supportive nature of the other bands on the bill — Generalissimo and Portland’s Cougar, which has since changed its name to East Wenatchee, Iowa — and a few boisterous friends who attended. The Generals nailed it as usual…in fact, I was consistently amazed through the tour at how tight they were night after night.
Cougar…er, uh, East Wenatchee, Iowa (seriously, don’t ask). A trio of grizzled and obviously seasoned vets making full-bore garage rock. I loved these guys because they played great, dirty, stripped down power trio music. Bonus: The drummer gave us a few 7″ records from his other band, Rapids, which is also really dope. (Double bonus: Colin and saw The Jesus Lizard a couple of weeks later in SF, and it turns out Cougar bass player Tom Glose is also the frontman in Black Elk, which was the opener on TJL’s recent West Coast jaunt.)
Cougar, Live at Kelly’s Olympian, Portland:
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After the show, we hit up Voodoo Doughnut, which is open until 4am, and got their famous bacon-maple bar, which definitely lived up to the hype, especially washed down by a tall can at 3am in the penthouse suite of a posh downtown hotel. We hit Fuller’s for breakfast the next morning, then Jackpot Records for a little fuel for the musical soul, and broke north for Bellingham.
Ovipositor Rocktober ‘09 Tour, Part 3: Bellingham, WA
Bellingham was great from the minute we arrived. We received a warm welcome from our host, local impresario, independent record label legend and garage rock god Dave Crider. Mono Men, the Garage Shock festival, Estrus Records (Man…Or Astroman, Moonie Suzuki, Mono Men, etc.) — music fans have Crider to thank for a long run of great music and staunch support of independence both as an art form and a business model. And he’s a hell of a guy to boot, friendly, riotously funny and extensively accommodating. It was an honor to be his guest.
After testing my amp (which had miraculously cured itself) in Crider’s living room, we decompressed a bit from the drive, sampled a local beer — a “growler” of IPA from the local Boundary Bay Brewery — then repacked the van and headed downtown to the venue, where we loaded in, and set up (we playd first again).
This show was in a subterranean art space called Jinx, which was hosting a show as part of a local Friday night art walk, so it was free. Which meant we got paid with dinner coupons at the local taqueria, Casa De Pasa, and a cooler full of Pabst Blue Ribbon cans. All good. Free food and beer as is (almost) as good as money on tour.
I knew going into Bellingham that it’s a college town (home of Western Washington University), but I was still a little surprised at how college-y it really is. While we were at the Casa De Pasa, we were surrounded by all manner of hipster college kid types, from backwards baseball cap frat boys to crunchy hippie kids to urban-hip and tight-pant stereotypes. I expected none of them to be at our show, and they did not prove me wrong.
The Jinx Art Space “stage” is a no-frills alcove set back from a vast concrete underground art gallery space, with a basic PA system for vocals and nothing else in the way of house sound. All good. Colin, Mark and I have enough experience playing without much in the way of amplification beyond our own rigs, and I’d rather have a stripped down live operation than just listen to kick drum and vocals from a monitor drown out everything else. The sound in the space proved to be a little weird (the recordings are gonna take some extra work to sound right), but we didn’t care. It was a comfortable venue.
We played to a pretty thin crowd made up mostly of the few friends we had in attendance, some of the guys from the other two bands on the bill, and underage attendees who couldn’t drink in the parking lot with the majority of the folks at the show. I’m usually pretty surprised when people stick around at watch us play, to be honest. It’s not like were a household name, our music can be a bit of challenge, especially in the live setting, and we tend to start on time. On this particular evening, we were told that show started at 9, and because we played first, we started at like 9:02. We don’t mess around much on stage, we play tight sets (short sets, too, if we’re the opening act), we rarely talk much between songs, unless one of is tuning or adjusting something, and even then, there’s not a lot of witty repartee coming from the stage. The point is, when we play a show, and especially if we play first, if you blink you might miss us.
I think we played a fairly good good set in Bellingham, and even threw in a song we don’t do much live, an artsy little number from our latest record called “Chewy Wires” that seem to fit the artsy vibe of the venue. I like playing the song because the bass parts contain liberal use of double-stop chords, which not only lets me get my bass-nerd rocks off, but I it think sounds cool.
The Generals were on-point (yet again), playing a bit longer than they had the previous two nights, to a crowd that knew a bunch of their songs and were more than happy to sing along. Though Generalissimo plays a slightly off kilter and tight-as-a-drum brand of metal-flavored rock, they embrace the concept of brevity in songwriting and manage to incorporate a mixture of odd timing and big anthemic choruses that can get stuck in your head all too easily.
Bellingham was the first of two shows we played with Police Teeth, a four-piece — two guitars, bass and drums. They’re jeans-and-t-shirt rock guys (and Adam has a nifty haircut with a matching mustache) with a knack for driving rhythms, backed by relentless energy and a ton of skill. They played a long set to a hometown crowd who couldn’t get enough. I generally like my rock a little darker, heavier and less peppy, but there’s more than enough fuck-you in their music to give me what I need. Plus they’re super nice guys. At the beginning of their set, they passed the jar for us, which yielded a pretty good take. Like I said, nice guys.
Ovipositor Rocktober ‘09 Tour, Part 4: Seattle, WA
We hung out in Belingham for most of the day after the show, since the trip from there to Seattle is only about 90 minutes and we wanted to spend some time with friends and exploring the town a bit. After digging through one of the most impressive and well-stocked antique spots I’ve ever been to, and wandering the downtown streets, Dave and Becky Crider met us at the Boundary Bay Brewery for lunch, where they introduced us to their friend and brewmaster Aaron Smith. We nabbed a table in the back of the brewery’s busy restaurant, and settled in for a bite to eat. On top of the round of beers we ordered, Aaron began bringing out a steady stream of the brewery’s special IPA, a 10% alcohol beast that was described as something that “must be respected.” After a few pulls off a goblet of it, it was easy to understand why. Powerful stuff. Between the hearty beers and great food at the Boundary Bay Brewery, even the cup of strong coffee I had after lunch couldn’t ward off the need for a nap, and I slept in the Criders’ living room late that afternoon, and on the van ride down to Seattle.
By the time we left Bellingham en route to Seattle, I really felt the fatigue setting in. In my square, everyday life I get up around 5:30am on weekdays, I commute over the Bay Bridge and bust my ass in the internet mines, I have a 16-month-old daughter (which can be a full time job), I try to play as much music as I can, and I even try to get out into the night once in a while. All that’s tiring enough, but I have the luxury of falling back on the comfort of routine, my own bed, (mostly) healthy home cooked meals and some regularly scheduled downtime. Things are less predictable on the road. Downtime is generally spent cramped in a van, a comfy bed isn’t always to be had, and sleeping can be a dicey prospect; system-debilitating things like rivers of readily available and often free beer, crappy heavy food and gas-station snacks, all piled up on top of late nights and early mornings can make things rough. And we were only out for five days. I know, right…goddamn pussy.
The beauty of it all is that, if you haven’t reached the end of your rope or completely burned out your health, salvation can be found in a few beers, some good (or even not-so-good) food and the energy that comes with getting on stage and making some noise. It’s the recipe for a temporary rejuvenation that returns a fire to the belly and a glint to the eye. That’s what Slim’s Last Chance Chili Shack was — energetic salvation on the last stop of this short tour.
Slim’s, a lone neon beacon in the Southwest industrial Seattle night, is a punk rock bar and venue, and chili shack. Apparently, no one really lives in that part of town, but the brisket chili is absolutely amazing, and they serve what might just be the best french fries I’ve ever had. And the Pabst was on the house. The bar’s sound system was nice, almost too much system for the room, but that’s not something to complain about.
Police Teeth, Live at Slim’s, Seattle:
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The evening’s lineup was opposite from the night before — Police Teeth, Generalissimo, us, then Crider’s band, The DTs — and despite my secret desire to play first that night and just get it over with, I really enjoyed ramping up tsome energy level by watching Police Teeth and Generalissimo. Because of the four-band bill (and possibly because of wicked hangovers), they both played brief, really tight sets. Another night on tour for the Generals, killing it as usual, and Police Teeth actually moved their mics off the stage on to the floor to give themselves more room to rock-dance while kicking out the jams. I can generally go without exorbitant on-stage rock moves, but if the band can bring it musically, as Police Teeth most certainly can, I don’t mind the accompanying theater of spectacle.
Generalissimo, “Swarm” Live at Slim’s, Seattle:
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By the time we hit the stage, the crowd had grown to include more people than just other bands (another perk of not playing first), and I think things went pretty well for us. Mark was really on a burner that night, pushing the rhythm of just about every song except the opener (“When I Die”), which I don’t generally mind so much. It makes things interesting.
Ovipositor, “Navvy” (Pere Ubu) Live at Slim’s, Seattle:
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Colin had mentioned more than once throughout the trip that, because we were playing right before The DTs in Seattle, we had to really hit it right that night. I’m not sure if we did, but after watching The DTs, I fully understood what he was talking about. There’s not a single miss in the DTs’ repertoire, they might be the perfect rock ‘n’ roll band — one of the best guitarists I’ve ever known paired with the one of the best rhythm sections I’ve ever witnessed.
The DTs, Live at Slim’s, Seattle:
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We meandered back to Oakland over the next two days, getting back into California in one long stretch, and taking a break in lovely Weed, CA, where we got rooms at the Hi-Lo Motel for the night. I spent the evening eating pizza and drinking beer, then sitting in my room trying to reflect profoundly on the tour, but all I could come up with was that I had a lot of fun playing music in strange places in front of strange people for a week. And that’s pretty much what it’s all about, I guess.
Here are my photos from the trip…
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Not long ago I sent an e-mail to a friend extolling the virtues of Bay Area skateboarding legend and solo musician Tommy Guerrero. I’m a big fan of Guerrero’s From The Soil To The Soul and Return Of The Bastard albums, and had suggested them as reference material in the art of making dynamic (mostly) solo music. Not 20 minutes after sending that e-mail, I received an e-mail from another friend (Ovipositor bandmate Mark) insisting that I seek out a band called Lord Newborn & The Magic Skulls, featuring none other than Tommy Guerrero, with keyboard legend Money Mark Ramos-Nishita and musician / producer Shawn Lee. The group put one album, on Ubiquity, in September of ‘09.
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