Twangfest Night 4; June 12, 2010; Blueberry Hill, St Louis

We’d already planned on not attending Twangfest this year since Bill, who has always been our Twangfest leader, needed to save vacation time (and probably some money) for an upcoming trip to Italy. That allowed me to finally book a date for the Bottle Rockets to play at the house after a year of trying. But then we found out the reunited Jason & the Scorchers were playing one of only two US dates announced thus far at the annual festival. So I did what anyone would do, got up at 7 o’clock in the morning and got in the car for the drive to St Louis. We probably wouldn’t have had to leave quite so early if it weren’t for the Ha Ha Tonka in store performance that afternoon and Euclid Records. I’ll confess right here, Jason & the Scorchers are good, but I was in on this trip for Ha Ha Tonka.

Sure I see them all the time, and yes they have been playing essentially the same set for the last year, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to miss a chance to see them. Most in store performances I’ve been to have been short, a half dozen songs to convince the store patrons to buy a record or come to the show, but Twangfest in-stores have become mini-shows usually lasting well over thirty minutes. It was a bit of a disappointment when after four songs they said they had time for one more and would take a request if anyone had one. Since mine would have been “Surrounded,” my second favorite song off Novel Sounds but never played live, I kept my mouth shut. We were rewarded with a new song “Westward Bound,” which extended their string of instantly likeable new tunes. It was short, but I still enjoyed the stripped down set, Lennon had a tambourine and a few other percussion instruments, Luke played acoustic bass, and Brett only played mandolin.

The mellow set could not have prepared me for the virtual firestorm to come later. In the middle slot at the Duck Room that night, they played with a fevered intensity above and beyond their consistently impressive show. The new song from earlier in the day made an appearance as well as “All of the Usual Suspects,” another new song which had been in the set since February. Almost everyone at Twangfest gets an encore, but seldom do they deserve it as much as Ha Ha Tonka did tonight. The most inspired of their covers has always been RamJam’s “Black Betty,” and tonight’s torrid version demonstrated why. In the middle of the song Luke commented that they had been watching the Blues Brothers the night before. Brian looked confused, “this song isn’t in the Blues Brothers, this one is.” And with the he went seamlessly into the “hidee hidee hidee ho” call and response section from “Minnie the Moocher” like that was the way they always did it. Awesome. Now that’s an encore.

Opener Magnolia Mountain earned points for having the biggest age gap I’ve ever seen in a band. On one side there was the little old guy who played a mean mandolin and harmonica and on the other a fresh faced guitar player barely old enough to drink. The ensemble band, with eight members total, had come from Cincinnati to play Twangfest. They were enjoyable but totally forgettable musically.

I’d seen Jason Ringenberg solo twice before. On the second occasion Matthew Grimm and his band (who had opened the show) played the part of the Scorchers for several songs. Before that moment I didn’t realize the difference between Jason solo and Jason & the Scorchers. Freed of his guitar, he turns into a dervish, whirling almost out of control across the stage, the fringe on his fancy silver shirt twirling with him. His energy and abandon would be impressive at any age, but even more so considering how long he’s been in the game. Less showy, but admittedly only slightly, was guitarist Warner Hodges, his well-worn boots sported a pair of spurs, as completely unnecessary as they were totally awesome. Once you got past that and his oddly out-dated hair, you realized what an amazing guitarist he was. Disappointingly the handsome young Scandinavian drummer with the name of Pontus Snibb, who had played on the recent release and the European tour dates, had been replaced on the US dates by a much gnarlier fellow. But he proved to be a monster drummer. I know there was at least one drummer in the audience who had a serious man crush by the end of their set.

I had moved to the back of the room when the heat got to be too much at the front of the room. Lennon came and stood by me and we watched the band together for a while. “That’s going to be us in twenty years.” “I hope so,” I replied, and after a moment added, “but you guys will still be cuter.”

Ha Ha Tonka at Euclid Records






Magnolia Mountain



Ha Ha Tonka




Jason & the Scorchers

The Bottle Rockets; June 11, 2010; Kiki’s House of Righteous Music

The Bottle Rockets booking agent had told me they were going to play a ninety minute set. Now, I’ve learned that booking agents aren’t always the authority on what a band is going to do, but I don’t think anyone expected the nearly three hour, all request marathon show they did tonight. Not only was it all request but they played every request they heard, never once making excuses about how they didn’t remember a song or how it had been too long since they played it last. I can’t remember the last time I heard “Financing His Romance” live, if in fact I’ve ever heard it live. It’s been years since I even thought about “Pretty Little Angie,” which Rocky convolutedly requested as “the song about the girl and a horse.” Lucky thing they knew what he was talking about, because it wouldn’t have surprised me at all if they’d been able to pull 70’s soft rock hit “Wildfire” out of the air. In fact the only request they did turn down was the inevitable call for “Freebird.” “Nope,” lead singer Brian Henneman smiled, “that’s only gonna happen once and it was in Neenah WI.” I smiled smugly since I had been there.

Over the years my request has been become a given. After years of literally begging for “When I Was Dumb,” all of a sudden they just started playing it without a word from me. I figured tonight was the one night I could make a second request. “I have two requests,” I told them between songs, “you already know the first one.” They smiled acknowledging that they did, “the other is “Hey Moon.”” Tonight we got a little background on the bounciest of their broken-heart songs. Turns out that Brian was a bit smitten with Moon Unit Zappa in the early days of MTV when she had her own show. Deciding it was creepy to write a song naming her, he wrote an entirely different song instead naming the Earth’s satellite. After nearly two hours, the band took a well-deserved break. They returned to play an extended encore. It seemed they had forgotten my second request, heck I almost had by that time. Then I heard drummer Mark Ortmann stage whisper the title to Brian. “Oh yeah,” he grinned, “we have to play this one or we don’t get paid.” It may have just been me, but that was the best version of it I have ever heard.

All the hits were there of course, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Bottle Rockets show where they didn’t play “Indianapolis,” “$1000 Car” and “Radar Gun.” The latter Brian dedicated to Paul Kegler who we had taken to see the band at Shank Hall in Milwaukee when he was somewhere in the neighborhood of twelve. There were also a few from their excellent new record Lean Forward, most notably “The Long Way” which sagely notes “the long way isn’t the wrong and a wrong turn isn’t the end when it’s understood something good is coming up around the bend.”

I’ve had shows sell out in advance before, well, OK one show actually. I thought this one would, but I certainly didn’t expect it to do it in six days. I spent the next month turning people away. I wish all my shows did this well, or even half this well. I set up chairs on only one side of the basement, leaving the other side open for the anticipated rock show. It worked well, to the point where a couple people suggested I probably could have fit a few more folks in. As it was there was room to move around, and to get to the coolers or the bathroom. I though it was a perfect amount of people and I am pretty sure they all left happy, feeling like they had just been a part of something very special.

The Bottle Rockets

Landon Pigg/Madi Diaz; June 10, 2010; High Noon Saloon

It isn’t always the music that convinces me to go to a show; there are additional factors that figure into the formula. In the case of Landon Pigg, his music was around third on the list. At the top of the list was how adorable he had been in Whip It, the roller derby movie directed by Drew Barrymore. He played Ellen Page’s love interest, who’s also in a band, natch. They meet cute and even though he turns out to be pretty much a complete jerk, I was still watching for his name in the credits. I learned he was actually a musician shortly after that, so when a show at the High Noon was announced I wrote it on the calendar, even though I still hadn’t heard his music. I had the next day off and nothing better to do, so I listened to the stuff on his MySpace page that day. Not amazing, but quite certainly listenable. Even so, I was still on the fence. When I found out that the High Noon’s gruff but lovable bartender who hates most everything was working that night I knew I had to go.

I expected it to be one of those shows were the only people I knew were the staff. What I didn’t expect was that everyone else would be a chubby college girl between the age of 18 and 24. There was definitely some small scale but quite certainly sincere teen idol worship going on here, from the squeals of “Landon!!” when he emerged from the bathroom before his set to the way they crowded to the front of the stage while he played. His band was equally lovable, but I am pretty sure none of them noticed. Like the MySpace page his live set was quite definitely listenable. The “hit” “Falling in Love in a Coffee Shop” was endearing, it’s puppy love overtones and utter sincerity making it irresistible. Unfortunately he didn’t play what I had thought to be the best of the tunes “Dressed to Kill,” regrettably he did play his track “Darling I Do” from the Shrek Forever soundtrack. All the money he is going to make from its placement doesn’t change the fact that it was a pretty dreadful song.

The night went as expected; our surly bartender friend hated it. We were facing the stage on a couple of occasions when we heard the unmistakable clunk of shot glasses on the bar behind us- his way of dealing with music that isn’t his thing. Admittedly, I still have no idea what his thing is since he seems to hate everything. Sometimes it’s fun to see a show you aren’t invested in. Tonight was one of those nights, I’m glad I went.

One Man Band Night; June 8, 2010; The Wisco
Roboman


Asumaya



Daniel Francis Doyle

The Hussy/Wheels on Fire/The Honeyslides/Nestor; June 7, 2010; High Noon Saloon

If you had told me that would be a girl in every band tonight and that I would like them all, I would have told you that was crazy talk. It’s not that I dislike all girl singers; it’s just that more often than not that is the case. I already knew how much I enjoyed Heather, the Hussy’s hard hitting drummer who also mans the kit for the Honeyslides, but I had no idea how much I would like Wheels on Fire’s bouncy keyboard player and Nestor’s gorgeous-voiced lead singer.

In fact, based on their name I expected local band Nestor to be terrible. Unfair I know, but often you can judge a band by its name. I’d never heard of them before, and only one of their members looked even vaguely familiar, but they were surprisingly good and obviously practiced. The voice fronting the band was the key, there weren’t a lot of vocals but they were hypnotic and hard-hitting at the same time. I look forward to seeing them again. Hopefully this isn’t a one and done band. The Honeyslides had become more a legend than a band in my mind. They’d played their first gig toward the end of last year on an almost identical bill that substituted the Hemlines for Nestor, but only a handful since, none of which I had managed to attend. They weren’t necessarily a revelation, but it was some genuine, hook-filled power pop, a typical Matt Joyce band powered by Heather’s awe-inspiring drumming.

Wheels on Fire from Athens OH was the only out of town band on the bill, and I got the feeling that this show and last October’s similar bill had been set up just to support them, which after seeing them seems a very worthy cause. Their slick pop was instantly likeable and incessantly catchy. Handsome lead singer Michael Chaney had a magnetic stage presence, but it was keyboard player Susan Musser that really got my attention. In her rolled-up jeans and sneakers she seemed to be having the time of her life, out of the spotlight and totally intent on the music. She was awesome. The Hussy finished the night with another powerful leave-em-wanting-more short set. Heather’s furious pounding and charming willingness to belt the songs out with conviction even though she doesn’t have the best voice ever are the best part of the set, but it wouldn’t work without Bobby’s frantic guitar wailing and dueting voice. On paper it doesn’t seem like it would work, but on stage it most certainly does.

Nestor



The Honeyslides





Wheels on Fire




The Hussy

Houses in Motion; June 4, 2010; High Noon Saloon

It’s hard to know what came first for Houses in Motion, the desire to start a Talking Heads cover band or meeting a guy that sounds just like David Byrne. I almost imagine it had to be the latter, and I can imagine the ensuing conversation. “Dude, you sound just like David Byrne, we should start a Talking Heads cover band!” “Really, I do? OK, I’m in.” Luckily, the first statement would have come from one of the members of Czarbles, an always impressive local instrumental band, who already had all the pieces in place to make it happen. And they’ve done the same with Sabra Cadabra, their Black Sabbath cover band. Though I haven’t heard them, so I don’t know if that dude sounds just like Ozzy Osbourne.

There are two points of genius in this project. The first is that they don’t play very often, so when they do it’s an event. Their shows frequently sell out the spacious High Noon, a feat not often accomplished by a local band. There was plenty of space when the evening began, but by the end of the night the floor was crowded with dancers. The second is that they stick to early Talking Heads material, meaning that I didn’t recognize a whole lot of it. Of course I knew “Psycho Killer” and “Once in a Lifetime,” but “Burning Down the House” was probably the most recent song they played. I am actually a big fan of later material like Little Creatures and True Stories, but that is sort of a guilty pleasure.

They arranged the night chronologically. The first set consisted of the earliest material played by the four piece band (Czarbles plus the dude who sounded just like David Byrne). The second set moved into later recordings and added female backing vocalists and extra musicians. The problem was that all the extra folks just cluttered up the music. The girls didn’t really have amazing voices, so it was hard to understand why were there. Since I never saw the Talking Heads live, you know, other than their Stop Making Sense movie, which doesn’t really count, I’m already looking forward to Houses in Motion’s next show. Even though it may be a year from now.