All You Hippies Can Fade Away

This was a one-off show at Popeye's Garage, which is still sorta shut down, which is a shame because Popeye's has fast become one of my all-time favorite places to see bands, along with the Whitney House. Both the Whitney House and Popeye's Garage have the same sort of vibe that the old Anthrax Club had, for reasons beyond just being DIY spaces. There's some other smaller reminders, too, like having to climb down a rickety set of stairs in order to get into the basement at the Whitney House, or Popeye's being in a burnt-out semi-industrial area and having a crowd of regulars that show up almost regardless of who's playing that night, just like it was at the old Anthrax. It's being left open that Popeye's could be ressurected at any given time, so we'll see what happens. Even if it isn't, it certainly left a pretty good skidmark over the past six months.

Estrogen Highs opened the show, once again with a set made up of almost all new stuff, save for "Logical Doctor" and maybe one or two others from the first LP. I've given up trying to figure out which ones are new songs, which ones are old songs that I don't recognize, and which ones are covers, although I found out that one of the new songs I like is called "Irresponsibility" because it's up on the MySpace now. Also, some of the slower, VU-type chuggers have been already released in demo form on the Permanent Feels cassettes(s), if you feel like digging in that direction. Brian from Dead Uncles/Escalator sat in on drums this time, and he'll be drumming on the upcoming tour that starts in mid-December, too, which is when at least one of the new Estrogen Highs records is supposed to be out. I thought I read somewhere that one of the new records is coming out on Safety Meeting, though I forgot to check if that's true or not, and there's an LP that will be coming out on Stefan and Kryssi's new label, Gramery (not Never Heard of It, but something else).

Terrible Twos didn't sound so hot to me at first, partly because I was standing off to the right side of the room, which is the better side to take photos from (because of the damn flourescent light on the back wall) except that the bands sound worse from that side. Once I moved to the left side, Terrible Twos sounded pretty good-- maybe like Catholic Boys with added keyboards, although once I caught myself thinking "gee, this song sounds just like the last two songs" for the third song in a row, it was time to go outside for a walk.

I'm sure there's not much new for me to add about Tyvek; the new LP, "Nothing Fits", is almost perfect-- friggin' blown-out loud, wilfully pissed off, and average-guy pathetic all at the same time-- so if you've been holding off checking these guys out before for any reason, now's a really good time to jump in. When I first heard the "Demos" tape (which was mostly songs that are on the new album) earlier in the year I was doing backflips, and the LP nails those songs completely; sorta like the second coming of Crime crossed with one of the forgotten bands on "Not So Quiet on The Western Front". Heath brought a whole box of Fag Tapes stuff with him, including a couple of new tapes of Tyvek demos and rehearsals that I bought but haven't listened to yet (one of them came in its own handmade little envelope). Great show: a bunch of slamming during Tyvek's set (the kind that punks do, not the kind that jocks do), people crowdsurfing and playing keep-away with Josh Kelly's shoe, Kevin from Tyvek not being able to read the set list because he was wearing sunglasses which he still never took off, really funny shit. Fer sure gunna miss this place.


Tyvek -

"Underwater To"

"Nothing Fits"

Terrible Twos -

"Crash the Circuit"

"Negative Drip"

Estrogen Highs -

"New Amphetamine Shriek"
(Fugs cover)