New Haven's roster of DIY spaces is in a bit of a transition right now, meaning new unfamiliar neighborhoods for me every time I go down to New Haven to see a show, which is kinda neat because it also means new parking challenges. I get way too involved about where I park my car, I guess; like how some people like to collect stupid movie shit, I like to find a good parking spot. Anyway, the venue at Daggett Street is in a pretty interesting place, partly because it's at the end of a long brick-walled alleyway behind an old factory building (long ago converted to 'artists spaces'), making it sorta like walking around the old Colt building in Hartford. Oh wait, I just noticed that I spelled Daggett wrong in the photo caption up there. Oh, well, who gives a fuck.
It's been a couple of years since I saw Night Birds at The Whitney House, and in the meantime they've switched guitar players, which doesn't mean that they still can't blow the doors off a place whenever they want to. Mike Hunchback was an awesome player and it was fun to watch him rolling around and stuff, but the 'new' guy is pretty good, too, and he still double-picks the riffs so that they sound like a Man or Astro-Man LP on 78. A bunch of little squirts were running around crashing into people while Night Birds were tearing it up, but one of the things I've noticed about New Haven which is kinda cool is that there's always someone around who steps in and straightens things out.
Temps were still a bit elevated afterwards, though, and maybe that's why Estrogen Highs (playing last) came out and did one of the more aggressive sets that I've seen them play lately-- although their new LP was out, too, so maybe they just wanted to throw down. The new record has some great tracks on it, like the opener "Tell It To Them"-- which, when they were playing it live over the past few shows, practically sounded like the Ramones compared to the rest of their set-- and "Seventh Sunday", which has a Blue Öyster Cult type riff or sounds like something off "Malcolm X Park" or "Series of Sneaks", or whatever. "Irrelevant Future", out now on Trouble In Mind, on mixed vinyl so yours might look different from mine.
One of Tommy Perkins' three or four new bands, Little Seizures, were one of the openers, and I was surprised as hell to see that Bill Florio was their bass player, since I used to read "Greedy Bastard" all the time. I've never met Bill in person before, so I went up to him and told him how much I used to dig his zine, but he didn't seem to want to hear it and sorta blew me off like "yeah, right, whatever". Little Seizures were definitely rock and roll on this night, and finished their set with a cover of "Civilization's Dying" (Zero Boys), which had everyone going nuts. Tommy's got another band, Mutant Genes, who are a bit more hardcore and are playing at Whitney House later this month; their demo's on Bandcamp, you should look it up. Supposedly both Little Seizures and Mutant Genes have 7"-ers coming out later this year, but I wouldn't know, nobody tells me anything.
"The Seventh Sunday of The Ordinary Times"
Night Birds -
"Midnight Movies"
Little Seizures -
6 comments:
Watched a clip of Little Seizures playing a few songs on YouTube. There's an inflatable banana and then T-Perk gets hit with a pie. Weirder is that it's a multi-camera production.
Yeah, they actually have a handful of YouTube clips that are all done pretty fancy (one was shot in Super 8, or was mocked-up to look like Super 8 at least). I wonder who's doing them.
Okay, so let's clear the air here.
1. I can't for Bill Florio personally but will vouch that he is a hell of a nice guy and usually very personable and chatty. Chalk it up to an off night?
2. The quality of several Little Seizures Youtube videos is due to the husband and wife who run Go Ape/Fancy that are putting out our 7" being responsible for making them. The Super 8 one is someone else, as are the Guitar Wolf show ones, but yeah, the "pie" one is all Go Ape as is the Don Pedro gig that opens with a shot of the subway.
3. Yes! Both bands are putting out 7"s. Mutant Genes' will be out hopefully next week or so before our late April tour. Little Seizures, as mentioned above, will be out on Go Ape/Fancy, probably around late May or early June.
4. That "pie" was actually a foil plate filled with shaving cream. You have no idea how much that burns in the old eye socket. Fortunately my friend John who did it also got himself and was unaware of the inedible nature of the pie contents he was shoving into our faces.
Yeah, it's no big deal with Bill, I just threw it out there because I thought it was funny. You should see some of the looks I give people when they walk up to me and say that they used to read a zine that I wrote 20 years ago. Well, actually, it's only happened once.
"4. That "pie" was actually a foil plate filled with shaving cream."
I have heard that TV pies are always shaving cream as whipped cream would melt under the lights. But concert pies? Those should be REAL PIES. Remember that Pac-Men show with the cake? Real! Confectionery war paint! But then there was the time somebody had the bright idea of slitting open that bag of cement and cement smoke was all in our eyes ears noses and throats. I'm surprised Newtown Teen Center had us, or anybody else, back after that.
Shaving-cream-as-pie reminds me of a Tonight Show story that I heard as a kid, when Johnny Carson made Ed McMahon eat shaving cream which was meant to represent ice cream under the TV lights. Ed was doing a sponsor bit, and Johnny was like "Oh yeah, if that's so great, why don't you have some of it right now?", knowing that the audience didn't realize that it wasn't real ice cream. Ed, being a dupe and not wanting to piss off a network sponsor, started eating it. Johnny Carson must've been a mean son of a bitch.
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