If The Universe Is Just Us Then That's An Awful Waste Of Space

Here's the Blessed State interview that ran in Incremental Decrepitude #2, which not a lot of people saw (completely by their own choice, I understand) so I figured I'd scan it and post it here. As usual, you can right-click on the images a couple of times to make them bigger. Blessed State have a week-long tour out to Milwaukee and back coming up in August, and their "Head Space" EP came out on Safety Meeting on June 24th. I'm not gonna say 'dropped' because that's so Anthony Fantano/'90s MTV. Anyway, the rec is pressed on 12" 45, which is pretty neat, and as you can see from the pic below -- which I stole from the Safety Meeting website -- it looks pretty snazzy, too. Here's the first couple of tracks from the EP, and you can also listen to the whole thing on Bandcamp. People can 'follow' each other on Bandcamp now, did you know that? Weird.

I've Been Haunted By Humans

I don't think I've ever not had a blast at a New Haven house/DIY show, across dozens of shows and 7 or 8 different venues, so this one was no different... in fact, it was probably more fun than all of the others, since it was scrunched up next to the washer/dryer (see pics, they're around here somewhere) and there was a fire pit in the back yard (as most New Haven backyards seem to have) and the house itself was super-neat and had a bunch of cool flyers tacked up on the living room wall of shows I've actually been to, so it was like a memory flashback... anyway, Estrogen Highs played as a trio without Wes, who was off working or fucking around somewhere, so they decided to throw all of their songs down the toilet and play them with a bunch of feedback and extended improv parts and so forth, and it sounded GREAT. The songs played were "Supposing View", "Alley Man", "Weed Queen", "It Has To Rhyme", and a couple of new ones; I might have one of the songs wrong, but fuckit, two people are gonna read this, so I don't think it matters. I remember thinking to myself, "man, why haven't they been playing all of these songs like this in the first place?" It's kinda neat when a band is able to pull their own songs apart to see what other stuff is inside them -- I saw Estrogen Highs do the same thing at Discovery Zone with Chip once, and maybe Cafe Nine or one other time, though that might've been just because they were all plastered -- and still have it sound like a good time, instead of a mess. Blessed State's set was plagued by sound and mic problems and Andrew cut his hand open after the first couple of songs and started bleeding all over himself, but y'know, it still wasn't bad and Kiana's Negative Approach shirt ruled. I finally figured out that the new slower one isn't a long song at all (must've been putting two songs together in my head the last time), so now I'm thinking they should just put everything up on Bandcamp and start selling digital albums that way instead of waiting for them to be pressed up, because I'm dying to hear this stuff in a proper form -- unless the tracks still haven't been mastered yet, I mean, what the fuck do I know about these things. I can't even write a coherent paragraph, and that's supposedly my main hobby.

Just Nod Your Head So They'll Go Away Again

We were told not to park in the church parking lot next door, so I drove around the block a couple of times and just as I was making a right off Washington a cop came up right behind me and turned his lights on for me to pull over. I wasn't doing anything anyway (I was actually kinda driving a little slow and looking for a place to park), so as I started to slide towards the shoulder Mr. Policeman sorta sauntered past me (there was no emergency, obviously) and cut his lights as soon as he was two feet ahead of me, meaning he was being a dick and just wanted me to move out of the way so he could get to the Dunkin' before it closed or whatever. Not that it was the worst thing that happened all night, which was some kid who was at the show getting hit by a car crossing the street, I'm told he's okay now though. I ended up parking in the church lot anyway, as did everyone else. Screw your rules.

Anyway, Blessed State started off their set with a really long drawn out song (unless it was two songs put together, I wasn't really paying attention) which seemed like it wasn't gonna go anywhere but then all of a sudden this great hook just started popping up, like I'm telling you it was a really good song and I started getting into it, and it was fuckin' long, too, I don't usually like long songs. I hope they haven't really finished their record like they say they have and can put this one on it, because it really should be on there, it's really cool. I think they ended up playing one or two other new songs, too, only their set got cut short because the thing that happened outside, but maybe I'll be seeing Blessed State again this weekend and I can figure it all out then.

There were some other bands that played but they were just some people from around, nothing to get too worked up about. That was a joke, you obviously haven't been here before.

I Wish There Was Something We Could Call You People

This show was pretty peachy, especially since you never know what you're gonna find when you hit a place for the first time. I managed to swing a parking spot right out in front that wasn't a handicapped spot (would've sucked if I had to park on one of the other side streets), plus, as basement venues go, this one has a bunch of neat things going for it. There's a decent-sized lawn out in back with a couple of fire pits for people to stand around making s'mores or whatever (really, that's what they were doing), and what not. The downstairs area where the bands play is decorated kinda like if the back room of a record store fell into an Applebee's, or what you'd imagine Chuck Eddy's basement looks like (I was gonna say Jim DeRogatis' basement but there weren't enough empty Cheetos bags laying around), and for extra visual noise there was a TV in the corner that by the end of the night was constantly playing some Turkish comedy show or something. I'm guessing no one uses the shower.

Blessed State and Potty Mouth were both dead-on, in fact I'd say this was probably the best set I've seen so far from Potty Mouth, who're becoming much more adept at their way of rocking vs. when I first saw them a year ago, and it really showed in the way they were playing off the crowd last Saturday night. Potty Mouth's got a new record coming out that I think is gonna turn some heads -- not that they haven't been getting a lot of attention lately anyway -- as there's some tracks on there like "The Gap" and "Rusted Shut" that came out like total gems, plus there's the two tracks from the "Big In Brazil" cassette like "Black and Studs", which I think is the best recorded track they've produced to date. On Saturday they ended their set with a cover of "Today Your Love, Tomorrow The World", which caught me by surprise because not only had I started walking out to my car already, thinking they were done, and then had to head back when I heard them starting another song, but I'm also not sure if they bothered to sing the "Nazi shatze" part or even if I've ever heard them attempt a cover before.

Blessed State wiped the floor pretty good, too; when I saw them a week or two earlier, in a tiny basement room in East Hartford, I stood right in front of Kiana's bass cabinet which (along with the cellblock-sized room) gave me a better appreciation of how much of an anchor she is for this band. Unfortunately, I stood in front of Rob this time, but that's where the fan was blowing so it was a lot cooler over there. Blessed State have this one song, I don't know the name of it and I never remember to ask (they just call it out as 'number 5'), but the bass line sounds like a total monster on it and it could be their best song right now -- I guess I'll have to wait for when the record comes out. By the way, last time I said Blessed State had enough material for an EP, but they've maybe gone past that and might even be putting together an LP now. You should see me trying to write and think at the same time, it gets pretty hilarious.


Potty Mouth -

"The Spins"

Blessed State -

"Wiser"

Don't Dig Where The Well Went Dry

Parkville gets all the hype as the hip 'multi-cultural' neighborhood of the moment (i.e., where suburban whites will drop a few bucks at the Piolin chicken place on a Friday night before hurriedly getting the fuck out), but I think East Hartford is just as interesting-- especially the Main St. section of Rte 44, where there's a cool-looking indie food store or restaurant every couple of feet-- plus it's a much easier neighborhood to drive through and the parking's way better. I'm mentioning this, even though you probably don't give a shit, because The Only Place That Ever Felt Like Home is a new-ish DIY spot in East Hartford, tucked in the basement of an old brick factory building, and it's got a lot going for itself so far; the walls and floor are all concrete and brick, which seems to help the sound a lot, plus it's in the middle of a parking lot off the street so it's not one of those basement venues where you end up driving around the block a few times just to find a parking spot. And, if you get the urge for a soda or something, there's a little plaza right at the end of the street, with like a chinese place and a dollar store and stuff (at least I think there was a dollar store).

I got there yesterday just as Snotrocket were playing their last two songs, though not before I walked through the wrong factory door a couple of times. Even though I caught them for only about 3 or 4 minutes, Snotrocket (which is Tim from Dead Uncles/Groomers and Dan Katz from Book Slave/Swift Moving, among others) (I hope I got that right) sounded pretty good. Not that I remember what the songs specifically sounded like, since we're only talking about 3 or 4 minutes here and my brain doesn't process that fast, but it was good, catchy rock. Much better songs than Groomers, although that's an unfortunate sentence. Supposedly Snotrocket will recording a demo later in the month, and then I won't have to worry about relying on my shitty memory after that.

Blessed State have progressed a ton since their demo last year, or even since I saw them the last time in April. It's actually gotten to the point where the new songs are so much better that I don't even want to hear them play the old songs anymore, although they only played a couple of old ones on Saturday anyway, so it's not like I suffered too much. There seems to be less processing going on with the guitar sound now and more straight-ahead punchy rocking instead, plus they seem to be trying more post-punk type twists with the new songs instead of just building a guitar wall, Noel Gallagher-style (ha ha, I just compared Blessed State to Oasis, that's pretty funny) (fuck you). The new songs are NOT all Hüsker Dü-- that's what everyone says, right? I gotta keep up with these things-- but the Wipers comparison still stands, so there you go. Potentially they'll be recording enough new songs for a 7" or 12" EP soon, that oughta be pretty hot.

Birth of Flower's new 7" is out, two songs recorded with Will at Dead Air Studios which sound heavy as fuck, but not in a cheesy obvious doom/sludge sort of way, more like that weird '70s Euro acid-prog record that everybody talks about on record collector message boards but nobody owns because it was a private press and there was only one acetate. I've seen some bands, and not many of them have bettered the set that Birth of Flower played in a little 18' x 18' basement room last night. Birth of Flower are the best band in Connecticut right now, and that's about it.


Birth of Flower, "Masters in Suspicion"



Blessed State, "Head Space"