Safe To Swim Weekend

I just got back from the second day of the Safe To Swim Weekend festival in Danbury, and I figured I'd throw up a photo or two and write a quick blurb about a couple of the bands that I liked...




TXT PSTLZ is Bruce Wingate's new band (or his old band, the Brunch Mummies, depending upon how you look at it), Bruce of course being ex of Adrenalin O.D., as well as the fairly awesome Shyster Shyster and Flywheel. TXT PSTLZ play old-fashioned crunchy, punchy punk rock, adding an exclamation point with some great covers. You coulda knocked me right over when they launched into Spoon's "Car Radio", and then followed it up with Cheap Trick's "He's a Whore"... I mean, that's an inside-the-park home run right there, pal. My thanks to Bruce for the couple of CDs he gave me, and to Jim Testa for bringing me copy of the Adrenalin O.D. "Wacky Hi-Jinks" CD re-issue (which he wrote the liner notes for), even though it isn't due to be out for another month... woo hoo! I got a freebie!




Failure's Art are from Danbury, and their set was way more rocked than I woulda guessed based on the recorded stuff of theirs that I've heard. I wouldn't want to say they sounded like Dinosaur Jr., or amped-up shoegaze (the sorta obvious comparisons that the local newspaper guy reached for), except that I was hoping to refresh my memory later by buying a CD or something from them after their set-- only when I asked them, they told me they didn't bring anything with them... Next time, I guess. Bonus points, though, for the Deadguy t-shirt the bass player was wearing.