Best. Saint. Patrick’s. Day. Ever!?!??!?!?!?
Well, the music was pretty motherfucking fantastic thanks to the Widow Babies, Carsuso Caruso, Walk, Skyline Electric and yet another MIND-BLOWING set from THE AMAZEMENTS!
Things got off to a great start with a quasi-psychedelic St. Paddy’s jungle of green streamers hung by the Amazements and friends. It put everybody in a great mood, and also served as a kind of avant-garde sculpture which (naturally) got mangled and, finally, destroyed in creative ways as the festivities progressed.
Skyline Electric included none other than Monday Night circuit-bending hero Jeff Boynton, Monday Night soup chef Andy Ben and Alan Myers of fuckin’ DEVO!!!! Yep, the drummer of Devo’s best and most popular line-up was jamming at Pehrspace. Wow—I was shitting myself—what a great conglomeration of talent! Skyline Electric wound their way through two expansive sonic amalgamations of drums, keys, horns, and whatnot. It sounded sort of like Amon Duul I hijacked by a bunch of mischievous leprechauns—a noisy, magical mirage.
The Widow Babies are one of the finest bands in the L.A. area currently. The debuted their new EP in its entirety. It has something to do with Mike Watt… Hmmm, I didn’t really grasp the concept there. But the music—that I got! You’d have to be braindead not to be rocked by their incredible interweaving bass/drums/guitar/vocal mastery. This band does a clever thing, audiophonically speaking. All the players play in different registers and the singer sings up really high. The result is that you can actually hear and feel every note from all performers, no matter how raging and complex things get—and they ripped out some pretty wild songs! This technique may sound elementary, but since the grunge era, its seems like a lot of bands have the instruments jamming away in the same frequencies. And that might make a beautiful sludge, but, man, does the Widow Babies music jump out at you because it is always hitting you at every frequency point at once. That’s pretty fucking arresting—these guys ‘n girl are gonna go far.
Walk is more conventional—with keys, guitar, vox and drums—but they make up for it by being just really great at what they do. Their songs are a bit college rock-ish, but they have great rhythm and a certain spazzy melodicism which I hope they resist all temptations to smooth out. I liked this band a lot.
The Amazements… Damn. What to say!? Week after week they have been launching new songs, reinventing old ones, and just generally demonstrating why this trio is the best in Los Angeles. I’ve compared them to bands from the past (stuff I adore like Beefheart, early U.S. Maple… although maybe a comparison to U.S. Maple predecessor band Shorty is also musically applicable here), highlighted the contemporary spin they put on their rock ‘n roll heritage, and talked about how they listen to each other and react in real time to all they crazy shit each of them is blasting from their instruments… But that is all a bit academic on my part. Believe me: The Amazements have a certain intangible quality that MUST be experienced, because in 2008, a GENIUS rock band is a beautiful and rare thing and these guys do it for real, with no reservations, and that’s pretty fucking special. The Amazements pulled out the head of St. Patrick impaled on a point, bloody stick, and even destroyed their drumkit at the end of the set, so they’ve got anarchic showmanship down, too. This week is the last of their Monday Night residency, so I would love to see all noise rock lovers and all the musicians who jammed with them all month for this final show. It’s gonna be a musical conflagration of epic proportions!!
All night, we had some truly rad DJing from the brothers Caruso. Rare and extremely danceable tunes poured from their music collections and into our ears and it was pretty goddamn glorious. Then, for the piece-de-resistance, the brothers clambered onstage for an incredibly impressive set of their own new music. Word is that they are leaving town again which, in my ever so humble opinion, is a total MISTAKE, ‘cuz what they did onstage—this confrontational post-psychedelic pop weirdness that simultaneously recalled my old Cleveland buddy (and recording protege) White Williams, plus Eno, Kim Fowley, Blurt, and even Porter Wagoner (!)—is truly unique and wonderful and made for Los Angeles!!! The Pehr audience this night was really grooving on Caruso Caruso so I can see success happening quickly in a big way. Caruso Caruso fucking slayed!
The other thing that made this party so fun was the incredible array of old and new friends, including Tai from Scoops Gelato and fellow ex-Clevelander Jessie who popped in from New York and made me so terrifically happy. Kyle did his usual awesome job with the sound (even though he was iPod-less) and Pehrspace was once again the perfect host for our experimentation with sound and visuals and FUN!
This week: the aforementioned final Monday Night installment of the Amazements’ month, a sure to be brain squelching performance from my favorite post-lysergic noise duo Moment Trigger, three touring bands that each dissect different parts of the best aspects of grunge (including Suzanne Silver from Italy—how rare is that!?), plus DJing from Amazements co-conspirator Sam, DJ Kyle Mabson AND a surprise guest set from face-shredding, glass-eating electronic chaos master Justice Yeldham from Australia. I also made cool new wristbands.
So work off that holiday ham and get yer butts down to Pehrspace for what promises to be one of the most transcendent shows of 2008 so far!!!!
SEAN CARNAGE PRESENTS SPECIAL MONDAY NIGHT CURATORS
THE AMAZEMENTS…. THE FIRST 4 MONDAYS IN MARCH!!!
DON’T MISS THIS CLIMACTIC CONCERT!
MONDAY, March 24th
The Amazements
Late Severa Wires
Moment Trigger
Suzanne Silver
Wisdom Teeth
+ Justice Yeldham (from Australia)
+ Sam spinning & performing?
+DJ Kyle Mabson
Music starts 9:30pm SHARP! / all-ages / $5
Pehrspace—325 Glendale Blvd., in Echo Park
See you there?
Photos below by Sean C. and Brendan
The Amazements & friends created an AWESOME St. Patrick’s jungle…
Skyline Electric!!!
The Widow Babies!!!
Carnage & Tai from old Il Corral neighbor Scoops Gelato!!!
Walk!!!
Yeah—Jessie made a surprise visit from NYC!!!
M.A.B.S.O.N.
The Amazements!!!
Caruso Caruso!!!
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