Ears. Still. Ringing.
Thanks for those that showed up and stayed late last night. If anyone has any photos they can share please send them to 800octane@gmail.com!
Show Journal 2012-11-17
When I think back to our first shows in Portland I think of rock clubs. Not clean all-ages rooms that double as art spaces, but gritty bars and dingy clubs. I think of layers upon layers of stickers and flyers, scratches and gouges on all walls, holes in the floor, and load in areas that probably double as a homeless shelter on an off night. I also think of stages. Small, covered in cords, a PA that has seen better days, and lighting that doesn’t really do anything. Aside from the negatives I think about the positives. I think about walking in and hearing music you like on the sound system, a cool staff that appreciates music and being at a place your friends may hang out at even if you weren’t playing. Satyricon. EJ’s. Tonic Lounge. They weren’t perfect, but you learned to love them, ugliness and all. By those criteria, the East End was a rock club in every sense of the word and tonight was one of those nights that took me back to the 90’s. Aside from my overwhelming sense of déjà vu, the show was pretty excellent. Stumblebum played first and dished out solid songs with a touch of hot rod sensibilities. Thundering Asteroids were second and awfully good. Catchy, energetic and fun with songs about skating and video games. It was nice to see Dwight again after all these years as we first shared the stage with his old band Thrust a few times back in 1997. Finding another old guy in the scene always makes me feel better. We “headlined” and the set felt really good. We have a very active front row who knew all the words and made the show all the more fun to play. We saw a couple of familiar faces and a few news ones. Not a bad night. Thanks to the East End for having us, Scott for setting up the show and those who stayed up late to rock out with us.
The triforce nears completion
Tonight will be our third show this year. That means we have will played 3x as many shows as 2011. Both Thundering Asteroids! and Stumblebum sound pretty rad, so this is shaping up to be a good show. Check it out if you are in the area!
The show gods giveth and they taketh away
Unfortunately we had to cancel our set in Seattle tomorrow evening. The show is still going on, just without us. If you are in the area go check it out anyway. Really, it’s hard to have a bad evening if Moral Crux is playing.
Show Journal 2012-06-08
I’ve noticed playing shows sure hurts a lot more than it used to. Had I followed the advice of Tenacious D and performed 20 rock squats before our set I may be in better shape today. Our contractually obligated show openers 48 Thrills started the show and then promptly left to perform another, presumably better show. Can’t say I blame them. It’s not like we were going to play something they haven’t heard before. The Stims were up second and sounded good considering our multi year absence from seeing them perform. We make a lot of “we’re old” jokes but it’s nice to see other people in the same boat as well. We have been circling the scene with at least two other members of their band since 1998. Although we don’t hang out much, it’s nice knowing you have something in common with people that goes that far back. My New Vice was third and clearly the main attraction of the evening. They sounded great. Impressive guitar work, catchy songs and people were fired up to see them. At this point they’ve been playing for many years, but this was my first time seeing them and I dug it. We “headlined” and I think it went over pretty well. There was an active bunch of folks up front clapping, singing, and throwing their hands in the air as if they didn’t care, which really made the night excellent. The resulting puddle of ball sweat and beer says that we did something right. All in all a pretty good night. Thanks to everyone who endured the crappy weather and stayed up until the wee hours of the morning with us. Also, thanks to Brian from The Stims for setting up the show. It’s a thankless job!
Plan B from Outer Space
We are playing a show tomorrow night in Portland with My New Vice, The Stims and 48 THRiLLS at Plan B Venue. We’re up last so plan on a late Friday night!
Two June shows
We’ve got two shows next month, including one in PDX with numerous friends’ bands and another in Seattle with Moral Crux, who we haven’t played a show with in about, oh, 12 years or so.
Well, that was fun.
Many thanks to those that come out to the show last night. We did upload two photos. Quite honestly, they aren’t very good pictures but our last photo uploads were back in April of 2010.
Show Journal 2012-02-25
About nine months had passed since our last show so we were pretty stoked to play tonight. All in all the show was pretty awesome. Cool venue, decent sound, good sized crowd and quite a few familiar faces. In fact, we saw some folks tonight we hadn’t seen in many years, some in almost a decade. It’s weird to think we played a few songs that were older than some of the people attending. Our set was pretty uneventful and drama free. We snuck in Ghosts of Monochrome, which we hadn’t played in years. Of course when you only play once a year that statement is pretty meaningless. Now, this is the part of the review where I comment about how much I liked 48 Thrills. To mix it up, we’re going Mad Libs style. 48 Thrills sounded _____ tonight, which is no surprise since they are _____. They have been one of our _____ bands since we met them in _____ while playing with _____. Hopefully your interpretation was positive and didn’t involve any phallus jokes. Speaking of phallus jokes, the highlight of the show actually occurred during the load out when at least 3/4 of the band members noticed and made inappropriate comments about what Dustin later dubbed “the world’s hottest tranny”. Stay classy Old Town. Thanks to Jeff and Backspace, all the other bands and the people who came out of a cold and soggy night. We really do appreciate everyone who comes to these shows and lets us keep playing. Next show in 2013?
Saturday Night Fever
This Saturday we are playing at Backspace in Portland w/ Burnside Heroes, Mourning Bed Head and our partners in crime 48 Thrills. This will be our first show in nine months. There are no new songs to debut, but a few rare ones may be performed. If you get a chance stop on by and see the effects of time and irrelevance on our once proud band. All ages? Yes, all ages.
Random Photos