Most who read this space (and I'm right there with you these days when I say, where exactly is this space?) understand that while I've come to accept the fact that rock music has become one big revolving Price Is Right showcase showdown wheel, I still get a huge rush of adrenaline from anyone who turns the unavoidable rehash into something new--especially if that "new" gets me jumping around like a teenager again.
A couple of weeks ago I peeked out from backstage as a packed, all-ages Showbox audience stood appreciatively yet nearly stock still as Visqueen played to one of their biggest, most intimidating crowds to date. Then Pretty Girls Make Graves came out and performed the best live set I've witnessed from this astounding, innervating musical force, and though there was a tight core of kids in front of the stage going apeshit with rapture, I was irked by the majority standing--you got it--stock still, arms folded over chest, eyes gazing forward at the band I believe kick-started the local scene into becoming the hotbed of creativity it is today. These kids have their whole lives ahead of them to stand around joylessly, I thought, and when I mentioned this to a few friends, including Pretty Girls member Derek Fudesco, they all said the same thing: This is Seattle. Everyone just stands at shows.
I guess I just hadn't realized that the kids did it too. This past week, however, I saw two shows that had audience members, and even a handful of us jaded folk, laughing with glee. And guess what? Hipsters largely missed out.
Event One: Studio Seven is in a God-awful location, situated among stacked freight containers, wooden pallets, and chunks of ersatz concrete and gravel-strewn roads. It was my maiden trip to this relatively new all-ages venue (alcohol is available upstairs to those with proper ID), and I was there to see the Sounds. I didn't care about openers Palo Alto or headliners Rooney; I was there for the Swedes. Studio Seven is a great venue, but that night it felt like a movie set, and a bunch of us couldn't help but compare the atmosphere to that of Singles. If I came back the next day and found the club gone I wouldn't be the least bit surprised. It felt like Portland, 1992, and Love on Ice was about to play--that's how weird it was.
The boys in the band took the stage wearing belts that read "The Sounds Est. 1998," a middle finger to the media mindset that the Sounds are yet another manufactured act. When Heineken-swigging singer Maja came out, her authenticity was immediately apparent; to say she ruled the roost is an understatement. "Today I'm your teacher," she informed the sweaty audience, "and I bet you've never had a fucking HOT Swedish teacher tell you what to do." In a matter of moments she had the entire audience singing along as she climbed up on the drum set and swung her microphone around like a cock. After the show I learned a certain publication dedicated to women in rock had requested an interview of Maja. The singer's response? "Tell them to go fuck themselves."
Event Two: The mere mention of grunge in this region sends hipsters into a quandary--to shun or not to shun? That bugs the shit out of me. Tragedy aside, grunge was a blast to experience live, and though the crowd at Graceland last Friday night was composed of 75 percent men, my friends and I banged our heads and howled like teenagers as Local H played one of the best live shows I've seen in years. Openers Sullen played a ferocious set--two guitar-shredding singers, one of each gender--and two songs in, Shanna Kiel was bleeding from both knees while partner Justin Slazinik channeled Sonic Youth and all that was grunge into a fabulously heavy snarl of sound. Check out the St. Louis trio's debut full-length, Paint the Moon, on Chicago's Thick Records.
* * *
Congratulations to Amanda and James Bertram of Luckyhorse Industries on the birth of baby boy Emmett James. And congratulations to the Pine Street Mafia (the folks behind Linda's, Rudy's, the Cha Cha) for brand-new Belltown baby Viceroy, a swank new bar on Second and Battery.
