2004 Recap

Seeing as it’s already halfway through January, it seems a bit late to be posting a “Favorites of 2004” list. Oh well, I wouldn’t want to disappoint any of my loyal readers (yes, both of you). Better late than never, right?

Fave Shows

If you count the 2 free warehouse shows and the Sunday BBQ matinee I attended, I went to 57 shows in 2004. Not bad for a guy who’s always complaining that nobody decent ever plays in Mootown. Here are the ones that stand out the most:

Love / The Zombies – This is the first show that comes to mind due to the absolutely amazing performance of Love’s Arthur Lee. For a guy pushing 60, he puts most performers less than half his age to shame – energetic, charismatic, and he still has an amazing voice. The band, which featured original Love guitarist Johnny Echols alongside the Baby Lemonade boys, positively smoked. This was no state fair oldies act! The Zombies set wasn’t as impressive, but still enjoyable. Colin Blunstone was in amazing voice, but keyboardist Rod Argent had a tendency to jam too much on some numbers (I really didn’t need to hear “Indication” turned into a prog rock song at the end). Still, it didn’t ruin an evening of terrific music that was well worth the weeknight drive to Greeley.

David Bowie – This was, by far, the best show I’ve ever seen Bowie do (who else saw that awful Glass Spider tour in the 80’s? Yuck!). In the relatively small surroundings of the Fillmore (I think we were maybe 20 feet from the man himself), Bowie mesmerized with a terrific 2-1/2 hour set of old and new tunes. He literally sang until his voice gave out. When he came back a few months later to play an arena date, we passed as we didn’t want anything to interfere with our memories of this perfect evening.

The Hives / Sahara Hotnights / Reigning Sounds – Yeah, their schtick can be ridiculous, but it’s all forgivable when you see the Hives perform live. They work incredibly hard on stage, until every member has sweated through their clothing (I’d hate to be the guy doing their laundry on tour). Add to that terrific opening sets by the Sahara Hotnights and Reigning Sound and you have a show so good you don’t mind dealing with the all ages crowd.

PJ Harvey – No shocker, Polly Jean once again delivered a great live set. The woman was born to be on a stage, and anyone who has ever witnessed her live knows this. Even better, afterwards I had time to catch a late show with the Dirtbombs and Dead Moon. Perhaps my ultimate rock and roll evening of 2004!

Also great: Hot Snakes, MC5/DKT, Clinic, Secret Machines, Tommy Stinson, Von Bondies (twice), Skulls, Psychedelic Furs, Vibrators, UK Subs, Cramps, Futureheads…and, of course, the Squirrels 20th Anniversary Show and 15th Annual Xxxmas Show.

Of Special Note:

The Pixies – This show, for me, was the biggest “ehhhhh” of the year. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t nearly as impressive as I was expecting. They sounded fine, they played well, but where was the fire and passion? Maybe I read too many rave reviews prior to the show, as I was expecting to be blown away. Instead I was just mildly entertained, nothing more and nothing less. I was thinking it was maybe just me, but we went out for dinner with some friends afterwards and we all agreed that the show was okay…but just okay, definitely not excellent or exciting.

The Von Bondies opening for The Donnas – Perhaps the best example I’ve ever seen of an opening act blowing the headliners off of the stage. Well, since the time I saw You Am I warm up for Therapy?…or maybe Green Day warming up for the Best Kissers in the World. (“Who?” I hear you ask. Don’t worry, nobody else remembers the Best Kissers either.)

Fave Releases of 2004

Seeing as I took a big pay cut in 2004, my music budget has gone down considerably. Still, I managed to scrape together enough spare change to buy a few new releases. I kept going back to these:

AC Newman The Slow Wonder – Terrific power pop from the former Zumpano leader and current New Pornographers frontman Newman. This might be the best thing to come out of Canada since, uh, Triumph? But I kid the Canadians….

Futureheads s/t – Quirky new wave with distinctive vocal harmonies, made all the more charming by the band refusing to smooth out their strong accents. I can’t stop playing this disc, and it gets better each time I give it a spin.

Franz Ferdinand s/t – Like a lot of the old new wave that this emulates, I wonder if I’ll be embarrassed about liking this so much some day? Nahhhhhhhh….

Rocket From the Tombs Rocket Redux – Did you hear the one about the legendary proto-punk band that never recorded anything during their brief existence that reunited (more or less) and quickly cut an album that absolutely killed? Well, you should’ve – this thing is amazing. Your average mall punk band would sell their souls to record something this ferocious – not bad for a bunch of cranky old men.

Secret Machines Now Here is Nowhere – This puppy is all about the drums! Loud freakin’ drums – part “When the Levee Breaks” Zeppelin, and part driving Krautrock (think Neu or Can). Add some 90’s indie rock sensibilities, and you’ve got a pretty great CD. I love it.

I also loved: Brian Wilson SMiLE, Sahara Hotnights Kiss & Tell, PJ Harvey Uh Huh Her, The Libertines s/t, Hives Tyrannosaurus Hives, Loretta Lynn Van Lear Rose, Sonic Youth Sonic Nurse, Thrills Let’s Bottle Bohemia, Green Day American Idiot, Von Bondies Pawn Shoppe Heart, Briefs Sex Objects, Breezy Porticos Keep It Crisp….

I also managed to pick up a few reissues:

The Faces Five Guys Walk Into a Bar… – The rare box set that delivers consistently from beginning to end. This has a great assortment of material – all of their singles, key album tracks, rehearsals, concert recordings, and BBC sessions. From raucous rockers to heartbreaking ballads, these four CD’s make a solid case for the Faces as one of the greatest bands ever. Give these discs a spin, have a few drinks, and get lost in it all.

Zolar X Timeless – A collection of glam/space/bubblegum-rock by some 1970’s LA nutjobs who dressed like spacemen. Seriously – we’re talking silver space suits and antennae on their heads. This is some fun stuff. In the liner notes, Jello Biafra describes them as “the missing link between the Stooges and Chrome.” Yeah, that sounds about right to me – set phasers on stun!

The Fastbacks Truth, Corrosion and Sour Biscuits – Basically a collection of odds and ends, recordings that were too good to let get away lovingly compiled for the fans. This is heavy on covers (Soft Boys, UK Subs, Raspberries, Elton John, Tommy James), with a few choice originals. Anyone who has known me awhile knows how much this band meant to me, so needless to say I love it. My favorite is “We Tried,” perhaps an adequate description of their career. Hell, as far as I’m concerned they succeeded…(special thanks to KB for sending this my way.)

And the mixed bag of the year award goes to:

Nirvana With the Lights Out – I’m sure that I wasn’t the only old Nirvana fan who bought this the day it came out, threw it on the CD player, and felt a bit overwhelmed. Granted, there is some good stuff on these discs. However, there is also a lot of material that is just average. And there are a few real stinkers to endure. (I challenge anyone to listen to the godawful rehearsal of “Scentless Apprentice” on disc 3 more than once – nearly 10 minutes of pure torture. I actually made it through twice.) If you’re a fan you’ll want to hear it all, but its not something you’ll listen to very often. Maybe you can burn a CD of your faves, or load them onto your ipod (I hear those are all the rage with the kids nowadays). Interesting, sure, but this won’t replace Nirvana’s actual releases.

Oh, and I think I went to a few movies as well…

It’s a Massacre at Central High Christmas

It’s interesting how different people create their own unique holiday traditions. We celebrated our most revered tradition on Christmas Eve Eve this year – our annual holiday double feature. Most folks would assume that we’d be enjoying a few holiday classics. Maybe It’s a Wonderful Life, Miracle on 34th Street, or perhaps a comedy like A Christmas Story. Well, every year we enjoy a lineup of two of the finest films ever to grace a movie or television screen – Massacre at Central High and The Van. I’ve been trying to piece together the foggy memories as to how this became an annual event. I think it was because I used to try and visit Denver every Christmas, and this was a good excuse for me and my friends TJ and Eric to get together, drink beer, and laugh at some familiar cheesy movies. It’s become a tradition with us – it’s not a question of if we’ll do this, but when during the holiday season we’ll do it. I’ve decided to give my thoughts on Massacre in this post.

My friend TJ was the first of us to discover Massacre, which was originally released in 1976. Back in the 80’s, an edited version appeared pretty regularly on late night programming on WTBS. He taped it at some point, and that was the copy we watched several times. Once we rented it for a party during our college days, just so we could see it uncut. A few years after that, I dubbed copies for us when I found it at Scarecrow Video in Seattle. The film has been out of print in this country for many years, but is available on DVD in England – I’ve actually entertained the idea of getting a multi region player many times for this reason. I recently found a DVD-r copy to replace my worn vhs dub, which I’d guess was burned from the foreign DVD, and this was what we watched this year.

(The next paragraph is a plot synopsis of the film and contains spoilers, so don’t read if you think you’ll be trying to track this down and see it for yourself. If you don’t mind knowing everything that’s going to happen, read on.)

The film is more or less about a group of bullies who run a high school, whom we’ve dubbed “the inner circle.” Enigmatic newcomer David arrives at Central High, and it turns out he’s old friends with inner circle member Mark (their mysterious past is never explained, but fighting every day to survive is mentioned, and Mark repeatedly says that he “owes” David). Mark is eager to induct David into the inner circle, so that his old friend (who he “owes”) can help he and his cronies rule the school and maintain the status quo. David doesn’t approve of the Gestapo tactics of the inner circle, and repeatedly asks the bullied students why they don’t fight back – this leads to friction between him and the inner circle. This culminates in David stopping an attempted gang rape by three of the inner circle members (Mark doesn’t join in on this particular activity) and giving the three toughs a good beating. The inner circle (less Mark, who wants to be left out – he feels loyalty to David, but also mistakenly believes that David is having an affair with his girlfriend Teresa which keeps him from trying to stop his cronies) visits David to exact revenge, and accidentally crushes his leg (it’s never explained if David’s leg is just injured, or if it’s actually lost). The inner circle believes this will be the end of David’s defiant stance, but once David returns to school he stars dealing out their ends one by one. At first, the demise of the inner circle is a liberating force for the formerly oppressed students. Soon enough, however, various cliques and individuals decide they the want to become the new rulers of the school – and they all try to enlist David to aid them. These new wannabe rulers start meeting their own demises, and David soon decides that the only way to truly end this cycle is to blow up the school and kill everyone inside during the annual Alumni Dance. A bomb is all set to go off, but at the last minute David has a change of heart – he doesn’t want to kill Teresa, who he loves, and is attending the dance with Mark despite knowing about David’s plot. David manages to hobble outside of the school with the bomb just in time, but dies when it explodes.

I’ve skipped over some of the plot points of the movie, but that’s more or less the story in a nutshell. I heard somebody describe it once as “a teen Death Wish,” which is fairly accurate in a sense. Also, if some of the above sounds like the movie Heathers to you, you’re right – I’ve read more than once that the filmmaker for Heathers admitted to borrowing liberally from Massacre. However, Heathers is a black comedy and Massacre plays everything totally straight (and is more of an unintentional comedy). If you do a search on the internet, you’ll find a few reviews here and there. Many of these that I’ve read have some plot inaccuracies, and some of the reviews focus on the film as a political allegory. Check out the entry on www.allmovie.com – the film only gets one and a half stars, but the review reads like a rave. WTF??!!??

It’s hard to explain my fascination with Massacre, but it’s something I never get tired of talking about. Part of it may be that the film is incredibly dated, and the 1976 fashions on display are pretty funny. That, coupled with the often hilarious dialog, makes it into an unintentional comedy for me. The actors play all of this straightforward, with the performances ranging from pretty good to downright awful. The film is incredibly low budget, with boom microphones showing up in a few scenes. Overall, it looks a lot like a made for TV film from that era, with a soundtrack to match. There is an inappropriate syrupy theme song, “Crossroads of Your Life,” which plays over the opening credits and pops up frequently in an instrumental version throughout the movie. No adults are seen in the film until the very end at the Alumni Dance – where in the hell were the teachers at this school? With all of these students dieing, you’d think the cops would be called at some point, but they don’t show up until the end either. How about a funeral or two for the dead students? Why do some of the high school kids appear to be in their early to mid thirties? Why do these kids park their cars in the middle of the road? Why does David live in what appears to be a garage? I could go on and on…but I probably shouldn’t!

As you can tell, this is a movie I never get tired of watching. The fact that I know that two of the cast members (Lani O’Grady of 8 is Enough fame, and Cheryl “Rainbeaux” Smith of too many 70's B-movies to list here fame) passed away in the last couple of years shows that I’ve spent too much time searching the internet for more Massacre information. Hopefully it will see a legitimate DVD release someday in this country. Until that day, track it down if you can.

(Maybe I'll write about The Van soon. I'm not nearly as obsessed with that movie.)