Tuesday, April 18, 2006  

You Can't Stop The (Radio Friendly) Rock!

Congrats to Scamper, who are en route to the finals of the WBCN Rumble after mowing down the competition like they've got cheat codes and health packs. I expect an easy win on Friday night, and then I expect the heroin-fuelled destruction to start on Saturday morning. They don't strike me as drug fiends or hotel wreckers, but Brendan has certain tendencies, and he is a proven bad influence on others. I just ask them, nay, beg them, to bide their time and keep it cool until the opportunity to punch the bass player from Fallout Boy right in his toothy little smile presents itself.

Cool? Cool.

Let's ride the rock theme a little longer. The BOC show in New Hampshire kicked enormous quantities of ass, as the pictures below demonstrate. The venue left a little to be desired - I mean, who plans a rock show with symmetrically-arranged banquet tables? - and the crowd had some douchey dead spots (a symptom of free ticket giveaways, methinks), but none of that stopped the boys from New York from putting on a hell of a show for nearly 2 hours.

There was a surreal moment when one scorchingly suburban-looking couple got up and left in the middle of Godzilla, I guess to beat the traffic. Huh? Who leaves a rock show just before the big boffo finish? How retarded to you have to be not to realize the obvious: we were at the Godzilla-Reaper-and-Out! portion of the show. I personally like to think that maybe they just looked like suburban free-ticket leeches but were instead superfans who were leaving in a huff because the band hadn't played She's As Beautiful As a Foot. And there were some hardcore fans there - I saw one woman with gorgeous long grey hair and surprisingly buff shoulders clutching a seriously beat-up copy of Secret Treaties on vinyl. A more beautiful sight I cannot imagine.

But I got my shirt, and I got Buck Dharma's guitar pick because the couple sitting across from us (again, at a fucking banquet table) was so cool. She caught it but gave it to me because it was obvious I was more into the band than she was. Kinda sad, really...I was sitting there clutching my Mirrors t-shirt and singing along to all the songs like a lovestruck junior high girl. But fuck it, I had a hell of a night, and may I just say how nice it is to see the band now that I'm old enough to drink beer FROM A CUP FROM THE BAR rather than out of a shitty sixer in someone's backpack?

And a quick shoutout to the "youth movement" of the band, namely Jules Radino, who plays angry, angry drums, and Richie Castellano, the bassist who is equal parts rock, funk, and straw-that-stirs-the-drink. They really drove the show, and the conspicuous lack of cowbell was duly noted.

All in all, a topnotch night of rock and roll, tables and all. I spent Easter Sunday playing the first few notes of Don't Fear the Reaper with Mr. Dharma's pick, and I think Jesus would have wanted it that way.