peeny wally

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January 27, 2003

Let There Be Rock

The other day at Sacred Cup Coffee House I heard tell of a new radio station that’s supposed to start up soon in the wake of KAOS, somewhere around 107 on your FM dial. I also heard some amazing, brutal hardcore from the likes of Guyana Punch Line, jumped around to the amazing, melodic (in a good way!) hardcore of Storm the Tower, and cowered from the fog machine pooting away during Sbitch’s defiant, metal-influenced set. It was an excellent way to spend a miserably cold Saturday afternoon.

I hate writing about music. I always sound like such a wanker critic. That said, I’ve got some more to say.

I went to the most annoying fucking show in Austin last night. It was at Le Privilege (which you would think should have tipped me off, but apparently I’m a slow learner and/or a glutton for punishment.)

I went because a band from Japan was playing. I met one of the guys in the band during an afternoon show at Emo’s during SXSW last year, and he was very friendly, entertaining and seemed pretty knowledgeable about punk rock and what makes a good band/show vs. what does not. His band is called Peelander Z (again, another tip-off, but I tend to cut bands from other lands with dumb names more slack than I do others).

While waiting for Peelander Z, I had to sit through a whole lot of boring, pretentious bullshit. I didn’t think they were ever going to get to play. When they finally did, I realized at once, “Oh shit, this is a gimmick band. Look at those wacky costumes.” They were each dressed in a theme color, one red, one blue, one yellow. They reminded me of Bomberman, and that’s good, but then proceeded to play a set of standard, uninspired punk rock, and that’s bad. They handed out noisemakers, pots and pans, cowbells and hunks of plastic for everyone in the audience to bang on, and that’s good. They didn’t play one song that wasn’t formulaic, and that’s bad.

At least they had energy, which is more than I can say for the first band, and words, which more than I can say for the second.

And now I’m sick. Damn you, Le Priv, damn you and your germs and your crappy Sunday night line-up.

Posted by pogo at January 27, 2003 8:48 PM