BBQ Gone Bad

Check out this review of the The Points and The King Khan and BBQ Show. Things got a little crazy at the Red & the Black. I wish Rock Club had been there to see it. Potsy could've filmed the mayhem and then fought the lead singer.

New Rock Club For Hire

New Rock Church Of Fire - October 19, 2007 - Velvet Lounge - $8

As usual, most of what I'm going to tell you about will have little to do with the NRCOF's performance at the Velvet Lounge Friday night. But it's not like you were expecting a lot anyway, right? I'll start by saying that once again, convenience played a critical role in deciding RC's show of the week. With Major League Baseball's October Classic looming, certain chocolate making duties on the calendar, breast feedings to monitor, and dog-walking to do, we narrowed the date for RC this past week to Friday the 19th. That left us with a limited schedule, and after Jumboslice's usual meddling, we settled on New Rock Church of Fire at the Velvet Lounge.

Ah, the Velvet Lounge. Home to our third ever Rock Club show (Bang Bang Bang). And so we return more than a year later with more sophisticated tastes. For example, Jumboslice chose to order himself a Corona (with lime) instead of his usual $2 Schlitz. There was a good crowd at the Velvet Lounge and I recall catching half a song of one of the opening bands (but I don't remember what they were called), but then I noticed I was already out of beer. So back downstairs to the bar for more beer for me and the rest of RC. And then this is where I got a little side-tracked. My thoughtfulness for buying a round for the fellas paid off as a couple of young barflies, eying my abundant supply of frothy goodness, asked me to give them some. Yeah. Like my buddy Ralph says, "I still got it." But being the good friend that I am, after a few minutes with the lasses, I returned upstairs with the beers, but no RC members were there. So I went back downstairs and found them outside smoking.

Since I found myself downstairs again, I returned to the bar to finish my conversation with the two young ladies. Did I mention they were sisters? And blondes? Yeah. So you'll pardon me if I don't go on and on about The Red House Church of Rock. They seemed to be a good band from what I saw on their myspace page. I especially liked their Fig Tree song. It has a bit of a Black Lips sound to it. But my conversation with the sisters wasn't without rock. They had both come from the 9:30 Club after seeing the Finnish hard rock band "H.I.M." In fact, they were waiting for one of the roadies to show up, let's call him "Scott." Cuz that's what his name was. He showed up. I met him. Fattish guy with a beard. Seemed nice. So here's a bit of H.I.M.



I recently promised that I would start to judge these RC shows using the only real measure of quality rock that you can count. It's the "can this music get me laid?" test. Despite only seeing 1 of their songs, based on my bar talk, I'd say this band scores high on this simple scale. The only question I have is what happened to the old Rock Church of Fire that resulted in the creation of a new one?

DAM!, I Forgot What Happened (RNR Hotel 10/11)

A few weeks ago, 3/4 of RC attended a show at the Rock and Roll Hotel. Here is what I can recall:

1. This show was part of the DAM Festival, a lackluster indie music showcase for Washington DC. Being supporters of the local scene, we thought we would make an appearance at one of the shows.

2. The 1st band (Via Audio) was playing when we arrived. There were like 12 people watching them play. It was awkward.

3. The 2nd band was Slaraffenland. They are from either Denmark, Sweden, Norway, or Finland. They have a tall and skinny lead singer. They all wore the same shirts. They were okay. There were now like 22 people in the room.

4. Jumboslice likes to hang out by the "merch" and chat up the salespeople. He was so entranced by the Scandanavian music he bought the CD. He made us suffer through it on the ride home. He also bought a pink T-Shirt at the Dan Deacon show, yet he stills clings to his hetrosexuality.

5. A Place to Bury Strangers was the next band. There were no approximately 34 people in the room. They were loud. Jumboslice offered me some earplugs. I declined, saying earplugs are for pussies who buy pink Dan Deacon t-shirts. The band was decent, but I had enough after a few songs and went upstairs to read the paper. I was the only one up there.

6. We left before the Big Sleep (who we had seen already, opening for someone?) and Dirty on Purpose. Once again, I missed seeing my doppleganger. I am sure the venue filled to capacity as soon as we left. The DAM festival needs some work.

7. RC Rating: 5.0

The Ghost of Spoon Lingers

Not surprisingly, last night's Spoon show was great. Even better than the Baltimore show (IMHO). I especially liked that it wasn't that crowded and we were able to get our usual spot w/o a problem. For those of you who want more Spoon, here's a great video for "Don't You Evah". You can also listen to last night's show at NPR. [Jimbromski: they have the set list posted]

Van Halen update

The Onion AV Club, along with Stereogum, have become the go-to sites for Van Halen news. The AV Club posted this vid (below) of Van Halen's encore of "Jump" at their Sept. 29 show in Greensboro NC:



Multiple choice question--this version of "Jump" sounds like:

(A) a 44-cat orgy in the alley behind your apartment
(B) a coercive interrogation technique banned by the Geneva Convention
(C) John Tesh on PCP
(D) all of the above

Here's the explanation from the AV Club:

Van Halen’s long-awaited, much-delayed reunion tour with David Lee Roth is in full swing, but they’re still working out the bugs: At the band’s Greensboro, North Carolina show on September 29, Van Halen played “Jump” as their triumphant encore—only the whole thing crashed and burned (and burned and burned) when some soundguy played the famous synthesized backing track at the wrong pitch. The result? Some of Eddie Van Halen’s most, um, experimental guitar playing ever.

Potsy will be attending the Van Halen DC show at the MCI Center (aka "The Call Center") and will be expected to report back. Maybe he'll score an interview with DLR. Or even WVH*.

*Wolfgang Van Halen

Be Cool For 20 Hours, and I'll Pay You 20 Grand

Glenn Frey's song "Smuggler's Blues" came up in conversation earlier today and I made a mental note to retrieve the video for the song and post it on here. I remember it being all Miami Vicey.

Well, long story short, Universal Music Group has made the crafty decision to disable embedding on all of Mr. Frey's videos.

No matter--I found an excellent substitute. The guy who posted it said he made the video in high school in 1988 for a class project. Grade? A-.

My favorite scenes are as follows:

1--Undercover cop gets ripped off by the drug dealer, who speeds off in his car. The cop takes 18 seconds to run to his car, put his seat belt on, start the car, and drive off. I'm surprised he didn't check the tire pressure first (1:40 - 1:58).

2--The cop runs to the top of the building where all the shit's going down, and trips (3:43).

3--The old dummy-being-thrown-off-of-the-side-of-a-building trick (4:03).

4--Close up on the corpse. Chilling (4:05).

So go eat a dick, Universal Music Group. We've found a workaround.




PS I left a comment on this guy's YouTube page asking him to come comment on this, I hope he shows up.

Who's Coming

I had a good business idea this weekend that I'd like to share with everyone, before I get into this post. As you may or may not know, my wife gave birth to a baby boy two months ago and since then I've been immersed in yelling/screaming/shit/pee and...glorious, glorious breast milk. Most baby specialists say you should probably breastfeed for about six months, then switch to a mix of bottles and solid foods, such as steak and nachos.

My idea is, start a dairy food line called Nature's Breast. I'll have a barn full of grass-fed hippie women pumping breast milk 24-7. This milk will then be used to make yogurt, butter, cheese, and maybe also ice cream. You give it to your baby to wean him off the nipple, but he's still getting the benefits of the breast milk. I'm looking for venture capital, if you're interested please e-mail me at jimbromski@naturesbreast.com. Thanks.

Nature's Breast: Because The Little Bastards Deserve It

Okay, here we go:

• "They broke my sitar": The Warlocks are playing at Rock and Roll Hotel on Nov. 5. They were founded by a former member of the Brian Jonestown Massacre (not Joel) and they kind of have that spacey Velvet Underground-type sound.
• You are getting very sleepy, due to a combination of hypnosis, plus the roofie I slipped into your cocktail: Comic hypnotist Flip Orley will be in DC for like three weeks, at the Improv, starting on Nov. 6. This could be uber-funny, until Potsy blurts out his repressed memory of the man in the park with the present in his pants.
• I love the 90s: Three items here. Rock Club interviewees 1990s (the band, not the decade) will return to DC on Nov. 20 with the Hold Steady and Art Brut. 1990s (the decade, not the band) superstars Dinosaur Jr and The Lemonheads will be in town on Nov. 27 and Dec. 19, respectively. What's next, Mr Bungle? Mary's Danish? Another 90s group--Superdrag--will be at the 9:30 on Nov. 8. I only ever heard one song from these guys: "Sucked Out" (1996). It's a great song, good enough to make me want to make the effort to go to this show:
• Insert Fat Joke Here: The Nov. 14 Gossip show has been postponed.
  
• Women's Lib: Why do chicks insist on having outside interests? I don't know either. Let's fucking ask Ani DiFranco (Nov. 16).
• Pretentious Twat Alert: Local group Le Loup at the Black Cat on Dec. 10. I read a Pitchfork review of their latest--the dude who wrote it basically spent half the review giving himself a handjob because he recognized the work of art referred to by the album title ("The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations' Millennium General Assembly"--it's a pretty interesting piece of folk art, a la Watts Towers, put together by a mentally ill DC native, now housed in the Smithsonian). Well done sir, you're very learned.
• The Most Commercially Successful R&B Group of All-Time: No foolin', I read that on Allmusic. Marvin Gaye? The Temptations? The Commodores? Nope, Boyz II Men. Boys II Men, ABC, BBD...

Date		Band		Venue
10/20/07		Middle Distance Runner		BC
10/21/07		Trail of Dead etc etc		BC
10/23/07		Spoon		9:30
10/23/07		Yo La Tengo		Birch
10/25/07		Jens Lekman		BC
10/27/07		Broken West		RNRH
11/02/07		Band of Horses		9:30
11/03/07		The Thermals		BC
11/04/07		Black Angels		RNRH
11/05/07		Rogue Wave		BC
11/05/07		The Warlocks		RNRH
11/06/07		Menomena		BC
11/06/07		Flip Orley		Improv
11/08/07		Superdrag		9:30
11/16/07		Georgie James		BC
11/16/07		Ani DiFranco		9:30
11/17/07		Electric Six		BC
11/20/07		Hold Steady w Art Brut/1990s		9:30
11/27/07		Dinosaur Jr.		BC
12/10/07		Le Loup		BC
12/12/07		Boyz II Men		Birch
12/19/07		The Lemonheads		BC
01/12/08		The Smithereens		State
02/01/08		Blue Oyster Cult		State

Monday Sports Extravaganza

Hi. Tonight Rock Club is going to the Black Cat to see Patrick Wolf. Here's a picture of young Patrick:


Ahem.

To counter the inevitable accusations that we're all gay, here is a sports-related post that will butch things up around here.

• Football: Rock Club is sitting pretty. Jumbo Slice's Buffalo Bills vaulted up to second place in the AFC East by dropping JP Losman for Trent Edwards, the former electrician who's lighting up the NFL. Potsy's universally-despised Pats are 4-0 and have solidified a data-sharing agreement with the NSA which will guarantee them a 16-0 season. And me? The Raiders are in sole possession of first place in the AFC West, along with two other teams. Before my son was born I bought him a Raiders onesie. The sizing was for 3-6 month olds but the little biscuit has been growing so fast I put it on him last week. The result? The Raiders are 2-0 when he wears the onesie. And guess what else? The onesie should still fit him on Feb. 8, 2008.

• Football (the other one): Clint Dempsey broke John Terry's cheekbone on Saturday. Well done, Deuce.

• Baseball: the Mets collapsed. Amusing. There are two other notoriously choke-lovin' teams in the playoffs--the Cubs and the Phillies. I expect to see some good weeping fan television shots.

One more thing about the Bills--here's a very, very, very funny video about Kevin Everett. If you recall, Everett's a tight end for the Bills who broke his neck and was partially paralyzed during the Bills' first game of the season a few weeks ago. Apparently he's improving.

Seriously, watch it. I laughed heartily and out loud for at least 20 seconds: