So, I've been doing Music Notes for over a month now. I figured I'd collect those first four columns here. This is how they were originally written, not how they printed. I guess these are the director's cut versions. Not that they were mostly changed very much. The Local Takeover story was revised pretty heavily, though.
Sometimes going to a show in New Haven is just like going home. When Dave Hogan, Seth Tiven, Frank Critelli, Christopher James Bousquet (nee Chris Buskey) and Ray Neal get together at the Neverending Bookstore, it's like a family reunion. They're one of those families that, after dinner and a couple of beers, everybody breaks out their guitars while the wives and mothers are in the kitchen, cleaning up.
You've got your ragged old uncle Dave, he's been in a bar band for years and likely drives a motorcycle. He's got a lot of songs and stories. Uncle Seth is probably an accountant. He's kind of dorky, but he's probably the best technical player of the lot. Little cousin Frank is very enthusiastic. He plays in coffeeshops and sometimes down at the park. Cousin Chris is the quirky one. Nobody quite understands his songs, but everybody recognizes there's some mysterious talent there. And uncle Ray, he's a little broken up about, well, you know; but his sense of humor is keeping him together. His songs are fragile and his voice cracked, but tender. They all know each others' songs and are glad to have the chance to fool around.
Each of these guys has been in bands, (Hogan - Rafterbats, Greylight Campfire; Tiven - Dumptruck; Critelli - 404, The Good Kind; Buskey - The High Lonesome Plains, The Telephone Hour; Neal - Miracle Legion) but you don't need to know that. You don’t need to know that in certain circles, these guys could be considered local songwriting royalty with decades of performance experience. Really, that would just make it weird. Come to a couple shows and they’ll call you friend, as they have done to me. What you’re witnessing is just a couple of guys having fun.
But that’s not to say they don’t take what they do seriously. These people believe in music. It is not, for them, a route to fame or glory, but a way to express something real. It’s community building. It’s about finding a connection. They’re too old to end up on the cover of Rolling Stone and they wouldn’t work in a big arena, anyway. They demand intimacy. They’re nothin’ special guys with something they care deeply about. They care enough to play for free in this tiny room to whoever happens to wander by. If they weren’t there playing that night, you’d likely find half of them down at Café 9 or watching some other band in some other bar. They care enough that when the sprit takes them, they run outside and play “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere” on the sidewalk.
The Neverending Bookstore is a weird space. Calling it a book store doesn’t feel quite right. There are two rooms. One is full of donated moldering books precariously towering overhead that you can take away for free, the other has a little stage with red curtains and some folding chairs. They don't have shows there often. You're more likely to find an anarchist meeting or a circus practice, if the place is even open at all. When there is a performance, it feels like a bunch of guys just sitting around, shooting the shit and showing off for one another in the living room.
Another interesting twist regarding this show is that it was organized by Brad Jacobs. For years, Brad has been the number one fan on the scene, but I guess he's now in the business of music promotion. This was the second in a quarterly series of Fifth Thursday shows at Neverending Books that he's put together. Every show finds Critelli, Buskey, and Neal playing together in the round with special guests and openers. The next will be November 29.
I've often thought the dance club landscape of the back room at Bar on Sunday nights lent a weird feeling to the rock shows that go on there. The color-changing lights keep you unsteady and walking from the fratboy pool room to the hipster cave in back is pretty disorienting. Further adding to this sense of strangeness the night Crooked Hook played was the '60s style oil dye emulsion lighting projected behind the bands. Psychedelic is the word people have been using of late to describe Crooked Hook. I suppose that is appropriate, in some senses, but not in a good way.
The first time I took mushrooms, I was alone, laying in the dark. I was overcome by an oppressive sense of gravity. I couldn't move. I imagined monsters in the shadows but couldn't conceive of a way to escape them. I had apocalyptic visions; the bombs were falling and we were all turned to jelly. That is similar to the effect Crooked Hook's music has. Inertia is, I think, the best word. The gravity of the riffing renders the audience immobile, a blob of amorphous goo.
Here's their trick: they play the same riff over and over again until nobody in the room can stand it anymore, then they speed up a little and play the tweedlydee guitar solo and that gets everybody's head bopping. It's actually pretty impressive that they can play the same thing over and over again for so long and not get bored themselves. There was a long instrumental bit, it must have gone on for 20 minutes, and it was really just the same couple of licks repeated ad nauseum. They are, technically, very tight. I'll give them that, they have their act down. I may not like what they do, but they do it well.
Essentially, these guys are Phish for the black t-shirt set. They appeal to people who like the unkempt and boring. They're a metal jam band. They're all fuzz and groove. I wonder why there isn't more cross-marketing to these overlapping stoner tastes. Maybe a joint Dinosaur Jr./Trey Anastasio tour would work. One could probably trace a line from The Grateful Dead through Blue Cheer to Crooked Hook.
So, are Crooked Hook really psychedelic? What I always sought from the psychedelic experience was consciousness expansion. I wanted something to give me that manic sense of wonder. I definitely don't get that from Crooked Hook. But at least they have the light show.
Openers Heavy Hands were a bit more interesting. Well, actually, I liked them better when I was standing out of the range of the monitors and couldn't hear the vocals very well. The singing was a bit crap. They're from New York. It's nice to see the touring band opening for the locals. I have to credit Crooked Hook bassist, Rick Omonte for that. He books the Sunday shows at Bar under the name Shaki Presents. He does a good job matching locals and out-of-towners.
The Truth of the story, though, is that Crooked Hook do have the potential to be a local music phenomenon. Along with Safety Meeting Records labelmates The Mountain Movers, they have developed a buzz on the scene. What this says about the scene, I don't know. There are better heavy bands around, certainly - Humanoid, Smooth Medusa and The Vultures, to name three - but I guess Crooked Hook are more accessible. They aren't especially challenging and you pretty much know what you're going to get from the first riff.
I have to confess - my concept of local music has been very limited. Local for me has always meant local to New Haven. I know The Space is, technically, in Hamden but, really, that's just an extension of New Haven. I know New London has a really vital scene, but that's an expensive train ride. Who knew that there'd be such an interesting ongoing music event as Local Takeover in Milford.
I got off the train at the Milford station a little after 7 o'clock. The show was set to start at 8 so I figured I had a little time to wander around. I found a cute little used bookstore and a coffeeshop with decent chai. In that same loop, right around the corner from the train station was Daniel Street.
Wandering by at quarter to 8, I don't know why I was surprised to find the place uninhabited. Every time I've been to a show that was advertised to start early, I've ended up waiting around forever. I thought things might be different outside New Haven, but I was wrong.
The place filled up slowly. At 9, when the show started pulling itself together, there were probably 20 people there. All told, there might have been 75 people there that night.
So, here's the idea - Local Takeover has been running for 2 years. This was the anniversary show. Phil Conine usually keeps it well organized to assure success. This time, though, he wanted to leave it all up to chance. He didn't book any bands, but invited all the bands who had played in the last year to show up and play a couple of songs. He didn't have the bands set to play in any particular order, but had them sign up for position. It could have been an inspired move, but it didn't turn out all that well.
The show started out alright. Primarily instrumental, Commercial Interruption did the job of providing background noise while everybody was getting their drinks. In spite of technical difficulties The Symbionts started making some real noise. They were energetic, but not too crazy. Poppy, in an early British punk kind of way (think The Jam.) My favorite discovery of the night was Fay Rey. It was just a girl with an electric guitar and a guy on drums, but they had some really good songs and she had a great voice. Most times, I want a band to strip down, but I think Fay Rey would be better as their normal four-piece.
The first low point of the evening was Falling Season. It was all overwrought post-emo top-40 wannabe nonsense. They'd almost deserve forgiveness if they were as young as they look, but the place is 21+, so they get none.
Seemingly unexpectedly, while the other bands were breaking down or setting up on stage, some guy had set up a guitar amp and busted out with a feedback laden version of the Star Spangled Banner from the back of the room.
The next five bands were a really good grouping. They, toghether, would make for an excellent bill. Puzzle People were good and chaotic. Phil, the disorganizer, played drums in spite of total inebriation. Bloarzeyd played a maniacal drum and guitar version of "Material Girl." Electric Bucket did some strong female-fronted punk. Three out of four members of the band stayed on stage to be joined by the remaining members of Horsefeathers. They were pretty eclectic. It's like every member of the band wanted to play a different kind of music, but they melded together into rock music with backup singers. The Vultures were the only band of the night to have to do an encore. They played their shortest punkiest songs and they played them powerfully.
Unfortunately, the rest of the night couldn't measure up to that string of bands. Jaykob Kendrick was kind of cute, but that was the end of his appeal. The low water mark for the evening was the vocal histrionics during his acoustic "blues song about drinking."
The only think that could make the night end worse was XPUNX. I don't know if they're meant to be a joke, but if so, they're not funny. It's repetitive, toneless gothy synthesizer music. They call it alien dance music. They put me to sleep.
I couldn't stick around, I had a train to catch. Really, though, I could have caught a later ride. I just couldn't take any more.
So, what were the drawbacks of Phil's deliberate disorganization? Well, it ended up with sensitive acoustic guitar guy playing after The Vultures. The most boring band went on last. Eula were supposed to play, but they got bumped for time and The Sawtelles left even before the show started when they saw it would be so late. And everybody had to share gear and that didn't always work out successfully.
All that said, in the balance, it was a pretty great show. If this was any indication of the standard of quality Local Takeover usually provides, I'll be happy to return. So, as it turns out, I'm just a provincial bigot. New Haven may be the center of the musical universe, but it is not the only inhabited planet.
Kriss Santala is a local music treasure. She's played with more bands than anyone, plus she works the bar at Cafe 9 and hosts her own music series there. She is exactly the kind of character that makes a scene thrive. I first encountered Santala as the bass player and backing vocalist for The Danglers. She puts the twang in their country punk. Next, I saw her play with Leila Crockett in Baby G. The sweetness of her voice is strikingly apparent when set against Crockett's deep soulful folk blues. Eventually, I got a chance to hear her play a rare lead performance. She demurely, seemingly reluctantly, commands the stage. Earlier this year, she put out her first solo album and it is a strong document of her talent.
Santala's most recent project is Joanie Loves Tchotchkes. In New Haven terms, this group is both completely improbable and yet absolutely inevitable. Santala’s co-conspirator in the band is Sean Bierne on guitar. Bierne's pedigree is that he is a member of the Battlecats, a spazzy garage pop band who wear suits and sing songs about jungle jims and road workers. Going into it, I was expecting some country pop with a slightly ragged edge. As the Battlecats have drifted into domestic hibernation, I figured Bierne was looking to do something a little more mellow and maybe Santala wanted something a little more aggressive than her solo stuff. I was not expecting this balls-out bluesy garage band. Their first song was "Nazi Robots from Outer Space." Bierne was jumping around like a maniac and I was floored. They covered "Wasted" by Black Flag and played "No Fun" by The Stooges as their encore. Bierne and Santala traded off vocals or sang in harmony together. Santala sounded more punk than I'd ever heard her.
This is exactly the kind of cross-niche band we need to see more of if we want to unify this fragmented and disparate music scene. Santala is a scene stalwart, but Bierne has really only been in the one band and there never seemed to be much overlap. The incestuous nature of a mid-sized city like New Haven can produce some really interesting stuff like this. I want to see a band made up of Chad Raines of The Simple Pleasure singing with Joe Nolan from Kimono Draggin' playing guitar, Mark Miller of Humanoid playing drums and James Velvet on bass. Or maybe an experimental noise band with Chris Buskey singing, Paul Belbusti of Mercy Choir making weird noises with effects loops and Dave Grazynski of Monitor and the Merrimac playing banjo. Maybe it would be a catastrophe, but it could be a great time. There are too many small cliques in the scene and I like the idea that Santala and Bierne are working to break out of that mindset.
The show followed the first week of Cafe 9's new open mic series. Every Tuesday from 6 - 9 Santala's hosting an acoustic open mic before the big bands play. It's good to see they've got open mic going there again. Besides the pseudo open time after Beatnik 2000, New Haven proper doesn't have anything else. Musicians cutting their teeth have to go out to Daniel Street in Orange or pay to play at The Space in Hamden.
