Ah, the silky mystique of "The Brown Note"; That earth-shattering, pants-splattering frequency zone where sounds manage to weave their way inside of you, stir up the most delicate parts of your inner-workings and rally the troops to abandon ship. While I never had a chance to see godheadSilo back in their heyday, I read enough zine articles and heard enough pre-internet folklore about the band to know that their live shows were widely regarded as a punishing display of sound and fury that left members of the audience walking away feeling nauseous. That two men could create a literal wall of sludge so physically affecting (minus the aid of computers/laptops, but merely aided by a wall of bass amps and a ridiculously large drum kit) was the stuff of legend. Their records required warning labels stating "we are not responsible for speaker damage", with more pre-internet rumblings of the band's records being engineered to essentially crack speakers in half. While the teens of the 70's had KISS to worship as a larger-than-life rock band shrouded in secrecy, godheadSilo had a lovely mystique of their own in the mid/late-90's.
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I'll fully admit to taking The Helio Sequence's presence as a Pacific NW regional band for granted. They play Seattle pretty frequently, and I never go see them. Their consistency as a band is incredible, but somehow, their newest album (self-titled, on Sub Pop) pushes at their atmospheric edges, experimenting with electronic elements but still retaining an organic/human foundation. At times, the record finds The Helio Sequence sounding more relaxed yet more confident than ever. "Battle Lines" marches along stridently while still retaining a breezy, shimmery atmosphere, pining for the promise of a better day (and remaining optimistically hopeful in the process). The entire record is a great summer soundtrack, urgent in all the right places but still wistfully relaxed.
Toronto's METZ is back with their second record (the subtly titled "II", out today on Sub Pop Records), and it's got the band doing exactly what I hoped they would do; taking their already jittery, agitated sound and somehow winding it up into an even more aggressive, anxious mess of noise that somehow still retains it's hookiness. They're touring basically from early May until October of this year, and if they don't come to a town near you? You might want to move.
The appearance of an indie band on Bob's Burgers is nothing new, but seeing a full-length video of Tina, Gene and Louise going bonkers to a private Sleater-Kinney concert in Tina's room sure is. (Tina does have a little bit of an Evergreen vibe to her.) I'm trying to imagine a better music video than this right now, and I really can't. As the icing on the cake, they even managed to get a Carrie Brownstein kick in there. Feast your eyes.
As you get older, you can glide comfortably (or acceptingly) into the adult world, accepting the tedium and monotony that life often gives you when you accept that comfy office job. Pissed Jeans is an embracing of those jittery voices of daily dissent, celebrating those moments of dark discomfort and adult awkwardness while occasionally tossing a gladly-welcomed splashing and screaming trantrum in the kiddie pool. The four piece from Pennsylvania come from a background full of East Coast hoodie-hardcore, but piece those frenetic elements into concise, well-structured blasts of chuggy, chaos ridden sludge pop. Add frontman Matt Korvette's manic personality and self-effacing observational lyrics and half-serious/half-sarcastic Iggy Pop-isms into the mix, and you have one of the most compelling live bands on the planet right now. Given that the band has embraced the office/family life, they don't tour much, so any chance to see Pissed Jeans (especially on the West Coast) is a "do not miss" affair.
Pissed Jeans plays at Barboza tonight. Stickers and Vexx open. Show is at 7pm. Tickets are $15.
