Los Angeles, CA - February 28, 2008 - Nebraska’s BRIMSTONE HOWL is heading back on the road in support of their debut Alive Records‘ release “Guts of Steel” - co-produced and engineered by Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys. The band will wrap their U.S. tour after performing several SXSW showcases then begin a month long European tour. Alive Records is currently offering an exclusive MP3 “Cyclone Boy,” available for download on their website (see link below).
With a furious mix of ’60s-influenced garage and old-school punk, Brimstone Howl’s Alive Records debut has been described as “cranked lo-fi blues rock” by Uncut magazine, “razor sharp snake rock” by NME and “lo-fi, loose punk wallowing in the blues” by Kerrang. Delivering in-your-face live performances, they describe themselves as “Guitar sluts and hook thieves with hearts of chrome, but with pretty good lyrics,” and their music as “burnt blues, steady tom beats, and looooooowwwwwd fuzz.”
Brimstone Howl is rounded out by John Ziegler (guitar/vocals), Nick Waggoner (guitar), Austin Ulmer (bass) and Calvin Retzlaff (drums).
“If retro-styled garage rock gave you an icky feeling in 2007, take two listens to Guts of Steel and burn your red-and-white clothes in the morning. Production by Black Keys frontman Dan Auerbach give Brimstone Howl some requisite vintage-sounding reverb, but there’s nothing reverent about these Nebraskans’ unholy hot-wiring of the Sonics, the Damned and the Blues Explosion.” - MAGNET Magazine
The perfect local band to open for the Bimstone Howl would be Kentucky Knife Fight. Or Left Arm. Or the Vultures, Blind Eyes, Nevermores, or any of our great local crop of rock’n'roll acts. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. Instead, you get some acoustic alt-country band called Theodore as well as a jam band from New England called Deer Tick (are they headlining???). Excuse me while I go bang my head on the fucking wall yet again. Oh well, at least this show is free (that’s right… FREE!).
I don’t really know much about this band… Joe from Euclid Records e-mailed me recently and told me about this show. I checked out the band’s Myspace page and I will admit that they sound somewhat interesting. There’s definitely some good, hard-nosed, distortion-heavy rock’n'roll going on there at times (check out their tune “Go Die” if ya don’t believe me), mixed in with a bit more indie rock shoegazerness (is that a word?) than I usually like to swallow, but still, not bad by any means. I’m detecting plenty of a soul and R&B influence for them to be able to keep my raw-boned attention live, I’d say (check out “Don’t Shake My Tree” for a prime example of that), and the organ reminds me a bit of Stereo Total, who I’ve always kinda liked in that ’60s-pop-meets-new-wave vein. Just don’t give me too much shit if you catch me at the bar chatting it up with friends and tossing back a coupla shots of Wild Turkey during the happy indie rocker “See and Be Scene” or the sappy “I Like Your Hair Long” (to quote Jason Potter, “indie rock is the new soft rock”). It’s just that, to me, they definitely have a sound that would lean more towards the Kill Rock Stars or Sub Pop crowds than, say, the In The Red, Sympathy, or even Bomp/Alive crowds. But I know there are plenty of you out there that can dip your ladles into both brew kettles with equal thirsts.
One of the really cool things about this show, though, is it’s happening at (what appears to me, anyway) as a relatively new venue for raw, “underground” rock’n'roll in River City. The Highway 61 Roadhouse and Kitchen was once the location of the old Webster Streetside Records that closed shop about a decade ago (and good riddance to that sorry old chain, I say). According to Joe, the venue is usually home to more of a blues-based musical variety, but those people tend to clear out by 10:30, so they’re looking to book more rock acts, presumably in an effort to attract a younger audience that’s not afraid to stay out past the bewitching hour.
The show is Friday, March 7. St. Louis garage/psych rock veterans The Nevermores open, who are perfectly adept at gettin’ your gears greased for what comes after. Cover is $5, by the way, and this one’s a late show: 10pm doors.
Well, this should be interesting! It’s not every day a traveling marching band rolls (marches?) through town. Mucca Pazza was conceived by composer Mark Messing and the band has been performing in and around the Chicago area, in bars, parks, parades and theaters for over three years. The lineup includes St. Louis expatriate Jeff Thomas, aka Jeffrey Positive, of The Honkeys, on guitar. The following is from their press kit:
30 people in a band? No problem. At every rehearsal, BBQ, and party, everyone loves one another like one big family. Until a gig comes along, and then… The trombones rumble with team saxophone, who fight for stage space with the clarinet and the fiddle, who don’t notice because they are busy vying for the attentions of the accordions, who could care less because the drum corps are a bunch of bullies, who are constantly melting at the sight of the glockenspiel, who has an eye for the cymbals, who keeps falling over the sousaphone, who is busy avoiding flying pom poms, who are chasing after the trombones, who are rumbling… Mucca Pazza are marching misfits. They play everything from Gainesbourg to Le Tigre, Bar-Kays to Ali Hassan Kuban and lotsa original compositions (including one commissioned by a queen from a distant planet - long story). One would think that only in Dr. Seuss’ imagination could a marching band perform in 10 canoes going down the Chicago River, but Mucca Pazza was there! They play everywhere: from punk venues to orchestral halls, from public parks to private extravaganzas, from diva palaces to dive bars, from TV shows (did you see them on Conan O’Brien?) to Lollapalooza. Your town is next! Watch out!
Featuring: Mucca Pazza (Chicago, IL), Ether Project, Super Fun Yeah Yeah Rocketship, & TBA
Doors: 8:00PM
Cover: $10.00 21+/$13.00 minors
Videos for your pleasure:
Mucca Pazza in NYC
Mucca Pazza at LollapaloozaFrom the Chicago Reader:
“The band’s raucous and giddy live shows are so unabashedly dorky that by the end every member of the 30-strong lineup winds up coming off cooler than you’ll ever be.”
From The Chicago Sun-Times: “Sometimes a group of musicians comes up with an idea that is so unique, so whimsically charming, so dynamically charged that all you can do is stand back and watch in wonder. Such is the case with Mucca Pazza.”
From the Chicago Daily Herald:
“Mark this name down on your must-see music list, folks; they’re exploding faster than marshmallow Peeps in the microwave.”
Lo-Fi Saint Louis, St. Louis’ first internationally recognized and award-wining video podcast, will make its debut of a new seasonal episode format on Monday, March 3, 2008, and will celebrate with an event at the Mad Art Gallery on Saturday, March 8. The event will feature video screenings, live performances by two great St. Louis-area indie rock bands, the Helium Tapes and the 75s, and other surprises. Doors will open at 8:00 p.m. and admission will be $6.00.
Lo-Fi Saint Louis has been on hiatus since mid-January in order to allow for a revamping of the website and to give its creator, Bill Streeter, a long-needed break.
“I’ve been producing two videos a week for Lo-Fi for the past year and I really needed a little break to rethink some things and to recharge my creative batteries. I also wanted to do some other projects that I just didn’t have time for if I was producing so much for Lo-Fi,” Streeter said.
The podcast will now be produced on a seasonal schedule, similar to that of a television program, with separate schedules for the spring and fall seasons. Each season will consist of two videos per week for ten weeks each.
Some of the other projects Streeter will be taking on with his new spare time are the recently launched Lo-Fi Sessions and a sketch comedy video series with comedian Bill Chott that will begin production in May.
Hey folks, I’m now taking writing/blogging volunteers for this website. Looking for people to write occasional garage/punk/rock’n'roll record/show reviews, post about concerts & other events, submit interesting and appropriate videos, audio files, etc. in an effort to turn this blog into more of a local music & entertainment resource (or “webzine,” if you will). If you’re interested please send a message via the contact page or reply below. Thanks!
Here’s Fear doing a promo spot for K-SHE 95 circa 1984/’85. Joe Stumble posted this on his Last Days of Man on Earth Blog the other day, and I couldn’t resist posting it here for ya, too. Enjoy!
Greg “Frog” Kessler and I have started what we’re calling the Saint Louis Flyer Project, in which we’re trying to collect as many “vintage” St. Louis-area punk/wave/hardcore and underground/alternative rock flyers from the mid-1970s through the mid-’90s as we can for a new Flickr group. We’re only really interested in actual scans of authentic, old-school paper flyers, no Web flyers made with Photoshop or Illustrator. We just feel there are probably a lot of these things stashed away in boxes in people’s attics or basements these days, and it’d be great to get them out, dust them off and let them live again now on the Web. So please contribute to our collection if you have anything worth sharing (and if you don’t have a scanner and aren’t afraid to let one of us borrow your collection for a week or two, please get in touch and we’ll gladly scan them for you). Thanks!
At Lemmons on Friday February 1st. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… The Modern Primitives are like Missouri’s own undiscovered version of the Black Lips (only younger).
I wasn’t able to make it out to the Nevermores/Thee Fine Lines show at the Underground at the Red Sea last Friday night, but I did ask John of the Nevermores about the show and he was nice enough to write a little review, which is posted here. I’ve read of other not-so-nice reports of how bands are treated at the Underground before (this topic came up once before on the GaragePunk Forums message board), but this really takes the cake. To actually tell a band they’re “headlining” and then to flat-out STIFF them, after forcing them to follow another band that wasn’t originally scheduled to even play (and not only plays way too long, but is so BAD that they run everyone out of the club)? Come on! How or why do places like the Underground think this is somehow cool or acceptable? What makes this bozo think ANY band will want to play this shithole once word spreads that they’re stiffing bands (not to mention fucking with lineups)? I’m sorry but this sort of thing is just unacceptable, and you may not read it anywhere else in St. Louis, but FUCK the Underground. Don’t play the damned place. I don’t care HOW desperate you are for shows, that sorta shit doesn’t help anyone, especially yourselves if you’re trying to actually make a few bucks to cover gas money (in the very least). There are plenty of decent venues in St. Louis that you can play these days… Lemmons, the Way Out, the Bluebird, Off Broadway, 2 Cents Plain (admittedly still wet behind the ears but learning), and more. But if you care about integrity don’t play the Underground. Thank you.
GARAGE NEWS FLASH: The legendary 1966 Iowa garage band GONN, inductees into the Iowa Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, featured on the “Nuggets” box set with their first record “Blackout of Gretely” and on the Sundazed “Loudest Band in Town” Beat Rocket LP, to name a few, are reuniting for a show at OFF BROADWAY in St. Louis on Saturday, January 5th, 2008. This will be the band’s first live show since their appearance at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland back in 2005. GONN 2008 still features ALL ORIGINAL MEMBERS: Gerry Gabel, Craig Moore, Rex Garrett, Larry LaMaster, Dave Johnson. The group members are driving & flying in from all over the US to do this one-night show. Also appearing are The Nevermores and The Vultures, two of the St. Louis area’s best current generation of garage/punk/rock’n'roll bands. Tickets are only $10 and will be limited due to club capacity. As of this posting it is not known if advance tickets will be available or at the door only. More details can be found soon at www.myspace.com/gonn66, or at www.offbroadwaystl.com. You may also write to youngernow@ameritech.net with any specific questions. SPREAD THE WORD!
Check out Craig Moore from Gonn appearing live on stage with both The Nevermores and The Geargrinders at the recent Show-Me Blowout garage fest in St. Louis at Bill Streeter’s Lo-Fi Saint Louis video blog: Craig Moore with The Geargrinders on “Blackout of Gretely” Craig Moore with The Nevermores on “Doin’ Me In”
Thanks,
kopper
