2010 has heralded for me the discovery of one of the best live bands of my generation, right under my nose, as it were. Some have called them one of the best SF underground groups, but I think their appeal is...or should be...more universal than that, even if I can't imagine them making any place else home, even if singer/guitarist John Dwyer started out in Providence, Rhode Island. Over the course of the next few weeks, I'll be featuring many Thee Oh Sees live shows from the AMH archives, but I'm going to first start with the most recent show at Eagles Tavern SF, which functions as literally their home base, as they have played there once about every other month this year.
And on this occasion, they were every bit as full-on intense as the first two times I have seen them...they didn't finish the set with Warm Slime (Summertime Jam) but with the rarely-featured Grease segueing into Grease 2, a special treat for the hometown crowd.
credit: jskallerup |
From my out-of-breath notes afterwards: "No video from me, just impossible anyway given that it was absolute bedlam, but there were people filming, etc....JPD was a bit under the weather but that's never stopped him before. By about midway through Contraption...I was pretty much toast...almost out of breath and had to ease back out of the pit...filled up on too much raw fish...blinding set, tomzero and I listened to it on the way home and have it on again now, probably will need some re-EQ to sound good, but is plenty listenable as-is, not bad for built-ins!."
Setlist: Enemy Destruct / Crushed Grass / Contraption / Tidal Wave / I Was Denied / The Dream / Block Of Ice / Grease > Grease 2.
(The Grease segue is up on YouTube, so click on it to view!)
Another wonderful discovery for me was Blasted Canyons. All of whom play drums, guitar, and keys... They've very recently got good press from the local newspaper here. I had missed them opening for Mayyors and Ty Segall at Serra Bowl, but finally got to see them opening for Thee Oh Sees and The Intelligence, the latter to be featured in
a future post.
A still from the 'Blood On The Wall' vid |
So I'll also feature a recording from them as well.
"Ice Cream Man" in particular is a sonic tour-de-force, and has been on repeat the past few days.
Setlist: soundchecking / Fries Yr Eyes / I Know A Dude / Pentagone-gone / The Man In Question / Lasers vs Lizards / Hether's wonderful anti-Pitchfork rant / Consider Drowning / Blood On The Wall / Ice Cream Man
Note: The songs which are hyperlinked are featured on YouTube, and are my own iPhone 4 recordings, which I've posted with the band's permission, which they may rescind, so hurry! I've done a pretty piss-poor job documenting all the different permutations of their line-up, as for some odd reason, I only filmed the songs with the girl in the group on vocals.
Blasted Canyons + Thee Oh Sees recordings (MP3 format) can be found here:
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thanks for the re-up! did you see Dwyer has reformed the Coachwhips, at least for some shows?
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