Silent Weapons @ sk Net
Finally made it out to see Eston's newly acquired musical home in concert the other day. Biased tho I may be, I was pleasantly surprised. I got there kind of late and missed most of the first set by Holster... I'd never heard them before either, so I wasn't overly worried. But I kind of liked them as well. The lead singer was fun to watch and, for some reason, reminded me of David Byrne. I have no basis for that... it's just what I thought of when I was watching. I only had a couple of photos... neither were that great... but they're here for the taking or viewing or whatever. They're playing again next Tuesday at the Milestone, and I'm not at all unhappy about seeing them again. Perhaps I'll have more of a real opinion then.
The only thing that I had time about which to be annoyed was the muddiness of the sound. At first I thought it was just the lead singer either not really belting it out or just being low in the mix... When Silent Weapons played, I felt like I was losing Eliza in the songs sometimes too. So I'm chalking that up to either sound problems or venue acoustics. Or lack thereof.
Actually... you can't really have a lack of acoustics, can you? It's really a matter of quality as opposed to quantity.
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But the only reason I went was to see Silent Weapons... I did catch that whole show. And, like I said, I was pleasantly surprised. I'd really only heard songs on myspace, and I don't really pay attention. I dunno why. I guess it's that stupid player with all it's controls locked down or the poor buffering... whatever... it's not talk-about-why-myspace-sucks time. Right... music.
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From stage-right... Eston looking very pleased with himself.
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Eliza trying to figure out just what, exactly, to do with that gun...
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And Josh looking like he's doing that AC/DC kick-step across the stage thing.
(he wasn't)
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(perhaps I should say that I, obviously, used a lot of Photoshop lighting and red-eye effects to try and make these photos better...)
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Well... it didn't take her long to figure out what to do with it. Eston busted a string on, like, song 2. Idiot.
His playing must be completely superfluous tho, as it didn't seem to affect the rest of the show. Hopefully he's learned his lesson now...
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So. I like drums.
There is, as you can see, no drummer in Silent Weapons. Which, is you watch the videos, you'll hear does not mean that there are no drums in Silent Weapons. Josh, as I understand it, programs the bass beats, and all the songs are played to backing tracks. On the one hand, it's really cool to be able to execute your songs basically the same way night-after-night. (I didn't hold it against The Helio Sequence) And I am kind of a sucker for the fusion of talent and technology. But, on the other hand, a drum track... Something about a real-live drumbeat is so much more comforting and emotional and raw than digital tracks. Not that I'm trying to get stuck on one minor thing. The tempos and beats that were there were groovy and entertaining. I just missed the sound of someone actually banging on something.
 And the sound issues... there was definitely some muddiness that pulled away from the show, but nothing I couldn't get over. Sometimes I just wanted to hear Eliza better, and I couldn't. I do think that both bands were just suffering from the acoustics of the venue. sk Net is a low-ceilinged, narrow, and long coffee bar. Not really the best place for big crisp sounds. The band itself seemed to be pretty tight and on with the backing tracks. At the very least, there weren't any major issues, and they sounded good. And like they were having fun. Well... Josh looked like he really wanted it to sound good. As Eston said, "Everyone listens to Josh but watches me." Makes sense.
I'm going to steer away from making any sort of comparissions. At this point, I'd end up saying they sounded a bit like the Rockfords, but I think I'd take that back in an hour. The song-writing was pretty catchy and hooky tho, and I don't recall being bored. I didn't record the whole show this time, and it's actually been a while since I've tried to write about something I didn't have recorded. Strange that it matters. But my memory sucks. The two videos I got were decent and, I think, a pretty good representation of the show.  There are definitely two distinct moods in the songs... the slower spacey kind of thing and then the more punk/pop kind of song to which I am more partial. Except for if I'm home alone lost in a project. Or really sad. Or on tons of drugs, perhaps.
But I digress.
What else? ...The lighting was actually really neat. Especially for such a small place. Basically, it was just cool that the lights were doing something other than shine. (cuz I'm pretty sure there wasn't anyone actually running lights.) Silent Weapons are playing with Holster at this next show too, and I'm looking forward to it. It'll be nice to go in having some kind of previous knowledge.
Uhmmm... and, to be completely honest, I wasn't really struck by the uniqueness of either band at the time, so it'll be cool to get to listen a bit closer this time without everything just being "new."
Dispite my earlier complaints... there are some good sounding songs on myspace...
Silent Weapons on myspace
Holster on myspace
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To be fair about the uniqueness statement... and, really, everything I said... I definitely wasn't giving 100% of my attention to the stage cuz there were other people there with whom I could interact. These people. So that was mostly nice. Except for the universal annoyance of ever trying to interact with anyone ever at a concert.
Or maybe that's just me.
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Sarah
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Judith
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Shirin (and Sarah again)
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And, dammit, I almost forgot this one. I jumped up on stage and took this from behind the band looking out. (obviously) I think it turned out to be pretty cool.
That's Jason - Holster's bass player - standing in the middle. Isn't it sweet when bands stay to watch bands who perform later? Yes. Yes, it is.
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ugh. I forgot this one too. Definitely the last photo this time...
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And, lastly, the couple of videos I have from the show.
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Labels: concerts, Eston, Judith, music, Sarah
This really is kind of getting out of hand. I think I used to have a life, but I might be wrong... Regardless... here are these things...
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I was thinking about that girl from the Cosby Show singing this song in High Fidelity... I think they pulled it off quite nicely... although I'm really baffled how I, as the suggester, did not receive a dedication.
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The light's kind of shitty in that one... sadly... naturally other people are more thoughtful than myself... so when I got up to torture people on stage, the lights got turned on... which is also sad... kind of. I think everything would have been a lot better if the only thing you could see was the light bouncing off my head onto the mirror ball.
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I'm available for parties. But only ones where I get to jump out of a cake.
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So... there's that... but, more importantly, there's this. I've never had anyone beat in number-of-times-doing-karaoke, but I think it's actually statistically more rare to see Brooke Moody on stage... I think Charlie intentionally fucked this up the first time just to make the moment last... Much to the chagrin of the guy at the bar...
What's sad is that there's a mild chance that I actually have interesting things to say... But, fuck that... I have karaoke videos. Labels: Allison, Brooke, Judith, music
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