Show Reviews – Page 35 – Spinning Platters

BottleRock Napa Valley 2016 Festival Journal, Day 1

The first taste of summer: BottleRock Napa Valley, the 2016 edition. (Photo credit: BottleRock Napa Valley / Latitude 38 Entertainment)

Before I get into all the details of the gloriousness that was this year’s BottleRock Napa Valley, please allow me a moment, not just to digress but to explain why this festival is so important to me. I was born in Napa. As many Napa kids do, I moved away in my early 20s seeking something more exciting (hard to imagine now, but at the time Napa was still a relatively small town without a lot to do). I had some oats to sow, and was gone for 5-6 years, but returned about a decade ago to go back to school. Since then, I often say that “this town and I grew up together,” as we’ve both evolved into something more worth enjoying. While once I was a kid from a small town most had never heard of (and because of which I often claimed SF or the Bay Area to those unfamiliar), I have since become a “townie,” and that’s okay with me. This place is something special, and I can’t imagine ever leaving. True, it was once far quieter (and okay, far more dull), but these days it’s really something to behold, and has earned its reputation as a world-famous, world-class destination on bucket lists the world over. So, add to that a phenomenal music festival that showcases not just the mind-blowing wines and taste-bud-tantalizing food for which we’re known, but consistently impressive musical lineups that offer something for everyone, year after year? How could I not love BottleRock? I’m happy to say that I’ve been BottleRocking since the very beginning, and I can’t imagine what it might take to keep me away. As you can imagine, I’m already looking forward to next year’s festival!

Okay, onward…this year, BottleRock was scheduled to fall on Memorial Day weekend. While I personally heard the frustration of local business owners (for many of whom the beloved festival pulls away business all weekend long), I didn’t have any reason to lament spending a long, beautiful-weathered weekend wandering the Napa Valley Expo grounds last weekend more or less than any other.

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Show Review: Refused with The Coathangers and Plague Vendor at the Fillmore, 5/26/2016

Four years later, it’s no longer a reunion — Refused are reborn as something new

It’s really hard to find a concert that was better, and more well-attended, than the 2012 show at the Warfield that marked the triumphant return of the Swedish hardcore giants known as Refused. Alumni and newcomers from all scenes of loud, angry music were found wandering the crowd en masse, and the band themselves, fresh off of their first gargantuan performance at Coachella, took the tinier stage they were offered and absolutely demolished any doubts held about their ability to still blow the minds of their audience. To this day, every time Refused has returned to the Bay Area, they acknowledge that performance as the one that actually convinced them to stay in the game. Singer Dennis Lyxzén regularly has stated that the gig brought them back down to earth, from the lofty, uncertain heights of trying to conquer the main stage down in Indio, and the energy expressed in every one of Refused’s shows since that time has always seemed to be a display of gratitude for that night. The question, then, was whether or not Refused would treat the early ’10s as their victory lap back in the race, or actually return with a new path to follow as an active band creating new art.

The answer, of course, is the latter — and they show no signs of slowing down.

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Show Review: Violent Femmes at the Fillmore, 05/11/2016

Gordon Gano of Violent Femmes (all photos by Daniel Martinez)

Nothing would have made the Violent Femmes a better band, because they were perfect. Gordon Gano sings like he’s a sick cat and has been drunk-crying all day; he has a kind of nasal whine, full of defeat, with a timbre as refined as cheap whiskey with generic Cherry Coke. I love his voice like I love cheap, shitty cocktails; it’s a love fueled by disillusionment and a longing for my more reckless and grimier youth when I didn’t care so much for creature comforts or sleep. The musical structure of their songs, like most punk pieces, is simple. But, like a lot of punk, their catchy songs about needing/wanting or frustration/disappointment are embittered perfection driven by a stripped, primitive skill and sound, and all of this sits squarely and perfectly with some of my perpetually adolescent tendencies.

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Show Review: Storm Large at Feinstein’s At The Nikko, 4/15/2016

Storm Large became famous on the Internet in 2009 with her song called “(My Vagina Is) 8 Miles Wide.” Any song about the joy of sluttiness and empowering embodiment will instantly hook into my feminist sensibilities, but what makes this song even more awesome is the power of Storm Large as a vocalist and performer. She’s about six-feet-two-inches of tempestuous energy, with a rich voice, and a gigantic range, who pens songs that range from irreverent and funny (“Vagina” abovre), to heartfelt and hopeful (“Stand Up for Me”), to ominous and jaunty (“Throw Away the Key”), and brings the same deft force to the standards and rock ballads she covers. Her material, her range, her presence – everything about her music and performance makes me want to live and love openly, bravely, boldly.

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Fauxchella Review: Savages at the Fillmore, 4/19/2016

A thunderstruck, brilliant display of chaotic camaraderie, with a stunning surprise for the end of the performance

Every year during Fauxchella, there is always The One Show To Rule Them All. Often times, it’s a wildly infamous, recently-reformed act playing a tiny venue; other times, it’s a great swath of bands all playing one massive evening; occasionally, however, the headlining act is simply one of the most talked-about acts on the live circuit, and as luck would have it, they have that night all to themselves, and are poised to deliver a heart-stopping, utterly thrilling set to all of the lucky fans that managed to snatch up tickets to their gig. Many Bay Area concertgoers will be likely to rant and rave about all of the indietronic acts that dominated the earlier part of the week and weekend prior as the Shows To See, but this year, that honor went to the London quartet known as Savages, who took over the stage at the Fillmore and delivered one of the most ferocious and stunningly energetic performances of 2016 — in less than two hours’ time.

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Show Review: Generation Axe at the Fox Oakland, 4/8/2016

Steve Vai’s latest excursion is as much a massive thrill ride as it is an endurance test — for band and audience alike

Let's Play Guitar In A Five Guitar Band — Let’s Play Guitar In A Five Guitar Band

It’s been twenty years since guitar mastermind Joe Satriani piloted the first G3 Tour, an endeavour that featured a total of three guitar wizards driving a multi-hour set that showcased some truly intense musicianship. On that tour, and on nearly every one that followed, Satriani was accompanied by his protégé, Steve Vai, who brought his own brand of sorcery to pair with Satch, alongside whichever third player was enlisted each year. In 2016, however, Vai apparently got the notion that three guitarists playing simultaneously was not a big enough challenge to pull off, and kicked off the “Generation Axe” tour which featured no less than five of them — spanning genres, geographical locations, and playing styles. With a titanic set that sprawled out for over 3 hours, it was a testament to the true meaning of “instrumental guitar music” and how such a term is a remarkably small pigeonhole, given the amount of players that work within it and the breadth of their expertise.

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Show Review: The Residents Present Shadowland at the Regency Ballroom, 4/10/2016

Four decades of experimental musicianship, catalogued onscreen and crammed neatly into a minimalistic trio performance

If you’re an act that’s been around for over 40 years, chances are that there are a few people who have heard of you. You probably have some chart-topping hits, your members are household names, and everyone in the band has been in some scandal or gossipy news story at some point during their career. This is the way of rock music — for everyone, it seems, except for The Residents, who exist as an experimental entity far more than any kind of traditional “band”. Formed in Shreeveport, LA and eventually based in San Mateo, CA, the Residents have managed to remain anonymous for the entirety of their career, and each of their subsequent works takes any previous notions of “what kind of band” they were and throws them bodily out the window. With such a dizzying body of work behind them, it’s never a sure thing what the group will do on each of their tours, and their current magnum opus Shadowland is no exception.

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Show Review: Elvis Costello at The Masonic, 3/30/2016

Elvis performing at the Donostiako Jazzaldia 2010 (photo by Dena Flows)

It’s common for the fame of the song to equal the fame of the artist, and Elvis Costello came out with a handful of hits in the 80s that have made their way into the American consciousness. “What’s So Funny ‘Bout Peace Love and Understanding” is one of the great rock anthems of the early 80s: a wanting to be more caring, but feeling burned and raw from life’s disappointments, and is as least as famous as the artist himself. He’s always been a broad reaching artist; early tracks of his like “Shipbuilding” and “Almost Blue” straddle the edge of jazz, but he’s best known for his angsty, sometimes political rock and roll from the 80s and early 90s.

He’s evolved as an artist since then, releasing jazz and country albums containing some truly excellent material, and more or less leaving his rock days behind. I imagine it must be a frustrating blessing to be so beloved as an artist for such a small subsection of a vast and eclectic catalogue; shows sell out but the audience wants the same five or six songs, when there are fifty newer songs that will never receive the same attention. It’s like the inverse to “adultolescence”, where instead of the artist’s refusal to grow, everyone else is attached to what he did at age 25. I’m guilty of this, and while I can get behind his new material, and his move towards a Merle Haggard musical style – a grandiose goal, and one he can pull off – I miss the angry rock star who I grew up listening to.

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Show Review: Iggy Pop’s ‘Post Pop Depression’ Tour at The Masonic, 3/31/16

The Stooges were one of the greatest American rock bands of all time. That core team of Iggy Pop along with the Asheton Brothers created a brand new sound that was so thick, dirty and ferocious, it made even the heaviest bands of the 60s sound like Peter Paul and Mary. As a young punk, I devoured the three records they put out in the 60s. Those records are perfection. However, that also meant that I avoided any and all of Pop’s solo material. Sure, if people were dancing to “Lust For Life”, I’d join in, but the little solo material I came across otherwise — “Candy”, “Real Wild Child” — all sounded like over produced parodies of that animalistic beast that was The Stooges.

Fast forward to 2016. I learn that Pop is releasing a so-called “farewell” album. He enlisted Josh Homme, the “too handsome for his own good” mastermind behind Queens of the Stone Age, to produce the album. He then drafted Homme, along with other members of QOTSA and the Arctic Monkeys, as his backing band. With the majority of the Stooges having passed away, I thought that these guys were capable of emulating that sound. I had high hopes for a back to basics, thick and dirty rock record and tour.

I was wrong, but I was wrong in the best way possible.

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