Mid-afternoon on the day on the concert I started feeling ill. Time came to start heading to the city and I told myself I was going no matter what. Driving along the 24 I see a sign that the Bay Bridge is closed…what the heck? This can’t be right. A quick call to 511 confirmed that the bridge was indeed closed.
Suddenly I had the perfect excuse not to go. I was sick and the bridge was closed; no one could blame me for not going. But something inside me, quite possibly the contrarian drive I have, told me if the bridge was closed I had to go.
So I quickly got off the highway and hopped onto BART. I don’t normally feel like puking when sick but I started moving the valuables out of my bag, just in case. Even when I got to the Civic Center BART I felt like turning around. Fact was, I was too sick to go to this show. I was worried I’d puke in the venue and then they’d think I was a lush.
The walk to Slim’s lifted my spirits a bit. I got to the venue just as Hot Tub was finishing their set. I did get to see three members of the band using the cords in different “provocative” ways, like jacking off the mic or holding the mic cord taught against their taint…I guess that’s rock and roll?
The crowd was pretty much non-existent. The Bay Bridge being closed, and it being a Tuesday night may have had huge impact on the amount of people there. The Heavy were going to have to bring it if they were going to make this an awesome show.
It was brought-en. 16 songs in about an hour ranging from LedZep rock to Sharon Jones R&B. It’s hard to pin down what one genre The Heavy are boxed into. I decided that they play College Party Playlist music. The type of playlist where all the girls in the party are shaking that ass and all the dudes have sweat on their brow.
They started off with “Short Change Hero” which begins with an awesome spaghetti western intro. This song really showcased the lead singers smooth croons. Next up was “Colleen” which got super funky. I felt like I was in the House of Groove and The Heavy were my tour guide. The big horns in this track were awesome but would be more so if they actually had horns on the stage.
After “Colleen” was a song where the crowd was told to chant, “I’m a big, bad wolf,” and periodically howl. San Francisco was not really showing its wolf spirit that night. It was a mix of Ben Harper vocal stylings and Zeppelin guitar riffs.
By the fourth song the crowd was cat calling the Heavy and rightly so, they had played an awesome set so far. The guitarist even got to sing lead on “Love Like That,” a light-hearted surf-rock track.
When they played “In the Morning” I may have been mistaken, but I thought I heard some an homage to Salt-n-Pepa’s “Push It” woven into the chorus.
The highlights were many, while the lowlights were few. They would have benefited from having actual horns on the stage rather than synthesized ones. Also the guitarist was having issues with his tuning halfway through the show. This seemed to cause a bit of tension between the lead singer and the guitarist. The band was starting songs before the guitarist was ready with his tuning: a lot of head-shakes and eye-rolls were being exchanged.
The show was overall really high energy with the lead singer really performing for the crowd. The Heavy really made me regret having to review the show because all I wanted to do was dance. With a larger audience, who knows to what levels of insanity the show might get to. Apart from the small issues I listed, The Heavy still managed to make this concert a great one. Next time someone else should review their show while I dance my balls off.
If you feel the urge to dance, you can simply dance. I don’t think dancing and reviewing are at odds with each other. Sometimes the review is “I shook my butt dancing all night long. The end.”