Sextiles – at the Anon CD Release Party at The Middle East and T.T. the Bear’s – Review

Sextiles

with The Borg, Women of Sodom, Double Dong, Curious Ritual, Turkish Delight, The Moors, Sirensong, and Cake Like at the Anon CD Release Party at The Middle East and T.T. the Bear’s
by J. Fritz

    This is a collection of top-speed scribblings found in a small black vinyl notebook I discovered in my coat pocket on Sunday morning, Oct. 17. Can’t tell if it’s my handwriting or not.

Night One – Friday October 16

The Borg
At times, the lyrics made me smile, but the music was too minimal for my taste, and the performance lacked visual impact. If the music isn’t important, then they should make more of a spectacle of the stage show. If the stage show isn’t important, then they should maybe add a musician or something a little more substantial in the way of samples, loops, whatever… The “2001” theme at the end was well done though. Good continuity too. Could become something interesting if left to fester in its own juices, despite its current embryonic form.

Sextiles
Ran over to T.T.’s and came in halfway through somebody’s set. Second time I’d been there this week. They have Guinness now, you know. The drummer had a mohawk, so it was obvious the band was cool. Songs were tightly sewn together by throbbing bass and frantic rhythms. Stage pulsed. Energy. Really a fine band. But the singer sounded like Joan Baez on methedrine. That probably works well for a lot of listeners but… I dunno.

Women of Sodom
Starts out with the voice of an angel and a sword-wielding bellydancer… fog machine and ghostly cross-bearing processional procession with penis-tipped love guns… vinyl-covered women branding mini artistic tools drag in their slaves and then hang them up like so much meat ’round the stage… then ensued repetitious flagellations, the shatting upon of every Catholic, the dog kennel corruption of some Mr. Straight who was planted in the crowd, and the enema bag parade followed by hot wax on the hard nipples of Jesus. Oh yeah, there was music too. Well, I’m pretty sure there was anyway. From where I was sitting, mostly what I heard was the drum machine, but I chose my seat for the view, not the acoustics. It all left me with the impression that an exhibition like this will hold your attention for 45 minutes as long as you have at least one functioning gland in your body, even if there’s a little bored posing and aimlessly wandering going on between the oral sex and abject humiliation.

Night Two Saturday October 17

(Bar-hopping with a three-song limit)

Double Dong
Guest appearance at T.T.’s was an unexpected gas. All-vocal hip-hop with one live drummer, zero technology. Three out front: 1 raps, 1 makes odd sounds, 1 is a prop with attitude. Second most fun thing I saw both nights, next to Turkish Delight.

Curious Ritual
Back to M.E. Downstairs. I always listen closely to a hollow-body guitar to see what it has to say. There was much in the way of psychedelic trauma. Solid bass and drum interplay left the six-string free to resonate and groove around without being bound to a rigid part. Good songs otherwise but the vocals were flat. The expression on her face said she couldn’t hear her monitors.

Turkish Delight
T.T.’s again for something interesting that only vaguely resembled what is conventionally thought of as music. Singer was a fairy queen complete with gauzy wings and wand. She made gifts to the house of toy instruments and odd curios and asked the crowd to play along. Second song was a rip along the psychotic freeway blowing off the tolls. This was odd-ball shit. Hep kat with red shirt and groovy shades goofed on the guitarist and danced a tripped-out psychosurf jig.

The Moors
M.E. Upstairs. Smells like pagan spirit. Must have been the incense. Celtic ambiance and mournful tunes. Looked like the gypsies passed through and somebody bounced off the cart. Really dug the flute, but too bad there was some kind of low-frequency hum that drowned it out and buzzed the speaker cabs.

Sirensong
Probably I wasn’t the right guy for this review. Sirensong wasn’t my thing. I recognized good musicianship and a tight band. I could hear that the singer hit all her notes. Yes, they had a solid drummer and the mix was pretty clear and loud enough to enjoy but not to trash my head. But in spite of all these good things, it sounded to this correspondent like the same song three times.

Cake Like
Got there just in time to see them breaking down the stage and going home. I had another beer and did the same.