SOUNDTRACK: RHEOSTATICS-The Horseshoe Tavern, Toronto, ON (December 9, 2017).
Final of three shows f
or the Horseshoe Tavern’s 70th anniversary celebrations. Kindly recorded and provided by Mark Sloggett and Matt Kositsky. Kevin was playing Massey Hall with Barenaked Ladies but showed up for the encore and played Accordion. Ensign Broderick opened.
The show opens with a beautiful two shot of Martin-sung songs. A lovely Stolen Car which starts out quietly and beautifully is followed by a soaring “Northern Wish” which starts and ends quietly but had a nice fast loud section in the middle.
After Clark starts inexplicably singing “Gary Indiana, Gary Indiana,” the band plays a quiet intro to “Michael Jackson.” There’s some great crazy sounds, I assume from Hugh Marsh, that add an interesting texture to the verses. The band really fills out the middle with some great soloing from Martin and Hugh and the vocals from Martin and Tim are great too. The end totally rocks. It’s an awesome version.
It segues into “AC/DC on My Stereo” which is a little sloppy but more fun than other versions. After a few technical difficulties, there’s two in a row from Tim. First the mellow “Music is the Message” with great violin from Hugh and then a terrific “Claire.” DB intros it by asking “How many people have read the novel Whale Music? Oh not nearly enough, that’s a Christmas order. Go to your beautiful local library and read it and we’ll talk in like four months. Deal?” The sound on this version is crisp and everyone’s instruments sound so clear.
DB: We’ll play longer than usual since its Saturday and no one has to do anything tomorrow. If you do just give me the number of your boss and Martin will call your boss and pretend he’s you. Martin: I’ll be up first thing in the morning. Not hungover. The Clark and Martin have a pretty darn funny pretend conversation in which Martin quits the company.
This is no a segue into a wonderful “Christopher” that has a terrific Martin and Hugh duo–they try to match each other in sound and scope and it’s just amazing–I would have loved to see that.
Then DB is coming out front to sing “Mountains and the Sea.” Clark: he’s not Neil Sedaka, he’s not Neil Diamond, uh oh. Tim: Dave’s fundraising again. DB: Tim, I put the fun in fundraising. DB: Anybody got a stool? Martin: Ah extra casual. Dave, make sure you’re not flying low. It’s a lovely quiet version of the song with a fun and funny solo by Hugh.
Clark starts chanting 6-11-11-18. DB: we’re doing new songs that require counting. We’re playing them for you tonight because you are elastic and rubbery and forgiving: Possible names 6-11-11-18 (Tim: that’s way better than 2067), could be called Swipe Right. Then Martin demonstrates the noise and nonsense that they will be doing for 90 minutes (feedback and slide whistle).
Martin: I’m a temperamental artist.
Clark: I thought you said tempura artist, you work wish sushi.
Martin: I play tantrum rock.
Clark: You’re like Sting, you can go all night long.
Martin: Except mine is just unpleasantness and anger.
This is a set up to Martin’s complicated “Albatross.” It sounds great and very dramatic. This is followed by a beautiful acoustic rendition of “Bad Time to Be Poor.” It winds up being just Tim and Hugh and it’s very pretty.
DB: You’re much more composed than last night’s crowd. Martin: who were a bunch of louts. DB: Lout-ish. Well, one guy was a lout. And congratulations to the Toronto Football Club for winning the MLS football cup.
Up next is “Supercollider,” with an unusually long and trippy opening from Hugh. Clark says: “I’d like to dedicate this to my oldest friend on the planet Karen Lindhart and my sister, who are here tonight. We listened to a lot of music together when we were kids. Take us into space, Hugh. A wondrous soaring violin solo ensues before the cool song begins.
DB: Okay, now we’re entering “shank” portion of the concert. This one features Tim Vesely on … air. This is an obvious dance party starter, but what the fuck. Dave starts chanting post-Ptolemaic and when he asks Tim if he;s like to say anything about the Ptolemaic universe, Tim says he wasn’t paying attention. It’s a wild and somewhat shambolic version of “Legal Age Life.” But things settle down nicely for Tim’s “Soul Glue: which has some lovely violin as an intro.
They start out a beautiful “California Dreamline” and when it gets to “questionable things like” just before the song takes off, something happens (not sure what) and it crashes to a halt. Tim says, “that was so fucking close. I thought the intro was pretty awesome.” They try to pick it up from where they left off, but it fails. Martin: Okay lets drop this song, we’ve only played it 14,000 times. Clark: let’s do a quick palette cleanser. Which turns out to be a bouncy “Alomar.” Mid song Martin says “your call will be answered shortly.” They jump back into “California” and after a few false starts, they play it through with no more hiccups (although a lot of sloppy guitars). When they get to “All the naked ladies,” Tim interjects, “they’re at Massey Hall tonight.”
DB: This is the birthday of the Horseshoe–70 years ago today. We (Me, Tim, Dave, and James Gray [of Blue Rodeo]) first played here Halloween in 1982 (or 1983) opening for The Government. I don’t even know how many years that is. Audience: “35” DB: “Wow. Thanks… math nerd.”
That kindly story segues into a harsh and rocking version of “Feed Yourself.” The middle instrumental section where Dave B gets really intense screaming and repeating lyrics is fleshed out even further by some great work from Hugh Marsh. It’s probably the most intense version of the song I’ve heard. I wish Martin’s guitar was a little quieter in the mix. And I wish more than ever that I’d managed to get to see this show.
DB: We have one more song. Then we’ll go back stage and we’ll have an internal review and you can have an external review. If you deem it worthy of continuation, perhaps you’ll show some sign of support. Tim: However if you disapproved of tonight’s show please remain silent. It would confuse us other otherwise.
Then Tim looks in the audience and asks, “Is that a bumble T-shirt? Sorry I thought you were promoting your dating website.”
They begin “Shaved Head” and Clark says he wants to play brushes, dammit. Which he does for the quiet opening. It’s an amazing song and a great ending to the set.
For the encore, Clark says Kevin is going to come up and play accordion. Then he sings an a capella (until Tim starts playing the drums) rendition of “My Mind Is On Fire” (“I wanna communicate with you about love… right now” are the whole of the lyrics).
Kevin starts the accordion for a sloppy wild “Who Stole the Kishka” which seems in the wrong key the whole time. When it’s over: DB: They don’t write any good fucking kisha songs anymore. Audience guy: “Taking Care of Business.” DB: “We fucking just took care of business right there.” Audience guy: “There’s something about you guys I really hate.” DB: “Know what I hate about our audience? Too many Italians.”
Tim: “Alright, Dim the lights, chill the ham. Turn the lights way down. As in off. Even the wiener roaster, turn that one off.” And so starts a slow, brooding version of “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.” By the end, the song has gotten huge, including the by-now obligatory “I wish I was back home in Derry” shout outs.
[READ: November 28, 2018] Ambient Comics
I love working in a place where I can see German comics (especially if they are wordless like this one), which I can fully enjoy.
This collection by German artist Nadine Redlich is wonderful. The introduction by Mahler talks about the urgent question in the study of sequential art: “What lies between the panels” and how this book makes it easy to answer the question. He says that that which lies between the panels is already within the panels, which explains “why there is so little room in between.”
Each of the pages of this book hosts a six panel cartoon in which literally almost nothing happens. (more…)
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SOUNDTRACK: hiatus.
I Just Read About That... 