SOUNDTRACK: RHEOSTATICS-Sugar, Victoria BC (November 17, 2005).
Lucky’s Notes: [Lucky recorded this show and gets a song dedicated to him]:
This was to be the last time the Rheos played in Victoria, though we had no idea at the time. We will all really miss you guys out here!!
Given that information, it’s particularly sad when they say, “we’ll see you hopefully in the spring.” But despite that future sadness, the show itself is great. It begins with a wonderful “Easy to Be with You” which sounds terrific: the “do da” part is really rich in harmonies.
It’s followed by a quite raw “CCYPA” and then a fun, romping “Garden” which ends with: “Hugh Syme’s dance party for your pleasure”–Martin making an electronic racket with his guitar.
“Fat” has some interesting echo on Dave’s voice that I wonder if it could be bouncing off the room or not. The “don’t even know who you are” is pretty wild with many different vocal from the guys. It’s a great version overall–the bands is really into it. Having more fun with “PIN” Dave seems to be really enjoying himself with the backing vocal nonsense.
Dave says, “It’s great to be here in Victoria, the Queen’s city, once again.” When they start the poppy and delightful “Mumbletypeg,” Martin acknowledges “the amazing rhythm guitar playing of Dave Bidini. Very rhythmic.”
“We’d like to thank Shane Koyczan for opening tonight–one of the sexiest men in Canada–another Neruda.”
“Marginalized” sounds great–dark and angry with a lot of echo on Tim’s voice. That sounds weird but cool. There’s a quiet middle section where Dave is playing a gentle acoustic and Tim is keeping that bassline. It goes on and then the final verse is sung quietly with little accompaniment.
Someone in the crowd shouts “Record Body Count,” and Dave says “yes we got records, what about it?”
But Tim says, “we’ll do another apocalyptic number for you.” They play “Here Comes the Image” with lots of great synth from MPW including an awesome solo. Some really cool backing vocal from Martin make this one of the best versions I’ve heard. Then MPW sits back at the drums: “good now I can relax.”
“Christopher” starts with an interesting guitar chord structure intro before they get to the song proper. There’s an intense soloing section and a terrific quiet ending. It’s followed by “King of the Past.” It’s not my favorite version of it but there’s a lot of interesting stuff going on in it. It’s followed by a wild “Rock Death America.”
When they get to “Satan is the Whistler” Dave says they’re going to try this one “coz we hope to play it [well] in two days in Vancouver.” Martin sings some verses pretty slowly and then later he plays the fast part much more slowly and sloppily than usual.
He also adds to these lines:
bouncers came and snuffed the fucking fire out / there’s no smoking in the parking lot / “I hate this fucking place” / some punks in the windy peaks
After the song Dave concurs: “You gotta keep those parking lots clean. For parking. And loitering. Gas huffing [Martin: “pathetic addicts”] nefarious activities.”
“Claire” is a little sloppy from everyone, even Tim’s singing is a bit mumbly. But there’s a great long solo from Martin. Martin continues the solid work on “California Dreamline which is slow and trippy with lovely weird keyboards. While singing, he whoops after “sand in my tequila” and rolls his r’s after the “escondido” part.
The song segues into what sounds like “Horses” with Tim chanting “do it do it do it do it ; do it do it don’t you do it” but then Martin plays a rocking guitar for the intro of “Feed Yourself.” It is noisy and aggressive and amazing, perhaps the best version of this song I’ve heard. They play a riff of “Hey Hey, My My” then Dave starts getting really intense: “what’s in his head?” he starts screaming “open it up. “Look inside.” (The loudest screaming I’ve heard him do). The intensity is undermined somewhat by Tim’s ending backing vocal of “trunk trunk… what ‘cha gonna do with all that junk / all that junk inside that trunk.”
They go for an encore break and Dave says, At this point in the gig Martin usually has a cigarette, so I felt required to write a smoking song. It’s a new song about Martin smoking. It’s called “Smoking Song,” but how on earth is it about Martin smoking when he references Joseph Stalin and Hitler? he doesn’t say, but when it’s over, he says, “uh oh looks like a 2 smoke break. He might never come out.” so they play “My First Rock Show.” During the first verse, Dave stops and asks, “What’s so funny sir? That must have been the laughter of pure joy.” You can’t hear what they’re talking about, but Dave mentions NoMeanasNo and agrees that “they sent a lot of us on the wrong road. In the best way.”
When Martin arrives, Mike asks, “Where to, lads?” After some mumbling, you hear Mike say “boogers?” Dave says “vetoed! songwriter gets veto.” He then says they “support the locked out Telus workers. Telus is the shittiest service. They just got so big and fat there sitting on themselves.” More quiet discussion then Mike says “that’s good, Martin you had a smoke and now you’re asserting yourself.”
Perhaps they agreed to the earlier request, because they play “Record Body Count” which sounds great. When the song is more or less over, Martin starts playing a riff and begins singing “I’ve Been Thinking of You” and the crowd cheers. They jam that song and afterwards, Martin says “What was that song we did in the middle was it April Wine or something?” No one knows. It was a band called Harlequin.
Dave says, “We were in Nanaimo last night. Home to two of the greatest record stores.” Someone shouts: “Home of the Nanaimo Bar.” To which Dave replies: “Home of the Naniamo Bear. That bear likes them dead salmon.”
They play “Making Progress” which opens with a buzzy staticky guitar and big echo on Tim’s voice. When they get to the synth part it’s all messed up and someone apologizes, saying “don’t let me near that thing again.” Then it gets fixed and the synth is back on.
They end the show with “Dope Fiends.” There’s a big echo on Martin’s voice. Someone else sings some great falsetto along with him. During the slow part, Dave stars singing “Legal Age Life” but the music doesn’t change–it’s rather disconcerting but cool. The melody starts playing a keyboard that sounds like “Norwegian Wood” and at the end Tim does backing humming to “Norwegian Wood” before Martin’s loud and wild guitar ending.
Despite the odd echo, it’s a really great show. The band sounds in great form and they are having a really good time. It’s hard to believe they broke up so soon after this.
[READ: February 15, 2017] The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl
Sarah and I have really enjoyed the Squirrel Girl graphic novels. She was really excited to see this actual novel about Squirrel girl from Shannon Hale.
This book is part of the Marvel Universe. And what I’ve learned recently is that while I enjoy the Marvel Universe, I far more enjoy the peripheral characters of the Marvel Universe–like those of S.H.I.E.L.D. (even if I don’t watch the show anymore–it got a little crazy). So I find myself enjoying Ms Marvel and Guardians of the Galaxy and now Squirrel Girl–characters who reference The Avengers but are not actually part of the team.
There’s some thing so much more enjoyable about these characters where the stories can have fun of the major Marvel figures. And this one has a ton of fun with that conceit. (more…)
SOUNDTRACK: RHEOSTATICS-Stan Rogers Folk Festival, Canso, NS (July 3, 2005).
