SOUNDTRACK: RHEOSTATICS-Halifax, NS (August 27, 2004).
Rheostatics are reuniting for 3 shows at the Art Gallery of Ontario in a few weeks. And I am going to see them!
So it’s time to listen to a few shows from eleven years ago. This show doesn’t even mention a club, but that’s ok. It’s a fun gig in Nova Scotia. The quality of the recording is not great–it was recorded in the audience and you can hear a lot of audience chatter (and consequently the band is not as clear as could be).
Their final album 2067 is out in just a few months from this show, and they play a few songs from it: “Marginalized” and “The Tarleks.” Later, Martin describes “Aliens” as “The Tarleks Part 1.” They also play “I Dig Music” a fun jazzy number. There’s a drum break in the middle and drummer MPW says that he was trying to play the intro from Rush’s “Lakeside Park.”
There’s a wild middle section in “Satan is the Whistler.”
This show has lots of banter, and there’s a discussion about an audience member mocking The Headpins. And later when a fan says his friend was kicked out, Dave gets mad at the bouncers and seems genuinely concerned for the friend and offers to go get him.
After they play “My First Rock Show” they ask MPW about his first rock show. The discussion devolves into a discussion of John Cage’s smell (Old man vegan smell).
For “Take Me in Your hand” a fellow named Reid does guest vocals.
During the encore they play a version of happy birthday to someone whose birthday it is which is followed by a scorching version of “Rock Death America.”
As the encore winds down Dave says “dim the lights, chill the ham,” which I assume is a nod to fellow Canadians Shadowy Men on a Shadowy Planet and their 1991 album. Martin (I assume) also starts playing around with a voice modulator as the song ends.
If the audio was better this would be an amazing show.
[READ: July 20, 2015] “So You’re Just What, Gone?”
I’ve enjoyed most of Taylor’s stories, even though his protagonists tend to be unpleasant. But this story felt entirely too insubstantial for me to get beyond the grossness of it.
Charity is a high school student. She is flying with her mother to visit her grandmother. She doesn’t want to go and doesn’t want to be with her mom. She’s pleased when she and her mom are separated on the plane (five plus hours of freedom!).
She winds up sitting next to a guy who tries to be chatty with her. She wants none of it, but when she wakes up mid-flight to find that she has been sleeping on the guy’s shoulder, she feels a little bad and actually talks to him. When Mark asks her if she gets bored and then says she is pretty, you know things are creepy.
When Mark he grabs her inner thigh and squeezes it and then gives her his business card, well, you just know the guy is a shit. (more…)
I Just Read About That... 