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APOLOGIES:
Last
week, this column erroneously called Djangos.com CEO Steve
Wood "Steve Woods." The Music Desk (which is, in actuality,
just one lone idiot!) regrets the error.
IN OTHER
NEWS:
NAIL
Distribution, a Portland company that distributes records
for scads of indie labels, announced an alliance with EMusic.com,
a site focused on MP3s and alt-rock. EMusic gets a piece
of NAIL, while the distro makes a strong move on the Net.
After
regulatory snafus kiboshed a planned series of outdoor shows
at the River Queen venue on the waterfront, local
promoter Show-man had to look elsewhere for some
big-ticket outdoor shows. And aha! Seems there's a fairly
big public square, right downtown. The company presents
the Indigo Girls (July 18) and a Los Lobos/John Hiatt/Wilco
triple bill (July 28) at Pioneer Court-house Square.
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Some
time after Lisa Kekaula, firestorm singer
of the Bellrays, communed voodoo-style with the ghost
of soul, and while Dead Moon made its mouth-foaming
hell ride, and before the Satyricon crowd
steamed, drunk and dehydrated and amazed, into the night,
my comrade Dan leaned over to shout in my ear.
"Pretty nice to see the real thing, isn't it?" he said,
getting the words out over Dead Moon's stark, bristling
noise. And yes--it may sound goo-goo and stupid, but it
is nice to see the real thing. Friday night, as the oldest
rock club on the West Coast celebrated its 16th with appropriate
savagery, Dead Moon and the Bellrays left no doubt as to
their bona fides.
The Bellrays, the Bellrays. The Los Angeles quartet crash-tests
Kekaula's classic soul vocals head-on into a garage rock
juggernaut, a force that rolls like a tank division, a force
led by a guitarist with the terrifying and final name Tony
Fate. Fate looks like he should be in Tesla and
plays rabid and ragged, like he's afraid electric guitar
might be outlawed tomorrow.
Kekaula's singing, which inevitably recalls Aretha
(a very, very pissed off Aretha), is so strong, her band
could get away with cut-rate Ramones ripoffs. Instead,
the Bellrays have mastered the art of writing fuelled-up
rock songs fit to tear the top of your skull off; this night,
they added lean, bad-mojo psychedelic chaos and even more
soul on ice.
When the Bellrays have a crowd that is theirs and theirs
alone, they can flog The People into a froth that makes
Kekaula's constant call-and-response question--"Are you
ready for the Revolution?"--seem like more than style posturing.
Friday night, though, the big crowd wanted to save a little
something. It was hot, the first unforgiving oven show of
the newborn summer, the kind of night that, between the
beer and the schvitzing, takes it out of you. What the Bellrays
may have lost in audience participation, everyone in the
house got back in raw thrill when Dead Moon took over.
Quaver-voiced singer Fred Cole, bassist Toody
Cole and drummer Andrew Loomis are probably Portland's
greatest rock band, a trio that rides 'em hard and puts
'em up wet every time. Like skilled pushers, they dole out
just enough of their unholy substance to keep the
believers happy. This was their first show in months, and
it hit with cold, coiled vengeance.
Coming with "It's a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock
'n' Roll)," their brand-marked AC/DC cover, early
on, the three gave no quarter. Always a little rough around
the edges, they sounded like industrial sandpaper this time,
but thick and solid. As they rampaged along, everyone hung
right there with them, forgetting the close heat.
The truly great thing about Dead Moon is that, at bottom,
it's irony free. Lots of bands toss off metal covers and
adopt goofy spook iconography. Dead Moon means it. These
three are in it for life, dedication tattooed to their skins
but even more obvious than that when they play. In their
world, love is hard but vital, the night has a bloody secret
and sweat is noble. It's the real thing, all right, and
in a world of counterfeits, it is good.
Elsewhere:
EJ's, the Northeast Sandy Boulevard rock club that
looks like a ski lodge at an alpine resort reserved for
members of the Kannibal Mongols Motorcycle & Glee Club,
likes it loud. Unfortunately, everyone has the right to
a morgue-silent neighborhood--says so right in the damn
Constitution! When The Owners, Add-X, Das Gravyboat
and Camera Obscura cranked up a little too high
on April 22, the forces of order swung into action.
An OLCC officer skillfully detected audible sound
outside and notified city noise czar Paul Van Orden.
Van Orden, who seems a reasonable fellow, issued the club
a "letter of violation"--a warning, essentially--last week.
According to Brendan Welsch of EJ's, the rock stronghold
is all over it. After taking noise readings inside the apartments
of the building that nestles up against the bar's back wall,
EJ's adjusted its sound system to cut back on the particular
bass frequencies that are the most problematic. The bar
is also instituting its first-ever "good neighbor" policy.
Civil society in action! A thing of beauty!
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Willamette Week | originally
published April 26,
2000
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