Sunday, November 1, 2009

Duff Gig Review: The Toasters, The Forthrights, Hey Stranger, and The Stress (10/30 at The Knitting Factory)

Despite my grousing about having to travel to Brooklyn to see this bill at the new Knitting Factory (I'm a spoiled Manhattanite), I found it, in all honesty, to be an easy trip: L train to the first stop in Brooklyn--Bedford Avenue--and then a two-minute walk to the club. The excellent new space is split between a large bar with plenty of booths and huge tilted windows that look out directly onto the dancefloor and stage (it resembles an oversized control booth in a recording studio--the bar is actually called The Kontrol Room--and when I ran into KF Vice Prez of East Coast Productions Shay Vishawadia, who was both The Skatalites' and Laurel Aitken's manager in a former life, he told me that the venue is purposefully set up in this manner, as The Knitting Factory operates several associated labels and they plan to offer the club as a place to cut albums) and a medium-sized performance space (through a good deal smaller than the first floor room of their old Manhattan joint). Also, the beer was reasonably priced for a club, which is always a welcome turn of events.

Just outside the club, a chalkboard sandwich sign listed the line-up for the night and times the bands were scheduled to play--and it was a nice surprise to find that The Stress had been added to the bill at the last minute, since I've been wanting to see them since I ran across their MySpace page a few weeks ago. (You can download their Muk! Muk! EP for free from Witty Banter Records--I tried to buy a hard copy of the EP, but the band forgot to bring them down from Rhode Island--d'oh!--so they gave me a free badge for my effort.) The Stress' sound is a cross between the soulful rocksteady stylings of The Bluebeats and the melodic, if quirky, ska of Easy Big Fella (both bands feature their keyboardist also as their singer). Wish I had videotaped a song or two of theirs to post here, like "What Cheer" or the tune that mentioned dropping bombs (any help here, Stress fans?) that's not on the EP. It was still pretty early when they hit the stage and since the room hadn't filled up yet, I felt a little self-conscious whipping out the Flip...next time I won't be so bashful. The superb Toasters/Void Union drummer Jesse Hayes played with the band, giving the rhythm section an extra shot of power and precision. Great songwriting and spot-on performances here--making The Stress a band to make sure to keep on your radar.

Hey Stranger, decked out in pirate gear, rocked out with their ska-pop-punk sound (think 1996 or '97, if you lived through it) and threw plastic gold coins into the audience now and then (hopefully missing the fan in the full-body penguin costume, who danced the entire night and probably lost 10 lbs sweating in that suit). I was a bit disappointed that no one in the band made themselves up like Johnny Depp in the second "Pirates of the Caribbean" flick with all of those extra painted-on eyes...

This was the first time I've seen The Forthrights, who performed a great set of rocksteady tracks (see their video at the bottom of this post). At the show, I picked up a copy of their debut vinyl single (pressed in Jamaica, natch) on Stubborn Records (preview the cuts on their MySpace page) and their sound is very much what you would expect to be associated with Django's label. Very good stuff.

I caught about 35 minutes of The Toasters' set, but had to leave a bit early, as the MTA was doing track work on the L line after midnight (which would've made traveling back to Manhattan a nightmare). As always, The Toasters delivered the goods--top notch performances from an extraordinary catalogue of songs (I shot video clips of four songs from this set--"Shocker," "I'm Running Right Through the World," "Pirate Radio," and "Sitting on Top of the World"--which are posted below). Since the lot of the constantly touring musician is a rough one, the Toasters core of Buck, Jesse Hayes, and Andy Pearson (on bass) is usually augmented by a rotating crew of sidemen (the time out, the horn section was comprised of Sander Loog from Mr. Review and formerly of The Beatbusters on sax, and Cooper Barton on trombone), which ends up giving the band a bit of a different feel each time you see them. The Toasters' ex-keyboardist Dave Barry also joined the band (though Buck told me earlier in the night that he was only sitting in for this gig, not the rest of their tour or the Ska is Dead IV extravaganza--which is a shame, as the keys are such an integral part of their sound, and Dave is so damn good). The Toasters are going to be all over the East Coast, South, and Southwest this November, so make sure to catch them!

None of my usual ska gig mates were in town/able to come out and play, so it was extra nice to run into some familiar faces in the crowd (in addition to Buck and Shay), including Coolie Ranx, singer Megg Howe of Across the Aisle, and Nicole Lapusan (AKA punk rock singer/guitarist Miss Pie, who also used to be a big ska promoter and DJ on the "Ska's the Limit" radio show on KDHX in St. Louis back in the mid-90s and would play the hell out of all the Moon promos I sent her). All in all a really good night for ska music and people at The Knitting Factory Brooklyn...







7 comments:

Steve from Moon said...

The Stress have their act together...I signed up to be on their mailing list on Friday night at their NYC gig and by yesterday had already received an e-mail from them alerting me to their next gig. More ska bands have to be better organized (in general) and really promote themselves in these kinds of simple, but very effective ways! Go team Stress! Come back to NYC soon.

Kames Jelly said...

the forthrights are always great. just wait until the full length is finished. its gonna be incredible.

also django's b-side to the 7" is a great tune.

a bit of shameless self promotion:
The Forthrights are playing live/acoustic on my college radiostation on friday, nov. 13th at 2pm. you can stream it online here:
http://ww2.ramapo.edu/studentmedia/wrpr/index.aspx

there will also be other bands, including 2 ska bands from jersey, 10 Cents Short and The Superzeros playing at 9 and 10pm.

and im gonna try to convince them to self-release it like the Green Room Rockers did with On The Wabash.

Steve from Moon said...

KJ:

Plug away--always! Thanks for supporting the scene in a big, meaningful way. Didn't realize you were on the radio...

My son is learning the t-bone in music at school (though he doesn't dig ska like his pops!).

Good luck!

Steve

Kames Jelly said...

i do what i can haha.

i try to push my friends bands on the air as much as possible, so i was stoked that they were able to come out and do a (sort of) acoustic set and plug the new 7", which we will probably be giving away a few copies of.

also, i hope your son sticks with it. i picked up trombone in school in the 4th grade, and it was the best decision i ever made.

Steve from Moon said...

KJ:

Back in the 90s, I was sending out each Moon release to several hundred college radio stations; we simply couldn't have accomplished all that we did without their collective support. I used to love combing through CMJ to see how our releases charted (Jeremy has all of the highlighted charts from the CMJ magazines, along with all of the press clippings from zines, newspapers, and mainstream music magazines, in the Moon archives in Oklahoma). The stations also did all sorts of giveways and interviews when our bands played gigs in their town, etc. College (and public) radio is the best!

My son also plays guitar, bass, and piano...and we're being very supportive of him as he practices his t-bone in our small NYC apartment. He's getting pretty good at it.

Boy, it's loud! Neighbors love us, too.

Best,

Steve

Anonymous said...

Hi Steve, just to let you know, I'm with MR. Review and played with the beatbusters,I was never a part of rude rich and the highnotes (actual name) although I really dig them. knitting factory was a blast to play. all the best, Sander

Steve from Moon said...

Sander:

Thanks for the correction and for stopping by. I'll fix the posting.

Best,

Steve