Mirah / The Blow
January 23 at Great American Music Hall

Mirah and the Blow co-headlined a two-night stand that, at least on Wednesday, had some drastic ups and downs. Formerly a two-piece and now but a solo Khaela Maricich, the Blow was exactly that, both to my patience and my respect for the capacity crowd that seemed to embrace her unconditionally. Performing works that basically amount to an off-key, uncoordinated poor-woman’s Postal Service, Maricich’srambling and vacuous chatter between songs lasted longer than the songs themselves, and often came out during songs, too. Her bubbly, inadvertent you-have-to-like-me-because-I’m-cute stage persona wore on through awkward dancing and unremarkable pop for what felt like the better part of an hour, though thankfully, Mirah was well worth the wait. Mirah Yom Tov Zeitlyn is a gem, spinning songs of substance and sweetness without any of the trappings of big productions. Supporting her on this night were four players, most notably a certain Tara Jane O’Neil on guitar and an extremely talented cellist with whom Ms. Mirah is currently collaborating on a project. Yet despite their strength in numbers, the songs remained intimate and spare. At a certain point Mirah commented on how she viewed Khaela as more of a proper singer-songwriter despite her “electro-pop” leanings because she talks and tells stories about each song, between songs. If I may, I’d like to suggest that ideally, the songs speak for themselves. Mirah’s certainly do, and though her banter is intelligent and charming, her songs would be no less enjoyable without it. Maricich’s neurotic fixations on boys, her flighty songwriting process, and “the universe” may help pass time on her blog, but when it comes to stuff people pay to cram in, stand, and watch—not so much. Not for this person, anyway. Everyone else seemed to applaud. Nevertheless, Mirah’s set was a triumph, and I’m eager to hear more of that project with the cellist. – HW

Listen: Various Tracks [at myspace.com]

Shaky Hands
January 23 at Bottom of the Hill

Shaky Hands came down to San Francisco from Portland, and they wore their locale on their sleeves—barefoot, shaggy haired, bearded, a bongo player. There’s a completely endearing reckless romp to their live show, and despite the fact that they broke two drumsticks, guitar strings, a mic stand, and amp cables (seriously!) they just kept on going and I think they reveled in the destruction of their stuff. They are very charming. Their studio tracks are noticeably more refined; on stage I was surprised to find them flailing so wildly on their instruments. Singer Nick Delff has an off-kilter, wheedling voice that, when he lets it play by its own devices, swoons up and down and is quite an effective tool to guide their rickety instrumentation. Their sound varies from whimsically funky to swinging to country rock to twangy, even recalling threads of hand-clapping reggae beats, and overwhelming, good-natured jangle pop, kinda like Of Montreal. They also reminded me of their fellow Portlanders, Blitzen Trapper, in their brazen execution of a variety of different sounding songs. Their ramshackle nature is probably the most obvious of their attributes, as exemplified by all the crap they broke on stage, but the Shaky Hands gave it their all, and I really hope to see more of them in the future. – AZ

Listen: Various Tracks [at myspace.com]

Chores / Browntown West
January 24 at Thee Parkside

Chores is a brand new, good ol’ steady rockin’ ’90s-style indie band from Portland, OR, that somehow got lumped onto a “covers night” bill at Thee Parkside for their first show in San Francisco. As such, the scrappy newcomers dutifully opened with an Alice Cooper cover, “Go to Hell”, before rolling into their own material, which included a bunch of songs off their debut record, Life is Hard. Tucked separately into the set were two parts of their “suburban trilogy”: “Super Car”, and the appropriately frenetic “Shopping”, and though it was a shame the headliner didn’t show (San Diego soul/blues band Lady Dottie and the Diamonds), their absence did thankfully allow for an extended Chores rockfest. Earlier, Browntown West’s supporting set was rife with covers ranging from Deep Purple to Van Halen, and though I didn’t realize it at the time, it turns out BW is made up of three of the four former rockers in Zen Guerilla. The Jon Spencer-esque blues/grunge foursome moved to SF from Delaware in the mid-’90s, climbed (distribution-wise) from Alternative Tentacles to Sub Pop, toured a shitload, and disbanded in the early ’00s. Three of them now apparently play ’70s and ’80s rock covers as Browntown West for the sheer, unadulterated hell of it (with SF girl-rock singer Christa Dibiase in place of distinguished ZG original Marcus Duvall). I guess that explains why Jello Biafra was allegedly hangin’ amongst the crowd that night. Zen Guerilla it was not, but it was good times, and it kinda made sense in that Chores currently makes the kind of music a pre-Warner Sub Pop might happily have pressed, if not Merge or Matador back in the day. Yeah, I know, the ZG Sub Pop albums were well post-Warner buyout, but whatever. The point is, hopefully we’ll hear more from Chores soon. – HW

Listen: Various Tracks [at myspace.com]

Against Me! with Foo Fighters
February 2 at Oakland Coliseum Arena

I’ve actually never been to a proper arena show, so I took this opportunity to go see a band I should’ve seen when they were coming up but now exist on a major label with many folks claiming they’ve sold out. I could really kick myself for waiting this long, but who else would’ve gotten me out to a show like this? Because they were on the bill with Foo Fighters, the arena was packed up to the very top… that’s about 15,500 people altogether. As we made our way into the show on a very, very rainy night in the East Bay, we were greeted by a parking lot full of chaos. As rain and wind ripped through the lot, next to the coliseum sits the Raiders’ stadium, which on this particular night was hosting a monster truck rally. The line to get into the show was long and hardly moving and they made us give up our umbrellas before going inside. Just like that sign says, with that many people in one place, shit has the ability to go haywire. Due to all of these obstacles we were a little late for Against Me! We caught the tail-end of their set, and I’m happy to report that they played several old favorites. Of course, when they played the title track off their latest release, New Wave, that was the only time the crowd really cheered at all, and I think the lead singer might’ve even shook his head in embarassment; amused but in a disapprov
ing way. That’s got to be weird for them, but they asked for it. It seemed like a full-on, energetic set and the vocal harmonizing they’re known for was great. I still love this band. But, I have to give credit to the Foo Fighters. Even though I haven’t liked a record of theirs in many, many years, they put on a fucking show, playing for over two hours. Dave Grohl has the energy of three adolescents. It was like Guitar Hero come to life! There were guitar soloing battles, drum solos, a triangle solo, and a second stage that dropped from the ceiling to the middle of the floor where they did some more acoustical stuff that was no less energetic. Luckily, however, there were no pyrotechnics. I spent a good portion of the show drinking beer at the bar with my friend though, mostly wanting to conduct some sort of impromptu jean intervention with the crowd. But other than, that I’ve got to say, I’m glad I finally went to an arena show. Quite the spectacle. It’s even likely that I’ll probably go again sometime in the next 30 years. – JH

Listen: Various Tracks [at myspace.com]

Black Mountain
February 4 at the Independent

You could go to a Black Mountain show totally sober and still walk out of there feeling stoned out of your mind. Such was the hypnotic spell cloaked over the rapt (stoned?) audience Monday night at the Independent. Bleak, spaced out, extended jams and heavy Black Sabbath-y guitar riffs swirled and coalesced and thickly permeated the pores of the venue—every note seemed to be absorbed by the walls and ceiling and our ears, and it was intoxicating. Amber Webber’s spellbindingly rich vocals cast a human touch to the otherwise ethereal proceedings, and while the magnetic, fuzzy sound of the band behind her never relented, she and singer/guitarist Stephen McBean kept focused enough to drive each song to its dark and bleary end. Amid strobbing lights of reds, pinks, and blues, the band was shrouded by an otherworldly sensibility but kept their sound direct, ominous, and heavy. Black Mountain unsurprisingly played a lot of music off their new record, In the Future, but live, before an audience, they executed their material in a boldly psychedelic way. Like I said before, it was enough just to be in the room with them to feel dismembered by the weighty, deep tones of their songs. – AZ

Listen: Various Tracks [at myspace.com]

» Previously: The Black Heart Procession, Jandek, and Magic Bullets