By day 3 things were beginning to look a bit hypnotic, overexertion and sleep deprivation coupled with copious amounts of…um…err…
Thursday, Oct 21st.
Social Studies opened 104 Ave C’s show, a Frisco quartet fond of mocking ballads tinged twee, railroad electronics and Transylvanian organs. Blonde Redhead without an edge, but very talented nonetheless. I was psyched to see them but now as I replay their album I am at a loss as to why I liked them so much. Taste being contingent on one’s mood, and my mood being “I heard too much goddamn music and I’m kinda over it and want to listen to really dark wavy shit cuz I’m jaded and cynical and a little too cracked out” I wouldn’t put too much stock in this Social Studies term paper.
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Off to the M for Montreal CMJ Showcase floating on a cloud twice noxious, once leavening. A davening agent of sound, P.S I Love You swept the crowd off their feet. Lead singer/guitarist who was anything but light on his feet, showcased an Aspergian spider-fingered right hand, preternatural to an almost Faustian extent. The drummer, also something of a prodigy made a P.S perfect 10, pun intended.
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They were followed by Random Recipe, Aptly named after their blending of dichotomous genres. Fronted by a hyphy Lady-Dude who performed like a Ras-Trent-Meets-Fred-Durst-Meets-Elvis, Random Recipe can really get a crowd going with their peculiar brand of soul-dub-hippity-hoppity-Natalie Merchant on meth sound.
But I was there to see was Red Mass, a band with a rotating roster so random and numerous, it is hard to say what, at any given moment, is Red Mass. Like your Intro to Philosphy 101, when your professor mindfucked you with the perennial question of identity, then later Leibniz made you put a rifle to your head to prove no two suicides are ever alike. Red Mass specialize in the kind of filthy post-punk garage rock that makes you want to punch suits in the balls and shotgun beers till 7am.
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Friday, Oct 22nd.
Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck- I was hoping last night’s CMJ afterparties would take my life away but somehow I’m still around. My hands are bugging me out, why 10 fingers?
Force Field PR has my favorite roster of all PR firms, but as great as they are they are also: A. Not the type of bands that kill it live and B. way too popular to have a showcase at Piano’s, their show room is the size of a fucking storage unit that they tried to pack us like cattle into. I couldn’t even breathe, I nearly fainted. Being packed into a room with kids who have “take my lunch money” written on their forehead is a recipe for disaster. La Sera, fronted by former Vivian Girl Kate McSomething, lost her pedals the night prior after getting too drunk somewhere. As beautiful as her doo-wop through an indie filter music is, and as much as I want to sniff her strawberry bangs I was very very bummed by her ludicrous display of live antics. I mean the Vivian Girls use to kill live and by kill I mean, like, whatevs.
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Next up, Violens, Same problem, their music is an amalgam of 80′s synth and 60′s psychedelia, their talent undeniable but, no cigar this time. 
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I really couldn’t sit through the rest of the bands as they kept jamming bodies into such a limited space, much as it pained me to miss Woven Bones, Wild Nothing, and The So So Glos, I settled for Zowie at Fat Baby. A New Zealand futura group fronted by the ever so ubiquitous tiny elfin-like-girl that seems to be the recipe for success these days. I was not one bit unimpressed with their stage presence and mastery of galactica sonics. They are a bit cheesy but after Piano’s tuna can operandi, their brand of Pop was palatable to my inner teenage girl.
After that, I lost my mind somewhere in L.E.S
Saturday, Oct 23.
Dear Diary, I’m done with this, I’m taking 5 ambien and sleeping all day. yeah yeah yeah. Later.
