ear blisters

Cancellations were welcome, instead of gatherings of folks, it was a nap on the couch and some leftover pasta, and then one of my former roomies with whom I bonded over tuneage our freshman year of college came over and we went up the street to see Elder and sundry local bands get their stoner groove on.

One of my fellow DJs plays in the first band, and I wasn't in the mood for the second, so we stood around outside and chatted with a couple folk and caught up on life and wandered back in for some great riffy rock and or roll. It's been awhile since I've seen a band that young play the hell out of their instruments ( I was amused that every guitarist on stage that night had one kind of red Gibson SG or another) and be that ecstatic in the riffing, the drummer pounding away, the bassist holding down the low end and rhythm with a wonderfully fuzzed-out bass tone, the guitarist with Cousin It hair soloing and powerchording through ten minute epics of sweetness. The set was four songs and then an encore that sounded very Om-esque, and I could have easily listened to another hour of it. Such is the nature of the beast. 

The bros in front were completely wasted, but the crowd was pretty chill overall, and mostly dudely, me and K being the only not-with-a-guy females in the place except for one older lady and doubtless getting the what are they doing here / dude, chicks! glances. I felt short, and short-haired for good measure among that crowd but had a great time.

Not many of my friends dig the stoner sound, but I'm glad at least I've got one female in my life that does too. One of my other friends told me today he wishes he could find a girl who likes metal and I wanted to scream that yes there are some of us who like the power chords and riffs as much as you, it's just that most of us don't look like Suicide Girls, you know? We'd rather play guitars or digress about our favorite bands  than spend our money on swanky tattoos or posting skank pictures in ripped 80's thrash shirts on the Internets.

But yeah, they were fantastic, and I at least contributed enough to fill their gas tank, snagging the new LP and the old CD and a t-shirt for good measure. I want to see them go far, and I'd go see them again. It's been awhile since I've seen anything that raw and rocking in the best way.