Observations, Musings, and Lessons Learned mostly in the world of Punk, Ska, Alternative, Metal, and just plain Rock and Roll. Music with guitars…mostly
Here are some “interesting” acts I ran across in my research. They didn’t make my final previews but some of them will be worthy of seeing, whether it’s for the music or the spectacle (a la Corey Feldman). One is an actor’s band that played a serial killer. One is Fat Mike’s latest project. And there’s a Yeti and a goblin.
Basement
English “soft grunge”
Saxsquatch
Just watch…
Princess Goes
Dexter’s band. Really. The TV Series about a serial killer. The actor that played Dexter is the singer of Princess Goes.
Urethane
From NoCal
Codefendants
A new band formed by Fat Mike. Includes a rap tone. “Get ready for the best aural sex of your life,” Fat Mike said.
Lord of the Lost
German “dark rock” band
The Warning
Mexican female band
The Aces
Pop band of four women. Imagine the Linda Lindas doing pop, older, and Mormon.
Sunday is Metal Day at Riot Fest with Slayer headlining and Mastodon, Lamb of God, and Rob Zombie coming along. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t other nuggets to find. We start the day with the Packwood special; the certified album of the year. And we finally get Operation Ivy at Riot Fest, kinda.
Sprints – 120pm Metro Stage
The Packwood find. May be in the running for ”Future Favorite Discovered at RF24”. They fit the formula perfectly…raucous garage/punk with a female lead. The Irish Amyl and the Sniffers. Just formed in 2019. And I’m gonna plagiarize Wikipedia for this next line….” Journalist Ed Power wrote that “Sprints songs are breathless pile-drivers, powered by Chubb’s ear for cut-glass melody and by their producer Daniel Fox’s ability to make intimate music feel huge”. Listening to their music “feels like tiptoeing into a stranger’s room and reading their intimate diary entries”.
Fiddlehead – 210pm Rise Stage
Called a post hard-core Supergroup, but I hadn’t heard of the bands they were in before. From Boston. The guitarist will do double duty this weekend playing with Basement on Saturday. No fiddles in Fiddlehead, btw.
Swingin Utters – 230pm NOFX World
Street punk from Northern California. Been at it a long time. Played at the first Warped Tour.
Strung Out – 330pm NOFX World
So Cal punks on Fat Wreck. “Melodic Hardcore” of “Skate Punk”
Slaughter Beach, Dog – 415pm Radical Stage
Indie rock from Philly. Was a solo project from one of our Lolla bands, Modern Baseball. Jake Ewald formed Slaughter Beach, Dog while Modern Baseball was on hiatus. They has since broken up.
The Vandals – 430pm NOFX World
We’ve kinda seen them before. Pennywise brought the Vandals lead singer, Dave Quackenbush, on stage during Surf City Blitz to sing a song. SoCal punk of the likes of all of the others. Pretty fun.
GWAR – 455pm AAA Stage
No explanation needed. No explanation given. Except….is this the year we dress in white and get up front? Maybe not, but that time isn’t far off.
Laura Jane Grace with Catbite – 545pm NOFX World
This is a Big Deal. On a list of most influential punk bands, Operation Ivy has very few rivals. Without Op Ivy, there wouldn’t be a Rancid or Green Day. For years, there have been many calls for an Operation Ivy reunion at Riot Fest. Not many have been more vocal than Laura Jane Grace of Against Me!. Rather than wait, Laura Jane is taking the matter into her hands. While not Op Ivy, it will be awesome to see these songs played at RF.
Catbite is a Philly ska band akin to our friends The Interrupters.
Speaking of The Interrupters, note the rhythm section on the Op Ivy/Tim Armstrong/Jesse Michaels video.
Pennywise – 7pm NOFX World
There can never be too many Bro Hymn videos.
Rob Zombie – 705pm AAA Stage
Rob Zombie was a production assistant by day on Pee Wee’s Playhouse, and trying to start a band at night in NYC in the early nineties. You learn something new everyday. If the stage show, at 7pm, is as good as the videos this make take priority over Pennywise.
Slayer – 815pm Metro Stage
They have announced they are done. This is a one-off show. If I was ever gonna see them it has to be here.
NOFX – 830pm NOFX World
The last Chicago show ever for NOFX. Slayer or NOFX? NOFX or Slayer? Or Lou Malnati’s.
Sublime – 9pm Rise Stage
You know the story…singer dies of drug OD on the eve of the band making it big. The band carries on with a new singer and slightly appended name. The original lead singer’s son gets old enough to take over singing duties. The replacement singer is kicked out. And they are Sublime again. Not thinking there’s a chance I’ll see them against Slayer and NOFX but by Sunday night I may need a low adrenalin show.
Grinderman, Frank Turner (!!!), Twenty One Pilots, Wolf Alice, Slaves (aka Soft Play), Drakulas, The Front Bottoms, Motion City Soundtrack, Sincere Engineer. That’s quite a collection of bands. That would be a hell of a lineup for a festival. It’s a list of bands I “discovered” at festivals. Bands I knew very little about going in to the festival but left as a big or bigger or HUGE fan. Is there an act of that nature at Riot Fest 2024?
I’m predicting The Hives. I’m embarrassed to say I didn’t know much about them before the last few weeks. They are a Swedish “garage punk” band that really got popular in the early 2000’s. Trying to figure out how I missed them but I think they got caught up in the other “The” acts of that time. At least in my mind…The Killers, The Strokes, The Hives.
Love their sound. Full on guitar assaults like few are still doing. Two guitars, one bass, drums, and a singer. Basic straight on rock and roll. And their live shows looks to be amazing. Matching suits that put the Bosstones to shame. Amazing energy. Full of personality with attitude. And they’re on at 255pm up against no one. The only knock is they only have 40 minutes.
