No Fun: Night Two

After the first night's lackluster performance, I was hoping night two would be better. I arrived once again, no ticket, and sure enough bought one of the last three available at the box office. I grabbed a slice of pizza and made my way to the bar, where happy hour was underway and I was able to quickly pound down three whiskey/cokes before the night started. It was all I could afford before I had to stop to make my way upstairs for the performances. Night two proved to be a lot better than night one, yet still lacked a lot of gusto that so many No Funs have provided for everyone before. I think it has to do with the shitty venue. MHoW is WAAAYYYY too big and too uptight. Plus it's crappily located off of Bedford Ave, which in my opinion is the shittiest street in the entire United States. I hate Williamburg. I hate most of New York, and sorry New York, I hate most of the hipster scum that infests your grime-filled city (seriously DC is cleaner). I wasn't drunk after three drinks pounded so that made things even more frustrating, still mostly all performances that night were consistent if not amazing, which made me happy and made up for the lack of cool people.

Pulse Emitter: I had heard good things about Pulse Emitter...too bad he sucked tonight. I appreciate the music obviously, and love the idea, but as Brian once again aptly points out "it's starting to become about the process and not the person." No where was this more evident than Pulse Emitter's cold set. I heard a little bit, thought I might get around to his songs later and decided to head down for last call for happy hour.

Mattin: I was told I should catch this dude's set and thank god I did. It was the first shockingly brilliant performace of the night. I had no idea who this dude was and instead was witness to one of the best PE sets I've ever seen. It was loud, it was abrasive, it was biding, it was so fucking confrontational. I walk up, hear just god awful aural rape being blasted out of the speakers and see a man in sunglasses standing perfectly still in front of his laptop with aviators on. Ten minutes into the brutality, he rips off his glasses throws them into the crowd(which some pussy on Brooklyn Vegan said "could have hurt somebody") and began to berate the crowd and indict them on all the guilty counts of vanity, egotism, and being general piece-of-shit human beings. It was awesome. He spit into the crowd (which the pussies once again ran away from) only to have his aural assault stopped. The crowd cheered as it appeared the set was over. From here Mattin's set really crossed the line from brilliant to genius. He walked over to a chair and proceeded to systematically destroy the self-concious crowd for being emotionally, mentally, and phyiscally "pathetic" with no music in a calm and restrained manner looking blankly off into a wall. He lambasted the Williamsburg pricks much to the dismay of one asshole who heckled and would not shut the fuck up until I pointed out loudly to the crowd that he was balding. The crowd doubled over in laughter, the guy shut the fuck up and Mattin ended. But not before calling everyone pathetic and upholding my handling of the heckler by saying, "there's nothing like an American joke." Fucking unbelievable.


The purveyor of all things not fun, Mattin.


Yellow Tears: Yes, yes, OH GOD YES. Many people called it the best performance of the weekend, and it would be hard to disagree. THis was the only band that legitamately seemed to be thrilled to be playing no fun and it fucking showed. Their brand of cut-up PE was loud, frightening, and just fucking volatile. I blasted Halflings last year for being too macho, but now I understand. They just love each other and love doing noise. I can't fault them for that. Yellow Tears were unbelievable, scaring the crowd into submission and winning everyone over with their terrifyingly disturbed sense of unbridled joy. If that's what happy looks like, I plan to be depressed forever. I loved it so much, I bought their new LP titled, "Stop Crying". Their first album was called, "Piss Mop". Jesus tapdancing Christ, these guys never relent do they? FUCK!!!


Far Rockaway's finest mechanic impersonators, Yellow Tears. They better fix my transmission.


Blank Dogs: Okay, now onto the crappy part of the night. I had mentioned earlier that this band was overrated and boy howdy, did they fucking suck up a storm. THere is A LOT of internet hype about this band, especially in their native Brooklyn and unforunately like I said earlier, Carlos HAS TO book these bands if he wants his little fest to have a venute and survive/cross over. Plain and simple, Blank Dogs suck. They play shitty lo-fi garage punk which is seemingly all the rage right now and the lead singer sings through some shitty vocoder, which is also all the rage right now. These dogs couldn't be anymore unoriginal and fucking patetic than a pack of chihuahuas. I walked outside to end the misery and maybe put a bullet in my skull. They almost ruined no fun for me. The sad part is, I got back to work Monday and noticed they were all over shitty BK/AA funded viva-radio, and surprise surprise, they suck. What's sadder is that actually, they are much better live than they are recorded. Ouch.

Pedestrian Deposit: This was the set I had been looking forward to all day/weekend. I have never really had a noise idol, the way I do in Borges. Sure Dom is awesome. Sure Dilloway is a god. But Borges' shit just connects so deep with me and the fact that he is easily accessable makes me look at him as more like a mentor than an untouchable god. He is to me, right now, the best thing in noise, and runs the best label in noise (to me) right now in Monorail Tresspassing. So imagine my anger when I hear the sound prick at Music Hall telling them to hurry up and start playing or get off. Are you kidding me?? Is Williamburg this much of a fucking hellhole. Blank Dogs just played with like 5 guitarists for half a fucking hour and you want PD to set up in five minutes? Go to hell you fucking douchebag. PD started and shoved a righteous fist right up the ass of the sound dude. Their set was arguably THE BEST set of the entire weekend. I could not fathom how incredible Pedestiran Deposit was. I've seen Borges before and he has put on some great shows, but nothing compares to the beauty and tragedy that I saw tonight. I was unsure as to what type of element Shannon would bring but it turns out, she just made the dynamic that much more intense. Straddling the line between insanity and retraint, the best way I could describe this monument of a set was "balls out control". The noise built to such a high pitch, you felt as if you were about to explode before----------it was all gone. All that was left, was Borges on an organ. Shannon on a cello, and the sorrowful fading out of a tragedy that had just unfolded. It was brutal. It was destructive, but above all it was fucking gorgeous. PD exceeded my expectations and it was worth the 25 bucks to see their set alone. I love Jon Borges and his music will inspire me to push on through the next phase in my love. Thanks dude.


The best thing to happen to my musical emotions since the Get Up Kids. Pedestrian Deposit. Fucking stunning.


Sons of God: After the beauty of the last set, I was pleasantly surprised as I witnessed the absurdity of Sons of God. Yet another PE set, this one was silly, obviously not planned well, and honestly pretty damn awesome. While it didn't capture my heart and imagination the way PD or Mattin did, it definitely made me smile as I watched a dude that looked like Common, and another dude that looked like Phil Spector, control the blaring noise and two old dudes that looked like Frankenstein seizure and meander about the stage. It was pretty sweet. You gotta give it up to a group of dudes who can keep it real after such power and drama.

Rafael Toral with C. Spencer Yeh,Trevor Tremaine: This set was probably the bummer of the night. I was really looking forward to it. I love Spence. I love Trevor, I don't know who they other dude is but he played with microamps. This all adds up to amazingly fucking awesomeness right? Wrong. Two thirds of BXC could not save this set from generally just not being very good. Spencer tried his best to bust out the crazy violin solos, but Toral's brand of noise just did not mesh with the the BXC dudes. I love the concept and all these dudes are awesome in their respective projects, but this is a classic example of when seemingly awesome collaboration just plain doesn't work out well(see Sutcliffe Jugend and Prurient).

Bardo Pond: This was another shocker. Bardo Pond is signed to Matador, and as such, I expected a shitty fucking set of indie-pysche rock. I couldn't have been happier to be so wrong. Bardo Pond were incredible! They played a long and droney song which was right up my alley and the lead singer, though Lilith Faired out, totally rocked the stage with her vocals and flute. It was totally fucking sweet. They droned out into this long and extremely fucking loud dirge of a song that made me so fucking wet, I almost creamed my pants. You could feel the place vibrate and the amps blare out sweet destructive ecstasy. It was a psychedelic doom freak out. These dudes that looked like they should be in Phish, sounded like they were competing with Sunn. It was the best surprise of the night.

Sonic Youth:Now before, I talk about this set I have to say something. I realize Sonic Youth is one of the most important bands in music history of all time. I realize that if they never came around, there would be no noise, or for that matter, New York scene. I know all of this. Yet I still question their ability to put on live shows because of their seemingly overrated status as icons. Well, they shut me the fuck up. I will never question Kim, Thurston, or Lee (even though he wasn't there), ever again. Sonic Youth was incredible. They performed a 35 minute piece of sonic terror and screeching ahnialation. There were no songs, just noise and a brilliant performance from true lengeds. True icons. Some of the most important artists in the history of the world. Aside from all this flowery bullshit praise, they were fucking sick. Sonic Youth was really on it tonight and it made no different half of the bullshit fucking prick crowd showed up to hear "Daydream Nation". They don't give a shit. And that's what I love about Sonic Youth. I can now sit here before you, and even though only 75% on the band was there, honestly say I have seen Sonic Youth. And it was awesome. With their screwdrivers placed firmly under the strings, Thurston and Co. proceeded to destory the eardrums of everyone with screeching guitar feedback and general incoherent destruction of guitars set to the sound of tribal drums. When Kim fell on her back and symbolically fucked her guitar into submission, it was one of the sexiest/brutal sights to behold. Kim Gordon after all these years is still hot, and in the most dangerous of ways. Sonic Youth was brilliant. I saw everyone on the boards and many fucking dumbshits criticized Sonic Youth for playing, of all things NOISE!!!! THese guys were the originators of this modern scene!!! And now you're going to get butthurt because they didn't play "Dirty Boots"?!?! Go to hell you Brooklyn retard. Tonight wasn't about appeasing fans, it was about doing what they've done for a quarter of a century: doing what they want, at their own discretion and raping the ears of anyone brave enough to listen. Sonic Youth rules. I don't care what anyone says. I'm just pissed I've JUST RECENTLY come to this conclusion.


Still crazy hot after all these years. Kim Gordon fucks the shit out of that guitar and our ears.

Low point of night: Blank Dogs. I've heard female dogs qweef out better live sets.

High Point: The subsequent p'owning of Blank Dogs by the universally recognized awesomeness of Pedestrian Deposit.



END NIGHT TWO.


So that was night two. Stay tuned from more from No Fun. Night three featured the best acts and the most consistent of performances so don't miss that shit (or at least a shitty, misspelled grammatical abortion of an account).