SUNDAY! SUNDAY! SUNDAY! GOOD SHOWS, TITE BROS AND VITAMIN DRINK AT THE 2007 HPMA SHOWCASE

Ah the Rites of July. The longest time most of us ever spend trudging up and down Main Street with a piece of torn newsprint in our hands and pockets. Cameras over shoulders and bands on wrists, we spend an afternoon in the shadow of our own bitching about its shortcomings, but nevertheless emerge tanned by another year’s Houston Press Music Awards Showcase. Arriving just past four, we bumped into one of our favorites and a candidate at the Nine Oclock Spot, Sharks and Sailors. Killing time while we waited for our conspiracy wristband to arrive, we headed down to Bar Bollywood and sneaked in to catch a few seconds of Dizzy Pilot’s set.

Dizzy Pilot, it is now confirmed, is not a snapshot band. This is a good thing – you should need more than a few moments to get any level of satisfaction out of something – even a Crunch Bar, which we were hoping there would be plenty of in the heralded Rice Loft Balcony VIP bacchanalia and meat and greet.


Alas, there was not, but there was Vitamin Energy Drinks. Indeed, at first, should you want a mixed drink, it was necessary to have it served to you with either purple, red or yellow colored nutritionally balanced hyper juice. Disgusting. We do not beg, we do not choose, we drink beer instead.

While the secret source of our wristbands (who we cannot thank enough, but won’t name names so they do not get in trouble) headed over to the Hard Rock to catch the Jonx, we kept it close to tha Rail and caught the second half of the blushingly-named Whoehound’s set at the extremely well lit Live.


Whorehound is Texas Roadhouse Metal. Diesel, one legged dogs, pickup trucks with nails in the bed and FM roads you don’t much want to change your tire on after sundown. The dirt on their boots is from a storm where it rained mud; they don’t have swagger – they have rust. Their set Sunday was the best we’d ever seen them put on. If you’re looking for something heavier that nails the metal fundamentals filtered through a punk aesthetic – be sure to check them out next time they play. If you enjoy the way Golden Axe playfully appropriates the phrasings of metal into hyperdistilled small chunks, you might equally find satisfaction in the way Whorehound parses it out with a bit more heavy and a bit more evil.


Headed back to the Rice to catch up with some more folks and get the skinny on The Jonx’s set. Apparently the stage at the Hard Rock is just feet from tables where folks were enjoying an authentic Rock and Roll meal. Suddenly, we were told, these particular patrons were treated to the mathy marinade of our Best Punk nominated Heroes. It further relayed to us (dammit, why didn’t we write any of this down) that during their set finale, a looping ten minute epic whose name escapes us, a Green Day video played on the monitor behind them. Punk indeed. (The above photo of the Jonx is from Elissa Brown’s consistently BA camera – view her flickr collection of the afternoon here.)


At seven we headed across main to Slainte, the Irish pub which had earlier in the day been treated to the relatively more mellow sounds of Lee Alexander and Jack Saunders. Not in this time slot. Setting aside what would be a ‘normal’ performance, our grindcore heroes opted for a noise set. One that did not meet with the satisfaction of the venue’s stage manager and was shut down about seven minutes after it began. Rather than try to describe it, we urge you to simply watch Ramon Medina’s (Linus Pauling Quartet) video of it above (Ramon also took pictures during the day and did a write up for Houstoned Rocks).


Thanks to the early shut down, we were able to hit up The Wiggins for the end of his last song. Life Lounge was a reasonable enough venue, but apparently his wig was not their wag, as the audience kept their distance through his final moments (which included a unabashed discussion of his thoughts of the press, which we will summarize as ‘negative.).


Over to the Grasshopper then, the full comedic value of whose second-floor-overlook-as-stage would not be realized for another hour or so, to catch O Pioneers!!!. The duo (which, as we never fail to mention, is Eric of i heart you productions joined recently by Chris Ryan of Dead City Sound) played a set that stabbed further into the heart of jangle and pop than we were expecting. We freely admit to not having seen O Pioneers!!! very often and wonder why that is. The set was definitely entertaining, both musically and through Eric’s between song banter (“We’re the Fatal Flying Guilloteens, and we’re nominated for best coke band.” “Be sure to head to Verizon later to welcome back Houston’s hometown heros…SALIVA!”

Saliva jokes were, as they should have been, in abundance throughout the day. But perhaps no one so succinctly characterized the disappointment with their being the ‘headlining act’ of the day’s events as well as John Cramer did on Tuesday’s Non-Alignment Pact Post:

That’s who Saliva is, and that’s who will wrap up the awards show into one neat and tidy little package of shit. Nobody likes this band, nobody, not even the fat, sleazy, Vegas crack dealer of a frontman who sings of unrequited love and big manly guns. They are completely worthless on every level, and then to think that some asshole thought it would be a good idea to put these douchenozzles on the end of a local music awards showcase, as if a national act of the lowest order was still somehow more interesting that anything we have to offer here in Houston, is as fucking brilliant as it is arrogant. It’s like telling all the local bands that, “hey guys, we really think you’re all so gosh-darn groovy. In fact, we think you’re all so dee-lish that we want to punch up the show with a little treat for everyone just to show, A) how little we actually think of Houston bands, and, B) how morally bankrupt our sense of humor has to be in order to think we could ever walk in this town again without being sniped from the top of every building. Enjoy your show, Houston! You rock, baby!”

Back to the day-of, O Pioneers!!! finished early and so we jetted across the rail to catch Satin Hooks. Damn glad we did. If for no other reason than we walked into the club to be immediately confronted by a pair of foam and fabric mannequins dancing and surfing about on the audience. We don’t know if they were the band’s or the audiences, but they fit and it was the nicest sort of crowd surfer to take a foot in the head from.


We say this every time we see them, but if you haven’t checked out Satin Hooks in the past six months YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG. This is a band has really found themselves, and damn, that prospecting turned up a hella gold vein. They’re songs are catchy but not predictable; rawkus and toe tapping without resorting to rock clichés. Perhaps that’s why they’ve been nominated for Best Experimental two years in a row. Regardless, at the end of their set, they were joined by some friends, each of whom wielded a drum. To the initial sounds of a blasting Korg synth, and eventually completely unaccompanied, the Satin Hooks Drum Corps banged out a beat on the stage, making their way into the audience, and eventually into the street. Normally this sort of thing would make us roll our eyes and yell “PLAY THE ONE ABOUT PATCHOULI AND LOSING YOUR HACKEY SACK!”, but damn if it wasn’t well executed, enjoyable and fun. HOOK IT UP!


Back to the Grasshopper for Bring Back the Guns. While we had only intended to stay for a bit of their set before scurrying off to catch another, the balcony-hanging antics to Ben “Wild Man” Murphy and the drunk exhortations of an audience member that they play more Red Hot Chili Pepper songs (some lyrics did eventually find their way in there) made it impossible to break away (video by Elissa Brown).

In the end, a solid day, though not a single band we saw ended up with a trophy. This would be a good place to say “but we’re all winners cause we all got to see so many good shows so quickly.” And really, though. That is kinda true. We take a piss on the Press as much as anyone (usually fairly, we feel), but we do begrudgingly say that it’s nice to have an afternoon where we can see six bands in a few hours without breaking a sweat. C’mon Noise and Smoke – step up and take the crown.