The F.U.’s / Kermit’s Finger / The Dimwits / BDSX
O’Briens, Allston, MA 9/21/13
I haven’t been to O’Briens for quite a while but I do appreciate this club for being so open to booking punk and metal shows. And from almost across the street I can see The Draft, a more DJ college kid kind of club. It was there that Andy and I hatched out ideas for TNB about two and half years ago so I feel comfortable in this area and I’m drawn to this bill by a couple of old favorites and one new.
BDSX is the first band playing tonight and the one I’m most excited to see. You see, they’ve recently become my favorite band by only seeing them once and reviewing their five song CD. It’s my favorite CD of the year and this band does not disappoint live either.
On their facebook under genre they put “Nope” and I can only agree. They play loud, exciting, heavy rock that’s in your face, in your ear and in your guts. Usually when I hear about a band that claims to play “just rock” they end up sounding like Bad Company or just a classic rock band. Not with this band, their sound is unique and indescribable. With two singer/ guitarists and a solid rhythm section and great songs like “We Will Never Speak Of This Again” and “I’m A Record Player, Baby,” this is intense, hard and brilliant and I get goose bumps listening to them play.
Next up is an old favorite punk band of mine for many years The Dimwits. Their style is more skate or pop/punk/hardcore with funny lyrics and titles. I just saw them a month ago at the Drago show and they sound even better tonight.
They dedicate a song to me which I spend most of the tune trying to figure out which one it is. It turns out it’s “I Wanna Be Canadian,” a song that they didn’t play last month and I mentioned missing. I guess I haven’t heard it in a while as I almost didn’t recognize it! Anyways they play an energetic, fun set and this might just be a rumor but I think this band has risen from the dead and I couldn’t be happier if this is true.
Kermit’s Finger is next and is a band I’ve never seen. I remember hearing about them from ten years ago or so about the time I was just getting back into the scene. I believe now they do rare, infrequent gigs. They play punk shows but I would describe them as a garage rock power trio that accelerates their music into hardcore warp speed, and this they do exceptionally well. They’re also extremely tight, surprisingly from a band that doesn’t play out much. They get a great response from the crowd and I was surprised how much I enjoy them.
Headlining is a band I’m not surprised by how good they are, the legendary original Boston hardcore band The F.U.’s- but I will say this is one of their best shows of the many times I’ve seen them. This is classic original hardcore with one of the bands that set the blueprint for the many bands that followed. Maybe since this is a twenty-one plus show there’s no moshing, which is too bad, but it does allow my frail, weak body to get up next to the stage. I’m enjoying fist pumping along with “Young Fast Iranians” and other songs. They even do “Tie Your Mother Down” by Queen tonight; a great set to cap off a perfect show.
So this was a terrific show, batting four for four bands tonight. Leaving the club, walking down Harvard Ave a mile or so back to my car, I start thinking about this town. I left for a couple of years a few years ago. And walking on the streets of Boston tonight I realized- these are my streets and I belong to them. I get a notion to write a poem about this and it’s in the Forum section now.
I guess you can walk away from where you live but you can never really go.
(Slimedog)
