Onward Charles: I Left My Gripe In Seattle

The vehicle that is Blogspot is an interesting one because you can save posts as drafts, post other entries while saved ones sit in limbo, and when you finally find it ready to resurrect, they are backdated. Though they may have been completed latest, they appear as far back as the date and time when you first began composing the post. (It is, in fact, around 11:15pm EST on Wednesday, August 9th, and I'm not even going to bother figuring out how to modify the date/time on this thing.)

But my brain doesn't work that way, so the fact that I haven't posted anything since my first morning in Seattle has a thick finger pointing in the direction of Seattle's Blood Brothers. The five-piece didn't play the Capitol Hill Block Party, but they did open for the Murder City Devils' second consecutive night of playing. This performance, however, was at the Showbox theater downtown, and differed very much from the calamity of MCD's first night of their reunion.

My focus, for the moment, though, is on Blood Brothers. I'd mentioned here about how displeased I was...nay, fucking dis.ap.point.ed at their latest full-length and EP. I've ranted in both reviews about how betrayed I felt as a diehard fan who now crosses my arms and rolls my eyes in frustration. Not in pretension, but in the sentiment of being truly let down by a band that I - someone who's met editors crazy enough to publish my music criticism in various publications - toted as being THE next big thing. THE groundbreakers.

They're nothing but a joke, and their poor excuse for a live set at the Showbox on Sunday, July 30th in Seattle only furthered that feeling. Most of their set consisted of the new garbage they've put out, ignoring their first three full-lengths save an earlier b-side, "Pink Tarantulas." Ending with "Cecilia And The Silhouette Saloon," they drew the song out longer than they should have, varying the tempo and experimenting with the vocal styles. The pinnacle a capella point of "Where is love now?" mid-way through the song was a bastardization of both the recorded and previous live versions before they committed musical Crimes with their awful fourth full-length.

Later in the evening, when Spencer Moody of Murder City Devils was half-way through the set, he noted that the Blood Brothers have influenced them more than they've influenced the Blood Brothers. I'm going to take that as a kind and grateful gesture, being that the next five days that I spent in Seattle getting acquainted with friends of friends who were born and raised in the area and its music scene all informed me of one unanimous thing when it comes to the Blood Brothers: "Eh, I don't know, no one's really into them here - I think it's more of an East coast thing."

Maybe, but being a born and raised East coaster, they need to stop, backtrack, and notice where they've been going terribly wrong. The hole can't get any deeper from here.

SO! With that off of my chest, I hope to continue my regularly scheduled blogramming. Thanks for listening.

/rant

++++++++++++++++++++++

Additionally, I spent the week with two real photographers. Before I plug them, take a look at my attempts of taking photographs...

The rose garden in Portland, Oregon - by far the cleanest city I've ever seen, awesome burritos (La Bonita), and two of the best alternative weeklies I've read (Wilamette Weekly & Portland Mercury)

Seattle was so awesome that I died and went to heaven. Or I just snuck a photo from my plane ride back to New York...

The sidewall mural of Oldschool Pizzeria in Olympia, WA - oh, and of COURSE we drove past Sleater-Kinney Rd while listening to youknowwhat! Also overheard in the car: "Hey! Is this where Courtney Love went to SKEWWWELLLL?! In Olym pee ya ya ya ya ya yaaaaa..."

And the plugs - music photographers to cream your pants to:
Justin Dylan Renney (host with the most)
Rachel Leah Woliansky (traveling amiga)

Oh yeah, and this too...