Black Lips, Coathangers
Assembly, Sacramento • Tuesday, March 25, 2014
Words & Photo by Andrew Scoggins
As advertised, the Black Lips show at Assembly last Tuesday was a booze-fueled, sweat-soaked rage fest where the dull day-to-day drudgery of the week faded into the background for a few moments of cathartic release. Or at least, this was how it was for a third of the crowd who chose to be a part of the show instead of those in the back, standing stoically with their arms crossed and scowls on their lips as all this merrymaking happened around them.
Maybe it’s just a symptom of the California scene and there’s some fantastic desert punk-rock shows going on right now in Arizona that are all kinds of buckwild, but it seems to be that no matter how raucous the show is, at least half of the crowd is standing silently. At the Black Lips show, people were crowd-surfing, stage diving, slam dancing in the mosh pits and spilling drinks all over each other; but then you look back and it’s that blank bored look on everyone’s face. It seemed to be even worse on the 18-plus side of Assembly.
Because of the fully stocked bar (possibly the No. 1 highlight of the sleek new venue), Assembly sectioned off the floor in order to keep the impressionable young tykes from the tottering, tattooed bad influences only a few yards away. This meant that while the drunk adult side was smashing into each other during the guttural shoutalong choruses of “O Katrina” and “Family Tree,” the 18-plus section seemed to be content to stand and watch, which was a complete 180 from the opening performance from fellow Atlantans The Coathangers.
The Coathangers is an all-female punk band firmly planted in the riot grrrl/garage aesthetic. The music is fuzzy, stripped down, snarling, snotty punk rock. And after walking on stage and telling the audience to “wake up,” the band proceeded to do just that. Lead singer Julia Kugel started the show with a barrage of shrieking vocals in a noise rock song that was played entirely with a slide. Most of the audience members seemed to not quite know what to make of that; but as the band got going into the rangy garage punk, most people were nodding to the beat and the 18-plus side was going wild, prompting bassist Meredith Franco to get into the crowd on that side and do vocals for a bit.
However, the real draw and the real energy from the band seemed to stem from drummer Stephanie Luke, who provided the snarling yell to Kugel’s shrieking yips. Luke’s drumming was ferocious and her singing style brought Iggy Pop to mind just in terms of the sheer visceral, animalistic violence of it. When the three members of the band switched instruments, it allowed Luke to step out from behind her black matted curtain of hair as she bent over the drum set and fronted the band, which she did with fantastic aplomb. Luke embodied a dangerous wild-card energy that the other members of the band seemed to lack. When she was leading the charge, the band fired on all cylinders. But when Franco took lead guitar duties for “Merry Go Round,” it all felt very staid and flat-footed. But judging from the reception the band drew, it’ll likely not be the last time they come to Sacramento.
Finally, Black Lips took the stage and it was really everything one would want from a punk rock show. There was some concern that after the production by Black Keys’ Patrick Carney, their newer material on Underneath the Rainbow wouldn’t have the same kind of frenetic vigor that their earlier material had. But after witnessing the slow-sludge stomp and grind of “Boys in the Wood,” their new material seems to complement their live set perfectly. There were a few misfires such as “Smiling,” which seemed a bit saccharine and pop-y for the Black Lips. But the entire set flowed well together and kept the crowd moving. Their second to last song, “Bad Kids” brought the place down as it tends to do, slapping every statue on the outskirts of the crowd from their apathy to a sweaty roiling mass of bodies.
The set seemed to end abruptly as the crowd called for an encore, perhaps “Veni Vidi Vici” that was conspicuously absent from their set, but Assembly turned on the house lights and some non-abrasive rock music and that was that. Although then they turned off the music soon after so those who wanted to hydrate properly with beer and booze were forced to go to another bar, losing potential revenue for the Assembly. Which was baffling to me. But other than that and the strange center divider for the show, the Assembly is a great venue for seeing some of the larger bands who overcrowd some of the smaller dives. Even the Black Lips seemed to be surprised by how many people came out, and guitarist Ian Saint Pé said, “We didn’t think any of you guys would show up.” Now if only they could get the lifeless mannequins to dance and participate, they’d have a proper rock ‘n’ roll show, but maybe next time.
Comments