Jennifer Hall/Kings of Spade

 
  So both these bands I was blown away by. Jennifer Hall and Kings of Spade, I still think about them. Kings of Spade come all the way from Hawaii. I think this is the first time I ever had to write that word on this blog. And they toured together, even performing a song together. They genuinely supported each other and that was sweet to see. Kings of Spade are far, far away from home, that means something for me to see Jennifer Hall to have them on tour with her. Having said that, I was barely getting to know both of them at the same time. I knew of JH....kinda sorta. I would notice her name when I would look up venues to see who was performing there...its hard to miss her when she's covered in gold paint in her pictures, but I was lazy and did not come around until this show at Emporium. That's when I looked them up for real this time on Youtube. Some of the videos there are from 2011, that's a long time not looking up a person. I'm fucking embarrassed.
  Jennifer Hall is from Chicago, and I'm barely finding out now. And so this time I look her up and then out of nowhere....well somewhere, Hawaii, well completely unexpected here is this powerhouse Kings of Spade that come with her. And they like each other, the mutual support is obvious and it is sweet to witness.
  Kings of Spade are away from home, vulnerable. Most of the videos I have seen were filmed in Hawaii, so this trip I imagine to be significant and imprinting to their experience. I hope Chicago left a positive imprint. KC sings and her voice is powerful, deep, bluesy and smokey. Her, and the rest of the band, they operate seamlessly with a single mind. That is always fascinating to see. Oh, Oh, and at some point, they were giving away CDs on stage right there! So yeah! I want one, and later I bought from them the coolest, blackest, XXL shirt from them. Yeah, oversized is awesome!! So in the end I came home with shirts and music from both bands, and that is so rare. There did seem to be among the crowd people for both bands and that was cool, but not everyone knew. Most, like me, were blindsided by how great they were.  It was a good modest sized crowd.
  Jennifer Hall also has a powerful voice, like a boxer that punches with the full weight of her body. I mean...I can see veins. Its awesome when someone delivers with that much passion. It sells the music that much more effectively and you become a believer as well. Its like I drank the Kool....you had me at "hello".....and you said it like Lionel Riche. Oh, yeah, more of this fucking Kool Aid. JH is....bold and romantic, she weaponizes vulnerability to work for her  like when Nick Cave sings "Do You Love Me". You want someone to feel this for you. And that is the power of Jennifer Hall, open veins and without bleeding out. Its rollerskating on fucking water. You want to slow dance to this with a significant other in a prom like moment.
   To Be Close To You I find myself listening multiple times.   And I watch the Wicker Park show of 2012, all four fucking segments, with a wonder of how it is only now.....And Kings of Spade are on the other side....power blues. That old blues dominant confidence is the radiation I felt from Kings Of Spade. Both bands capture for me this timeless and old sense modernity. Like....modernity itself is now old.
  And from these eternal periods comes Jennifer Hall. I feel swooned into a romantic oasis within a noir-ish world. Fuck the eclipse, this was the eclipse I was looking for.
Zig

Jovan,Pixel Grip,Spaces of Disappearance, Born Days

  I wanna mythologize this whole fucking night. I arrived early, or on time at Emporium and so  saw everything, and finished the night at Late Bar. Pixel Grip DJ's were going to do a set after playing Emporium.  Late Bar being this place founded by Neo exiles is way west of Belmont.  Late Bar had no cover that night and did get this influx of people from Emporium that trickled slowly, then to a full dance floor. Late Bar had this queer goth disco night.  What? That's how they called it, and this awesome band that played Emporium would DJ later at Late Bar.
  I'm so fucking into Born Days. I'm glad I caught most of it. There I saw Elaine from Spaces Of Disappearance. She would play later. Elaine is awesome. Her beats are singular and resonant dance floor tracks. They make you move like its the first time something moved you.  But here she is in the audience and let me say hi to her. She is the coolest. I see her regularly at shows. Adele from Axons arrived after Born Days was done and so was Danielle. Alright so I'm on Spaces.... Dick Cheney In The Light, one of the songs she played. Its meant to vilify Cheney and now look at what we got now with fucking Trump, Sessions......anyway the song is a great dance floor track. Elaine would be at Late Bar with the other Emporium people.
  By the time I would enter Late Bar, it was as a newly rabid fan for Pixel Grip. Wednesday 13 September at Emporium. To have all these bands diverse as I don't know you, but all local it was like once in that rare moment. So I fucking went. Elaine was there, and so was Axons Adele and Impulsive Hearts Danielle. They support each others shows all the time. In seems to be a common enough cool as hell occurrence I get to witness.  I am in the audience for all of them. Jovan came with a full band, had us all movin' and waving hands at her Emporium set. Oh, she's a rapper, yeah. We was all dancing to her. And later she partied at Late Bar! In The Sun from Born Days Melissa Harris played. Ok, that was abrupt, jumping from Jovan to Born Days, I'm just following the rapids of thoughts in my head about this.
  Be True is the name of the six track EP, just released. Born Days was first. There is this simmering intensity that is in her signature. There is the weight of it just being her on stage alone with all her instruments. Her stage is always dim, dark. Cold slow, dark, intense electronic, like a minimal Phosphor, or Linea Aspera. It just holds you to dance relaxed.  The dark lining seems natural and not intentional.....what I mean, I think this can have a natural goth leaning audience. Pixel Grip played last and they fucking killed it. I came to the after-party at Late Bar a fan of them. I felt taken back to when I first liked disco as a kid. I'm not saying that I am actually taken back to an actual memory, but that feeling of liking something for the first time, and that feeling washing over you. I know I said something similar about Spaces, and I can say that about everything I see and find resonant. But that does not water down to feeling when I say it about PG. And this night I was bombarded with awesome bands. Normally I may just like one of the bands and the rest no. This night was stacked with one great local act after another, and on top of that the after-party at Late Bar with Elaine and Pixel Grip. In the midst of all the shit that is nationally going on and beyond, it amazes me that I can have these little moments away from it. The individuals mentioned here help me tremendously in seeing my way through it.
Zig

Last night at Resistor on Lincoln

  The Monday night of the eclipse I went to see Axons with Impulsive Hearts, and Emily Davis. The show was at Emporium. I arrived on time to see Emily and then Danielle. It was a good time. Its no revelation that I am way into Impulsive Hearts. It has that summer vibe you miss when fall arrives, makes you really appreciate fleeting moments. Summer, more than any other season has that feeling of "you better enjoy it while it lasts".  I know we saver all four seasons for what they uniquely represent, but when do we want winter to last into fucking March or April. Alright....so Impulsive Hearts jamming away, summer vibe, I'm all into it. In the audience was Sophie. Yes! From Videotape and now Fauvely. Y'all are getting so much better at this. And perhaps y'all are wondering why the pics are not of Sophie, Danielle or Adele. I'll get to that, for now I want to crystallize that as a common mental wandering for later on.
  She was scheduled to play Cafe Mustache that Friday with her band Fauvely, a minimal set I think.
  I am way into Fauvely. So here I am talking to Sophie, and so many words escape me. I fucking can't even properly tell her why I like the band. Its music that makes me think and wander inwardly. We talked about Born Days and how awesome Melissa Harris is with her new band. The song In The Sun is beautiful slow hypnotic and cold wave-ish. I can dance to it like fucking Audrey from Twin Peaks. So even as I choked on my dissertation on why Fauvely is awesome, right in front of Ms Sophie, I managed to express my intention to go see her gig at Cafe Mustache. This was how it was going to happen. I was going to squeeze two events in one night. I was going to catch Sophie's minimal Fauvely set on Milwaukee Ave near California, and then run to the second important night Resistor's last night at up on Lincoln Ave near Western Ave. Here and there indeed my mind did wander to Fauvely, the show I missed on Cafe Mustache. Yet I did not regret at all going to Resistor. We bouncing and dancing to Dream House, I think was Ami DJ for the night.  We stretched it for as long as we could. We are old and responsible, so it wasn't that long.
  Rani Young was saying goodbye to its first location before moving to Belmont. She was performing a mini set of Girl Detective, her old band and then Dream House! Her Siouxsie tribute band. That was going to be a fucking massive party! Girl Detective I saw perhaps once and missed her other shows. And I kinda let it fuck with me. So this performance from Rani as Girl Detective would be rare. Still.... I was going to catch both of these fucking events, I keep telling myself. So this is my ambition for that Friday, and it is what I was thinking as I was somehow blinded by Sophie's smile. "I am making your show and this one other show...its going to fucking happen"......I didn't actually say that to Sophie, remember I was choking and tripping on my words. Friday arrives and its looking difficult. What is more likely to happen is I would spend precious time going from one place to another and not fully enjoy either because I would be looking at the clock. So I decided. I would go to one place and stay.
  It would be Resistor. I mean, this is Rani's venue I would be directly supporting. I put on my best preserved Siouxsie shirt. So I arrived on time to see Rani do her Girl Detective set. That's when she had her Siouxsie shirt on. And it was great. It seemed as if everyone was in black for this. The whole fucking night was one beautiful impacting moment. Rani belted out this power set with Dream House. And I got to hang with these people. Talked with Mark, Ami and Rani. Even as I enjoyed these times with all these people, my mind would steer flashes of Fauvely, the band I missed. It had to happen. I knew Fauvely would play again sooner. The next Resistor will be way bigger and near some significant goth friendly venues. It will be on Belmont a short walk east of Late Bar. The grand thing about Resistor for me was the inclusive, supportive vibe it just had. This for me is where I saw for the first time a lot of different artists, most recently Adrian H And The Wounds.  This one December night.....I remember Adele played just the right Leonard Cohen track, to reflect and collect this fucked up feeling we all kinda had, Everybody Knows. Donna from Beat Drun Juel was there, not to perform, in the audience. But....I know abrupt, but back to this last night for Resistor on Lincoln, and there were a lot of people. In its brief existence were some impacting flashes. Anyway...these pics are from the very last night, a Friday. Rani and Ami I am happy to call them friends.  
  And there is something so powerful about having Dream House belt out some old abrasive Siouxsie punk for the last night of awesome for Resistor. I think there will be more from Rani. She is in a new band. Ami has more from Solemn Meant Walks. Recently they released the new video for Said The Night. They guerrilla recorded the video on House On The Rock. Whatever the video caught behind Ami was just spontaneously there. This is harder to do than you think. No one around you knows your recording for a song. You lip sync to a song that is playing just in your head. And the video turned out great. So I got to chill with these people and in researching for this post I just binged on some videos of SMW, and Girl Detective. On the one hand, I feel the sting of missing all these shows posted, but hey, I can see them now and the official Youtube SMW vids. For that last Friday 25 August, the crowd was good and supportive. I went wanting to experience and document this fleeting thing.  Zig