gig review: 50 foot wave @ café du nerd

[rone]

Kim and i had a hard time finding parking, but we eventually settled for the garage on top of the Tower Records, which closed at midnight. Three other bands shared the night: Knife and Fork (the vocalist sounded like P J Harvey, and it turns out she and one of her bandmates met at a P J Harvey show, and the guitarist looked like she was trying to channel Corey Feldman; i found them a cut above average), Loquat (another band that goes for the cheesy Casiotone sound to go with a jangly feel that sounds like a cross between early Cars, Weezer, and the Pixies' poppier moments; although Kim felt that they were more technically proficient, i didn't like `em much except for one song), and The Monolith ("mellow chick rock" with quite good vocals; first two songs were good, but the rest were blah). Each band played for 30-35 minutes, and the break between each performance was about 25-30 minutes, so we had to go move the car after Loquat was done.

50' Wave came on and rocked very hard. Kristin's voice was abrasive. I only recognized "Clara Bow" (second song) and "Lavender" (near the end of the set). They came back for a two-song encore; they played no non-Wave songs. They didn't sound like they'd quite jelled on the songs (they had one false start), but there's a lot of energy there and i look forward to their upcoming release (March 23, i think) and subsequent tour. They only played for 45 minutes, so a full 90min show, with pre-Wave songs, should be really rockin'. Too bad the show went on so long... they really should've started at 20:00 (they started at 21:00). We didn't get home till 02:00.