Reverend Horton Heat, the Supersuckers & Murphy’s Law @ High Dive
This is the first show I’ve seen in seriously (it IS time to get serious, people) a year. The last show I saw was The (International) Noise Conspiracy & The Rogers Sisters & The Boss Martians play at the Triple Rock Social Club in Minneapolis. Believe you and me sailor man, the 8 hour drive was well worth it!
I had never heard of Murphy’s Law before seeing them on the bill. I talked with the swag-man for a while and he said they’ve been around the New York scene for quite a while…touring with the Beastie Boys and the band that was on my shirt (getting the conversation going) NOFX. They had one of the kool-issst things I’ve seen in a while incorporated into their act. A “Jagermeister cow-bell.” Explanation? Sure thing! The band was enjoying a bottle of Jager, and throughout various tunes, the singer would hold the bottle & the mic up together and the drummer would use it as a cowbell. NIIIIIIICE!
If you’ve ever seen Guttermouth (Lord knows I have) you’ll know what these boys are about. Stage banter! Calling out tomato-based female netherregions instead of vinegar-based such & such…glorious! Vegans, homo-sexuals, even the Jewish guitar player…stood no chance as long as the singer was on the mic. Political correctness aside, they were titties. Even making fun of the johnny-come-lately rock-a-billy-lookin’ trickstah’s on bein’ the same people who were jammin’ to ska and wearing the checker ties and playing trumpets…oh man, he’s the man (note: CBC endorsed Ska, Rock-a-billy, and Hardcore…let the truth be known!). Just as I thought they were going to make fun of ZZ Top (calling them out a bit) the band jammed out to a NIIIIIIICE version of “Tush.”
For those of you who aren’t familiar with The Supersuckers…please allow me to introduce them to you. Eddie Spaghetti on bass & lead vocals killed…almost as much as guitarist Ron Heathman. They rocked a few favorites “Creepy Eyed Jackalope,” “The Evil Powers of Rock & Roll” plus some more…baby! Heathman eventually jammed out to Joe Walsh’s Funk #49 (with VOCAL!-plural) which shot down the Nazi’s, the Taliban AND the French Canadians! They killed!
REVEREND HORTON HEAT
In all fairness, they took a crap-ton of time setting up and ol’ Jim Heath (aka The Rev) was mighty pissed for the first bit of the show due to the shotty sound-work that was being done. It got better…Sweet Crap! it got better!…First and foremost, the bassist & fan favorite Jimbo Wallace killed with his stand-up bass. His fingers were taped as crap to cover his fingers (my friend tells me he saw blood on the strings and bass…Jimbo…have you been playing too hard again?). He surfed on the bass during “I Can’t Surf.” Him & The Rev played the fretboard for each others jams. And that’s just the start of it. I got a kick out of the Rev’s stage banter, especially his statement on porno during “Los Gringos Like a Party”: jibba-jabbin’ about how some people always shout “Porno!” instead of “Corn Dogs” as the lyrics go. They killed the show with “Big Red Rocket of Love” which included a killer drum solo by Scott Churchilla. The Rev. eventually played on top of Jimbo’s bass (on its side as Jimbo played it) which was a visual punch to the chopahs! My absolute favorite songs of the night: “I Can’t Surf” “The JIMBO Song” and “Psychobilly Freakout!”
