from Sunday 9/7

I've been here just over a week and already feel the drag. Where New York had two shows a night I might see, Philly had four a week, Providence has one ever nine or ten days. Then there's Boston, but the drive and the bizarre let down of the city make it unlikely that I will be journey up there often, even to go to the Harvard Square Other. The folks in my department seem generally enthusiastic, sometimes even passionate about the music that they study, but none of them seem passionate about music in general. Maybe it's curiousity that has put me in the predicament of being a rock critic - a professional obligation to stay broad.

Checked out the Sounds as my first foray in the Providence rock club scene. Lupo's Met Café isn't a bad place, though the sound was shoddy. I was warned about the sightlines but find the foundation supports minimally intrusive, maybe because the show was only 1/3 full. Providence is a rock town, maybe even a metal town, and it has little love in its heart for hipster pop bands. The Sounds, granted, are little more than a stripped down Motley Crue cover band with a chubby Debbie Harry impersonator on vox, but I was surprised that the NME hype hasn't made it this far north. Haven't heard the album, but the cheerleader S O U N D S song is amazing taken in context of either punk or indie culture. It only truly works as an underground hair metal anthem.

And…ha ha ha…I've already seen Lightning Bolt twice in the week I've been here. Saturday was some marathon of crusty punk and noise bands at AS220 and the Living Room, the latter being one of the most disgusting wrecks of rock civilization I've ever had the misfortune to pay money to enter. No wonder shit goes up in flames in this city. Also Chinese Stars, a more fringed, asymetrical and downright bad version of the Rapture (a phenomenon I refused to believe but is true - bands that rip off the Rapture?) and Mahi Mahi, two guys with matching white synth drums and keys, a camp/industrial mojo and a perma-vocoder. The singers/keyboardist, painted with red and blue siren light, pumped a ghostly fist to the audience while riffing on staccato melodies not unlike Fad Gadget. Strangely, girls danced and boys stood dumbfounded at this neo-industrial robot dance party tragedy.