October 2019

October 3rd at Light Club Lampshop

I had a great time seeing music last night at Light Club Lamp Shop. I have a radio show on Thursdays on WBKM that begins at 9 pm. I trigger the show from my laptop and usually like to stay close to home so everything runs smoothly. Every once in a while, a Thursday show seems do-able, and the idea of seeing Matthew Bryan Hagen play murder ballads with Brett Lanier on Pedal Steel seemed too good to pass up, especially as the show was set to go from 7-8 pm. That should have allowed plenty of time to get home and get things running.

I headed out around 20 of 7 and the door was still locked when I arrived. I grabbed some coffee at Radio Bean then made my way into the Lamp Shop. Everything was mostly set up and Ryan Cohen was there to record the show for Robot Dog Studio. A little bit of warm-up/soundcheck quickly turned into the beginning of the show. Matt began with gentle dark chords on the acoustic guitar and a deep haunting vocal. Brett’s mournful slide added extra shivers to the songs. They began with a cheery song about a guy asking someone to watch his bar stool since he gave the person the skin off his back to make a coat. Things turned darker on a tale of honeymooners who robbed a bank and were later hung together. That’s one way to celebrate a wedding. Up next was a tale of a man who had a wolf as his spirit animal until the wolf ate him and he became the wolf’s Spirit Man. A song about Bone Picking kept the spirit dark, then they followed with a tale of unknowing revenge. You know how sometimes kids make a pact to marry each other when they grow up, but the man leaves instead, and takes the woman’s knife and heart? Hearing the story of how that woman in black dealt with the situation when he returned was both surprising and not surprising at all. A song about some cold friends showed that they were not really such good friends in the end. A song about an outlaw who knew his time was almost up followed. I found it easy to sing along with the chorus about the Horizon the second time through. After the song, Matt said it was an old Kyle The Rider song, so it’s likely I’d heard it a few times before, a long time ago. A tale of selling your soul to corporate America revealed itself in Wallet Of Sin. Then came a song about tables that had been turned. It turned out that Larry The Canary had picked up on how this coal mine thing works. He flew in just far enough to no longer be seen, waited a while, then flew out. The miners went in with the expected results. They capped the night with a fast rousing cover of Bobby Bare’s song about Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau which was a great end to the show.

I ducked out quickly and zipped home in plenty of time to start my show. Wow, with that timing, I just might be able to make the other four shows this month. Matt’s got a lot of creepy Shocktober plans, so if you need a Halloween fix, head to the Lamp Shop from 7-8 on Thursdays.

October 10th at Light Club Lamp Shop

I had a great time seeing music last night at Light Club Lamp Shop. It was the second show in the weekly Shocktober series that Matthew Bryan Hagen has created to bring us into the Halloween mood. This weeks version was the return of Brainscapes.

I met up with Nathan Curtis and we drove downtown. As we got settled, the band donned their squid hats and slipped into the groove. With Matt on guitar, Bob Wagner on guitar, Dan Davine on bass and maybe Ari on keys, they had a bit of an old Floyd sound. The whole show was one long piece of music that began as a slow drippy soundscape with a steady driving bass line. The music built intensely for a bit and eased up and down and found all of the cavities in our brains. Both Wagner and Hagen were stunning on guitar with Matt working the sound hard and Bob playing gentle and incendiary leads, sometimes with a slide and sometimes not. At one point the music was so intense it was almost shrieking then it eased way back and Matt wrapped his hands around the Theremin and coaxed out some delightfully creepy sounds. The music rose to new depths and almost sounded like a giant squid attacking a ship during a raging storm. It eventually eased back and Matt tossed in some words about a gnome and the piece quietly ended.

We hung out and chatted for a moment then Nathan drove us back, dropped me off and headed to his place. I got in and logged into the WBKM computer and had plenty of time to run my radio show at 9. Even if it’s a bit stressful to see a show before I go to work on a Thursday night, the timing seems great and I might just have to do it again. There are three more chances this month. Stop by if you want.

October 17th at Light Club Lamp Shop

I had a great time seeing music Thursday night at Light Club Lamp Shop. It was the third part of Matthew Bryan Hagen‘s Shocktober series.

This week’s version was billed as “Angel Bones and the Filthy Fist”. Imagine, if you will, Matt Hagen alternating between a spooky guitar and a spookier keyboard. Imagine a long sprawling jam that rose from gentle beauty to terrifying heights. What could give the sound even more depth? How about Lauren Costello‘s amazing cello playing. What could give the sound a more eerie edge? How about Johnnie Day Durand‘s musical saw. Together they built a dark sonic platform. Once they settled in a little, Annie Parmalee cited the name of a movie and two characters. Chris Friday and Kris Brown became the characters and recited a few lines from the classic horror movie that Annie mentioned. Throughout the night they moved through some of the Halloween movies and some of the Friday the 13th movies. Some bits of dialog were just a couple of lines and some were extended sequences. Some were terrifying and some were outrageously funny. They hit on the classics like The Exorcist, Carrie, Psycho, and The Birds. The packed room hung on to every word. Some lines were delivered with exquisite terror and some amusingly butchered. Sometimes they broke the fourth wall and asked, is Happy Death Day really a movie? And, while the dialog was the focus, watching Lauren and Johnnie listen to where Matt was going musically and staying locked in was my favorite part.

The whole show was a very amusing hour, then I zipped home to put a radio show together. There are two more eerie weeks of Shocktober shows still on the books, so head to the Lamp Shop for your Halloween needs.

Thanks to Luke Awtry Photography for the photos. Thanks Robot Dog Studio for filming and recording the show. I’ll be playing parts of it soon on WBKM

October  24th at Light Club Lamp Shop

I had a great time seeing music last night at Light Club Lamp Shop. I got going at the last minute and took the quick walk downtown. The clock finished striking 7 as I was 50 feet from the door. I slid into the club and Matt the Gnat and the Gators featuring Miss Saxy were on stage singing a song about a witch doctor making gumbo. The fourth night of the weekly Shocktober series was off to the usual dark start. Matthew Bryan Hagen‘s stark guitar and deep voice were nicely complemented by Caroline Marie‘s mournful sax and choice backing vocals. They continued on with a tale of someone who was Done Saving Bones then sang the tale of a man who’s dog found a human bone in the neighbor’s back yard. It was called Two Dirty Dogs. Up next was a true story of a man who’s life was saved on a frigid night by finding an abandoned winter jacket. Afterward, much time was spent with the next hit, Looking For Forgetful Louis Brown. The song after, Paper Doll, was fraught with several hilarious jokes and then things took a darker turn when a hitchhiker got picked up by a nefarious character. I believe the song was called One Day Closer To The Devil Man. A cheery tale followed from a man who lived on a cobblestone street in 1847 and suffered blackouts and wondered if he is Jack The Ripper. I believe the proper title is Born On Cobblestone In 1847. From there we went from tremendous highs to stupendous lows in Frozen Winning Streak Of A Gambler. A tale of a man in a space capsule that was out of energy and heading towards the atmosphere, in a bad way, changed perspectives to that of a child on earth who sees the capsule burning up and experiences it as A Cut In The Night Sky. They closed the night in a joyous fashion and celebrated A Monsters Holiday.

I said a couple of quick hellos but was out the door with haste. The walk home was quick and I had enough time to get that night’s radio show running. Next week’s show is Surf Sabbath and I may need to go see that one too since I’ve made it four of the four so far.