Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Woods + New Bloods + Power Douglas @ 234 Wythe, Brooklyn. May 27th, 2008

There's something so nice about going to an underground show. You know, where the venue doesn't technically have a name, and asks you to be quiet when you smoke outside, so that the cops don't come, and the bar consists of just a couple of haphazardly thrown together cheap bottles of booze, and you've never heard of any of the bands, but you don't care because they all have the right spirit, and you end up blogging about it when you're slightly inebriated at 2 in the morning. =)
I originally came to this show to see Woods, but since they were playing last, I killed some time at Monkeytown with some cheap wine and pleasant company before heading over to the nondescript club known only as 234 Wythe. The first band I caught, Power Douglas, played an energetic and heavily distorted punk set with only drums, bass and delayed vocals. They had a memorable finish, when the singer repeated the mantra, 'love is indestructible' over and over again. True that. The second band, New Bloods, could only be conceived in 2008, a three-piece all-girl punk band with bass, drums, and violin. They held it together surprisingly well, given the sparse instrumentation, and I left impressed, although I bet they make a better impression live than on record... Finally, Woods came on and delivered a psychedlic folk set that is distinctly louder live than on record. But what they lack in dynamics, they more than make up for in originality, which is what really draws you into the band from the get-go (notice the band member using his headphones as a microphone for background vocals, wow!). Regardless, they played 'Night Creature' exactly when I wanted them to, which pretty much sold them for me. Like I said, sometimes you can't beat a night in the underground...

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