Sunday, February 13, 2011

swillmerchants, craft beer, chin strap beards, para-diddles

great night out with my buddy Jim last night. we went to max cap for a show, crowrider, swillmerchants and against apocalypse were on the bill. when we got there, there was a band already on stage - for the life of me i cannot remember the name. it was something to the effect of 220's or along those lines. good stuff, great vocal harmonies and the drummer used some interesting crash cymbals. one was destroyed - as in it looked like it had gotten the rough end of an industrial paper shredder. however, it had the most beautiful trashy and dark sound.

the crowd was full of familiar faces - some i haven't seen in ages! i was enjoying the selection of craft beers on tap. started out the night drinking Magic Hat's "Howl" (which is terrific btw), then based on the bartenders recommendation after my initial inquiry - i switched to Goose Island's Mild Winter. this was out of this world! enough about my beverages - Crowrider was up next. after months of missing the shows under the name UTAH - i finally got a chance to see them. i'll leave it at this - Dino's 'tiger shirt' said it all. and if you missed it, your loss!

Swills played a killer set and blew me away! played a lot of tunes i expected to hear - but they dug into a few of the newer tunes (i assume for the new record) - and did a cover of "girls on film". they put on such a good rock show. the type of show that engages the crowd from beginning to end. for the genre, the accomplish everything they should be, while on stage. everything is executed with the idea of having a good show in mind.

then Against Apocalypse played some songs. not really my thing, well played however! i think it's just catered more toward the chin-strap beard wearing crowd - not that there is anything wrong with that. :/

during the evening i spoke with a handful of people who told me they have checked out this blog - that made my night! best compliment i could have heard - i heard last night regarding dedication to writing this. couldn't have come from a better guy either, he's one of my favorite drummers (taught me how to apply the paradiddle to the drum kit back in the day, not that i do correctly - but he taught me) - thanks Bill!

anyway, Chloe is flipping her lid because we asked her to wait a bit on breakfast. i had better get on that. also, Holly is giving me a ton of crap about "computing" - i am terrible now that i have my own machine. amazing.

more soon!

peace!