Re: j’s review of mudhoney @ the electric ballroom

[rambleon]

well … here it is as promised …

The birth and re-birth of grunge, as witnessed by the ex-Dinosaur Jr frontman.

Most people, after being in a Chris Farley movie (1996’s Black Sheep), would be happy to rest on their laurels. In the ‘90s, Mudhoney would hang out at all the A-list parties. They called celebrities their friends, and even recorded a hit song with Buttmaster Sir Mixalot. What was ledt to prove? Hollywood was kind to the Mudhoney boys, but the crowd at Camden’s Electric Ballroom gave them something more.

Whenever I hear the word grunge, the only band that comes to mind are Mudhoney. They are the definitive band of an era. They knew The Stooges should be your jumping off point, not Dio, The Beatles, Guns n’Roses, U2 or The Doors like all their buddies. Mudhoney did Seattle proud. Now here they are over 10 years later at a sold-out gig, and the first thing that strikes me is how happy people are. This is not the typical Seattle indie rock crowd of late, scowling angry nerds with backpacks. All you see is bobbin’ heads, raised fists and smiles.

The band start off with Baby Can You Dig The Light, the opener from their recent and glorious return to form, Since We’ve Become Translucent, an eight-minute Soft-Machine style organ space-jam that acts as a teaser before the hits. And Mudhoney are not afraid to play the hits: Sweet Young Thing, Touch Me I’m Sick … In ‘N’ Out Of Grace, they’re all here. There are not some whimpering artistes with a fear of not ebing relevant if they don’t convey their latest emotional scars. Joy is not feared by Mudhoney. They feel no pain in letting people hear the songs they love.

The energy is high, the sound ferocious, much of which has to do with drummer Dan Peters – the thumping beat for a generation, The Forrest Gump of grunge. Whenever some historic moment was going down in the early ‘90s, Dan was there with a beer and a butt, smiling and waving. Pounding the skins of Nirvana, Screaming Trees and Valice among others. He is the Cozy Powell of today. And all this energy is not lost on the fire regulation-convening crowd. As stray members of tonight’s support act and Seattle’s new standard bearers The Catheters fly past, there were some pretty young girls in the front singing along with all the songs, not seeming to mind being flattened up against the barriers and occasionally kicked in the head by passing crowd surfers. Everybody was rockin’. Thanks boys …

– J Mascis

set list :

baby can you dig the light
the straight life
poisoned water
inside job
sweet young thing ain’t sweet no more
our time is now
touch me i’m sick
where the flavor is
i have to laugh
you got it
take it like a man
suck you dry
dyin’ for it
sonic infusion
when tomorrow hits
in ‘n’ out of grace
urban guerilla

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

also … my husband and i were there at the show that night … we were in the upstairs bit because by the time we got there the place was packed to the rafters and there was no way we were going to get to see anything from ground level … so we had a pretty good view of the left hand side of the place including the back/side stage area …

somehow we got seperated for most of the show and about 1/2 way thru mudhoney’s set i saw j peer out from behind the stack of speakers at the left hand side of the stage … and i thought … hey, maybe he’ll play w/them for one song or something, but he never did …

when i finally found my other half after the show i told him that i saw j mascis and he was like, yeah right … and at that v.same second we looked down again and he was down there again talking to some people in the crowd … so we got down there as fast as we could to see if we could meet him and maybe get him to sign something for us, but by the time we got to the front he was gone …

but that was ok because he kindly signed a cd of mine the next night at his acoustic show at the metro …