Yesterday I woke up early and ran some errands before heading into Williamsburg for the day/night. I found parking right on the corner of N. 6th Street so I fed the meter a bunch of quarters and wandered around for hours. I stopped at Academy Records and found some cheap vinyl (Karate’s Some Boots, June of 44’s Anatomy of Sharks, Van Morrison’s Veedon Fleece, David Bowie’s Low, Vietnam’s The Concrete’s Always Grayer on the Other Side of the Fence, Tom Waits’ Small Change, the Evil Dead 2 soundtrack, and Helium’s The Magic City). All told, I spent like $45 bucks. I went into another few stores but didn’t find much that piqued my interest.
Upon exiting the store, I walked a few doors down to Northsix and got tickets for the Serena Maneesh gig, which wasn’t even close to being sold-out. Then I walked down to Mug’s Ale House and plopped down at the bar for a few drinks. They were out of the Pizza Port ale that I had last time I was there, so instead I had maybe four pints of Blue Point Toasted Lager to wash down my buffalo burger. The George Mason/Florida game was on, so I watched the first half before leaving to walk back over to Northsix.
While standing outside I met and befriended a nice kid named Tyson from Australia. We talked for maybe half-an-hour, about his travels around North America and shared general interest stories about life and music, before Ilya showed up. Then the three of us walked to the waterfront and killed a bottle of Dewars. When we returned to the club, the opening band wasn’t at all appealing so we went back outside to hang around and chat more.
With Ilya drunk, myself still buzzed and Tyson buzzed (perhaps? hard to tell with those Australians), we inched towards the stage. Serena Maneesh came on minus Emil’s sister and plus a male bassist. They played a fiery set that totally smoked the Mercury Lounge gig back in January. They seem like they’ve matured during the course of this US tour. There was a lot of energy, it was loud and they freaked out quite a bit. The set featured two extended noise jams, one at the end of Sapphire High Eyes and a super-long, intense sonic meandering at the conclusion of their set that included endless feedback and wild instrument/effects manipulations. I’m pretty sure they were on stage for an hour, if not slightly longer. Ilya came up front during the wild finale and reached up on stage to detune the guitarist’s guitar as he was rolling around on the floor with it. It was pretty funny. I thought Ilya might get smacked in the face for it, but the guy didn’t even notice. At the end of the show, Emil thanked everyone profusely, said “see you in September” and headed backstage.
I drove Tyson back into Manhattan and dropped him off on Ludlow to enjoy downtown NYC on a Saturdy night. Back in Jersey, Ilya and I stopped for chips and a burrito before I dropped him off at Dan and Mark’s for a birthday party, which apparently ended right when he walked inside their apartment. When I got home I said (aloud, to no one), “oh shit. the clocks” and passed out.
Setlist:
Chorale Lick
Sapphire High Eyes
Selina’s Melodie Fountain
Candlelighted
Drain Cosmetics
Your Blood In Mine
Beehiver II
All photos can be found here. Click to enlarge these photos.
