show review: Fifty on Their Heels & New Motherfuckers @ the Beauty Bar San Diego

As I was watching the Rapture bore me to death at Coachella 2007 I couldn't help but think "fuck, fifty on their heels could play coachella." in fact, it was pretty funny to see how many really boring live bands were playing coachella. i'm kind of the opinion that rock bands should be interesting to watch live. well, what do i know anyways...

Last night, pretty good rumor had it that the night clocked 215 at the beauty bar door. Not a fantastic number, but not a bad number either. The New Motherfuckers were amazing. They get tighter and tighter each time I see them. They are losing a bit of the extreme quirkiness that marked their earlier performances/recordings and moving more into a "conventional" rock idiom, but they are still odd ducks, and that makes me like them.

Between sets I had a chance to talk to Cullen from the North Atlantic who is a really cool/interesting guy. Had a chance to check out their most recent cd on the drive home and I liked what I heard- it had a fugazi/math rock vibe. I think it is fair to say that you could see a north atlantic/fifty on their heels bill at some point in the next few months. maybe at the casbah?

The concert area really filled up for the Fifty on Their Heels set. The crowd was quite attentive and enthusiastic- which pleased me. Junior was in fine form, Fifty played a new song which was really good. My favorite part of the set was when the last song, Junior said "this next song is the A side from our upcoming single" and people in the crowd were yelling "I am the riot"- like- they already knew about the single! Wow! Actual awareness of Fifty on Their Heels. Great.

The DJ part of the night didn't really go off like I was expecting. Not sure what's up with that.

Tonight, all you UCSD students who are peeping the Sun God line up- come out and see Fifty on Their Heels at the Che Cafe:

CAT DIRT PRESENTS
Fifty on Their Heels
The Muslims
The New Motherfuckers
The Corvinas
Che Cafe
ALL AGES/$5

It should be super happy fun time.

2007 Coachella Review: Coachella Style, The Trucker Hat is Dead, Long Live the Army Cap!

cobrasnake and cory kennedy, originally uploaded by catdirtrecords.

Sigh. I literally never get tired of looking at that photo.
OK- this my 2007 Coachella Review "Style Round-up" and I just wanted to do a quick run down of the fashion trends I observed at Coachella.

1. I didn't take that picture of Cory Kennedy until Sunday afternoon, BUT on Friday and Saturday everyone in our party made dozens of "Cory Kennedy" sighting that were false alarms. A "Cory Kennedy" sighting typically entails a rail thin girl with shoulder length brown hair (straight), oversize sunglasses and a thin head band of some kind. Of course, the oversize sunglasses is not Cory Kennedy specific, but that was the look we saw a bunch of.

2. The memo on trucker hats has been disseminated. Not even the rage against the machine guys were wearing them (!) They have been replaced by the "army cap" which is a fitted cloth hat, usually in a dark color, with no logo or type of photo or anything. v. v. basic. Literally, every other person at Coachella (guys n' gals) had one.

3. Skulls! Skulls on t-shirts! Skulls on hats! Skulls on dresses! There are even t-shirts that have dozens of different skulls on them. Skulls. Skulls. Skulls.

4. Mini Dresses with boots. Dozens of sightings, espech in the VIP tent.

5. Guys with waxed torsos. Not technically a "style" but I saw so many dudes with their shirts off and perfectly hairless torsos, I had to take note. Impossible to ignore. Guys- put those shirts back on!

6. Wearing your 2007 Coachella Rage Against the Machine Shirt BEFORE they've played. Again, I saw this at least one hundred times on friday and saturday. What's up with that? You haven't even seen Rage yet.


CAT DIRT SEZ 2007 COACHELLA REVIEW

Coachella 2007: Soulwax (Nite Versions)

Coachella 2007: Expressing My Preference for One Local Alt Rock Station over the Other, In Photographs

Coachella 2007: Corn on the Cob

Coachella 2007: People Passed Out

Coachella 2007: Introduction to Coverage

coachella 2007: photos of people passed out at coachella 2007

this girl wins my award for "best passed out person" of the weekend. She wins because 1) face down 2) it's like, four pm on saturday when i took this photo 3) she's passed out oustside the "dome" during a drum and bass dj set! do you know how noisy that is? Plenty noisy.


I liked these cats b/c they had there arms folded across their chest- vampire style. sorry- coffin style. If there is a "look" to have when you are passed out during coachella (hey- just go home!) it is this look. Study it carefully for future reference.



These two are sleeping outside of LCD Soundsystem. Seriously? There is plenty of music I heard at Coachella that made we want to go to sleep, but the outskirts of the Sahara tent- that is not sleepy time territory.


Basically, I grouped every band I saw at Coachella into one of two categories "didn't bore me to death" and "bored me to death." I'm really just looking for someone who can be exciting OR interesting for 20 to 45 minutes. Full sets rarely exceeded forty minutes, and if they do, you leave. Coachella is like an appetizer sampler platter- a musical buffet, if you will. The same rules apply as apply at a buffet: try everything, don't get filled up on one item, don't be the morbidly obese guy or gal that makes everyone uneasy. Only for music not food.


If I could spit out one name for my readership: Soulwax. They were awesome. They were "too many dj's"(are?), used to be on... astralworks? geffen? In some combination. I'm going to get into detail on that partic set- maybe dig up some mp3s, throw up some pics, the whole "mp3 blog" treatment- later in the week.

Ok that's all for now


Previous Cat Dirt 2007 Coachella Coverage: Introduction