After a wild shitstorm of a few weeks, I returned to The Republic for duty last Wednesday. Thanks to Brian Riley for taking the reins on the last two reviews. Radio Rubber Room had lined up Machine Gun Mustache and One Night Standard, two bands I had never taken a close listen to. Machine Gun Mustache - these guys are absolute lunatics, and they are fabulous. Their frontman, Immanuel the Liberator I presume, exudes a psycho-energy that I rarely run across.
Most of the time, I feel like I have a pretty good grasp of a band within their first three or four songs. This was not the case with MGM. My brain struggled to pin them down, but they would not be pinned. For one thing, they fully rotate their instruments throughout the set. Guitar to drums to bass, mandolin to melodica to banjo, don’t forget the violin, and there was some weird xylophone or something up there.
The instruments are only the half of it – the vocal delivery and the content struck me initially as kooky, funny, whatever. Then you understand that they are bordering somewhere on the continuum of extreme genius. It’s pure, unadulterated haphazard crack rock - and I believe they even sang a song about smoking crack with a hobo, which was awesome. Machine Gun Mustache is almost disturbingly creative and inventive, and I need to see them again, just to make sure they are indeed as crazy as I think they are.
One Night Standard followed with their mid-nineties heavy rock throwback style. Two loud, distortion-heavy guitars are the primary elements in this band. Despite the constant ripping of guitars, complex song structures and time signatures, there’s a creative edge that doesn’t seem to make its way through.
One Night Standard definitely rocks, and pretty hard at that. But I don’t know if I would define it as progressive, at least not anymore; it was progressive in the nineties. I see this band really coming into its own in the near future – all of the proper elements for a great project exist in the group. All the same, One Night Standard is hugely talented and nonetheless a show worth seeing, so keep an eye out.
This Wednesday at The Republic, it’s an evening of comfort music with our old friends The Dream Machine along with the Legion of Doom. TDM has been busy lately, pimping their recently released debut album on ReverbNation. They’ve also been sharing some previously unreleased recordings, week by week, on facebook. Give ‘er a listen.
I had the pleasure of playing with Legion of Doom last Saturday at The Yerb!, which was a funking awesome time. Gabe Santamaria’s new project is essentially fail-proof. Aside from its five regular members, Legion of Doom has a rotating line up of some of Richmond’s best musicians.
(epic photobomb...)
I asked Gabe to sum up Legion of Doom for me, since it’s a rather amorphous project. “It’s affiliated with everything I’m part of, as well as Just Plain Sounds, The Brotherhood, Red Velvet Joints, and Splendid Suns," he said. "It’s more of an RVA collective than a band.” It’s extremely upbeat; they stay nice and goofy on stage, and the Legion is brimming with talent. As always and forever, I just can’t wait til Wednesday. 10pm at The Republic.
http://www.facebook.com/events/355773684518438
Words by Dan Mulrooney
Images by Tyler M. Conta