Saturday night saw the return once again of Silver Abuse! I saw them last December when they did a reunion show and had a lot of fun, so when I found out they were doing another one I wasn’t about to miss it. This time around they were playing with three newer bands instead of sharing a bill of all old punk rock bands reuniting and sharing members.
Das Kapital
Das Kapital
Das Kapital
On the Silver Abuse myspace page it said the show was at 8pm so that’s when we got there. It turned out the show didn’t end up starting until nearly 11pm! After a very long wait, Das Kapital set up their gear and took the floor (there is no stage at this place). I recognized one of the members as being Marc Ruvolo from No Empathy. I really wasn’t much of a No Empathy fan but I ended up liking Das Kaptial way more. They played a punchy melodic punk rock that was pretty fun. Their half-hour set went by very quickly.
The Disabled
The Disabled
The Disabled
After a pretty short setup, The Disabled played next. They reminded me of a band on No Idea Records, melodic with raspy male vocals and occasional female vocals that kind of bridged the gap between punk rock and indie rock. They had some pretty good songs for the most part.
Conniption Fitts
Conniption Fitts
Conniption Fitts
Conniption Fitts were third. They played some distored low-fi sort of Stooges inspired punk. Raw and fast short songs. Their singer was running all over the place and seemed very aggressive, hurling himself into people in the crowd. The whole thing seemed rather forced and calculated to me and I’ve heard about 100 other bands play what sounded like the exact same songs. Their fans were also pretty annoying and rude too throwing beers and bumping into anyone in their vicinity. They also all seemed to have moustaches too.
Silver Abuse
Silver Abuse
Silver Abuse
After some time for setup, Silver Abuse took the stage. This time they had a different drummer with them than the last time. They started out with a new song, their first new song in 25 years! If Paul hadn’t announced this, I would have thought it was one from back in the old days as it sounded just like their other material, which is a good thing. From there they went through a pretty lenghty set consisting of nearly every song they had, including “Cuban Homo Farm”, “Ron Santo”, ‘Salt Peter Eater”, and their rendition of “Bomb Shelter” which got a pretty good response from the crowd. Their unique art-punk, oddball sound took me back in a time machine and made me feel like it was the early days of punk again and made me realilze that even today there are so few bands who sound like this or who are willing to be really out there and different. The clock read past two o’clock when Silver Abuse closed their set with “Kill the Commies” and I went home tired but fully satisfied.
Silver Abuse
Silver Abuse
Silver Abuse
Overall despite the delayed start time, it was a really enjoyable show and a fun night out. I hope to do it again sometime so hopefully this isn’t the last of the reunions.
Additional photos from this show will be posted tomorrow on MXV’s Flickr Stream.
Boy I can’t believe it started at 11pm. Was at another show in Bridgeport and thanks to the Sox game it took nearly 45 minutes to go that 5 miles. Since it was 11:15 by the time we hit Wicker Park, my buddies and I didn’t go because we thought it was over. Total bummer…
I was surprised you weren’t there as I thought for sure you wouldn’t miss it.