The Dead Part of You

So last Tuesday Stacie, Rob and I went to the big Sadcore show over at Harper's Ferry in Allston. American Music Club played and some other bands opened.

The night started out strange when almost immediately after we sat down at Le's, Mark Eitzel walked in and sat down at the table-in-progress next to ours, which had Vudi and a bunch of girls. I had the Mi Xao while trying to avoid eye contact.

Everyone seemed to hate Barn Burning, like nails on chalkboard hate them, while I was able to just ignore their Counting Crowsism. Ad Frank & The Fast Easy Women were cute for like half the set - mostly it was like watching Hedwig and the Angry Inch, only without a tranny. It just seemed to go a little long for me.

So American Music Club. Hmm. Well, I've seen Mark Eitzel a bunch of times now, and his shows always have an ACOA vibe to them, and tonight was no exception. Before they started in he proclaimed his love for Boston, but admitted he always gets too drunk here, scowled and started looking like he would fall over. Would he yell at us? Smile? Is this happy Mark or angry Mark? How about poorly-lit Mark?

Much like his solo 2007 show, this turned out to be a quick by-the-numbers "I get paid anyway" run through. The first 40 minutes was spent on new material, then a few back catalog numbers and they barely played an hour. Two song encore.



What was good about the show? "Hello Amsterdam" and "Wish the World Away" - Mark had banned songs from AMC's final record "San Francisco" up until now. And they were amazing. I realized I actually have never seen Mark in a simple proper rock band set up before, and once I adjusted to the vocals being unusually low in the mix I thought it was great. The merch table was fierce. I had to stop myself. I picked up the "Atwater Afternoon" tour rehearsal disc and the long OOP "Come On Beautiful" tribute record. Apparently someone found a box of them in his basement and gave them to Mark. I stopped short of a shirt because I do not poop money these days, but they were WAY classier than the last batch of shirts, and I might have to order one.

The crowd was super small [I mean, like there couldn't have been more than 50 people, and really only 30 actively watching] and fucked up, and I don't mean drunk. Just a lot of creepy, creepy people - but I suppose I sort of fall into that category a bit myself. My favorite part was how some of them kept turning around, glaring at and SHUSHING the people talking at the bar. AMC could have cared less, they were still getting paid.

No, wait. The saddest part easily was when Vudi asked the bartender for a Guinness, and pleaded "I have money", and pulled a crumpled fiver out of his pocket. Then bartender actually took the money before bringing him the beer. Not one of us in the crowd was classy enough to buy it for him. Not a single one.

And the Upcoming Shows Muxtape has been updated.