Run-DMSteve

Baby Boomers Social Club Dance
Red Lion Convention Center
7 December 2012
Portland, Oregon

The mosh pit formed early on that rainy Friday night thanks to one of the best cover bands I’ve heard in years, Crash Sunday. This all-male quintet (average age around 40) knew what we wanted to hear. Their three guitarists (one also played keyboards) were stellar, more than compensating for the singer, who was charming but adequate, and the drummer, who was muscular but monotonous. Special D and I entered the hall just as they broke into Billy Idol’s “White Wedding,” which was a gas. While dancing to this one I realized that I no longer remembered the original lyrics – I could only recall the words to the literal “White Wedding,” where the Billy Idol impersonator sings what’s happening in the video. “Time to bleach my/hair agaaiiiiin!!”

Unlike our last outing with the Baby Boomer Social Club, I didn’t take notes. I just stood back and let it all be. That is, I kept dancing. I will say that Crash Sunday chose their lineup well and that they had not just practiced their material, they had found ways to fool with it. For example, the keyboard player treated us to some Gary Numan-style atmospherics in the middle of a song by The Cars. Yes, The Cars and Gary Numan were contemporaries, but The Cars played pop music for people who like just about anything while Gary Numan played music for people made out of circuit boards.

Crash Sunday never let the room’s energy flag by venturing into the doldrums of Norah Jones or The Carpenters or the swamplands of “House of the Rising Sun.” They never installed safety bars on their songs or commended us for still being able to walk unaided at our age. They assumed from the opening note of the opening song that we were there to rock. And we were.

As we say here in the Rose City, the Baby Boomers Social Club is Portland as Fuck.

Random Pick of the Week
Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears
Tell ’em What Your Name Is! (2009)
Scandalous (2011)
Imagine if The Rolling Stones had matured into the Sticky Fingers / Goat’s Head Soup era with more blues and without a psychedelic pit stop. Add some social commentary and you’re somewhere close to Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears. Standout songs for me are “Master Sold My Baby” from the first album and “Messin’ ” from the second.

Random Pan of the Week
Life Is People (2012)
Time of the Last Persecution (1971)
Bill Fay
Bill Fay is an English singer and songwriter who takes a dim view of humanity, nature, and pretty much everything in the universe no matter how far it expands. He makes the Existentialists look like an insane clown posse. After decades of seclusion he has returned with another album about life and why it’s not worth living. But I’ll give him this: He has impressive hair for a man his age.

Random Run-DMSteve of the Week
You may recall from my sign-off last summer that I’m trying to write a novel. Although in the past six months I’ve had to cope with a number of setbacks (what those of you in the psychotherapy game call “life challenges”), I’m definitely making progress. If I can continue to do so, I’m going to try to post every Sunday. I miss this blog.