Today’s piece comes from ninebullets.net staffer (i said staff): Marci Richter
Dari is a great bartender. A hot bartender. A great, hot bartender. So, when I saw a myspace bulletin from a friend saying that Dari’s band was going to be playing Czar, the club she bartends at, I knew I had to check it out. She had never mentioned being in a band before, so I figured this was a new project and had almost no expectations, aside from seeing a hot chick in a band, when I saw Someday Souvenir. Well, it turns out Dari is a hot chick, a great bartender, and…even with a cold…also has a mean set of pipes, Add to that the fact that the other band members playing that night, Chris on lead guitar and Stephanie on rhythm guitar, are also rather talented, and it’s an understatement to say I was pleasantly surprised and it wasn’t long before I found myself bobbing my head along with the rest of the fans, most of whom knew every word. The show they were in was all acoustic, and onstage Dari mentioned this was their first time playing a live acoustic set, but it sounded very natural for them. Their myspace page actually lists five band members total (a third guitarist and a drummer), so if they sound like this unplugged and down a couple members, I definitely need to see them all together and plugged in.
The second band that performed at the show was another local group, GreyMarket. Again, due to the format of the night, there was no drummer on stage, which in this case meant that it was Cave (lead vocals, guitar) performing, as Mike (drums and backing vocals) chilled in a red velvet chair in front of the stage. I’d already seen them perform one other time and knew that I really liked their music, but I was very impressed with how well their songs came across in the acoustic format and it was nice to be able to catch them in this intimate, stripped-down show. The two of them put out textured alt rock that definitely sounds more lush than you’d expect from two members. Because I had heard their demo and seen them live, I was curious how they would do the acoustic thing, but it was great. Cave has great vocal range and sang and played his guitar with earnest emotion that has the crowd fixated.
Headlining the show was Chris Otepka of The Heligoats/Troubled Hubble. Hailing from Illinois, The Heligoats is his solo project, while he is also an active member of Troubled Hubble. He came across to me as much a comedian as he did a musician, so when I read in Splendid that, “(d)uring a SXSW showcase two years ago, Otepka broke his ankle jumping off a balcony and passed-out mid-set.” I was not at all surprised. Alternately wincing and grinning, Chris moved out of the center stage spotlight maybe 1 or 2 songs into the set, to the right and into the blue light. He stood and played in that corner of the stage the whole set, wiping the sweat from his forehead and joking between songs. His vocals were complex and rambling, but with a clear destination, and it about wore me out just listening to them. The energy that was behind everything he did was infectious and it made me hope more people were paying attention than it seemed. As the place warmed up and the drinks (and all of us) got more drunk, I noticed people chatting amongst themselves more and less attention focused on the stage, which was a bit of a shame, because he was putting on a hell of a show up there. Keeping in mind that this was an acoustic set and likely not his normal live show, I checked out the stuff on his myspace and was amazed at how different it sounded. I heard more of a Modest Mouse/Dismemberment Plan influence and even more energy, the possibility of which scared me a little for what Troubled Hubble must be like at a normal live show.
All in all, I thought this was a damned cool idea for a show and I’d love to see Czar do another one some time.
