Guided By Voices

Opening Night, Tuesday, July 20, 1999
Picked up press pass, which is actually a playable CD worn around your neck. I don't know how playable it'll be after four days of rubbing up against the sweat and gold chains on my chest, though. I am too tired to see the opening night's bands. Instead, I go home and fall asleep watching a 1950s B-movie called Crash of the Moons rented solely on the cover's testimonial that it had "better than average special effects." Alas, I've witnessed better special effects during grade-school productions of A Christmas Carol.

Day Two, Wednesday, July 21, 1999
Bush (by far the biggest band to play this festival) is playing Irving Plaza tonight and I decide to see Public Enemy at Tramps instead. I've been a Public Enemy fan since being a pint-sized whigger. Growing up, I even walked around my Bronx neighborhood with a huge Flavor Flav clock around my neck (all right, it was my parents clock radio). Precious enthusiasm began to wane, however, after an hour-long show delay and then having to sit through an awful band called virus.kom, whose industrialized, Wonderbread rap and 25-minute rip off of Ministry's "Just One Fix" propelled me to new heights of inertia. No matter, though, when Public Enemy took the stage, all was forgiven.

They kicked the set off with "Welcome to the Terrordome" and it was a cornucopia of their "greatest misses" from there on out. "Can't Truss It," "Shut 'em Down," "Fight the Power" and a slew of others rocked from the speaker cabinets even without the benefit of Terminator X (who is apparently MIA camping in the Valley of the Jeep Beats).

Public Enemy frontman, Chuck D then gave a righteous speech on MP3 and how it'll be the Robin Hood of the future, redistributing wealth monopolized by the record industry and giving it back to the artists.

After closing with "Bring the Noise" and another encore, there was a quick set by the Public Enemy side group Confrontation Camp, fronted by Chuck and controversial Minister of Information, Professor "I Hate Jews" Griff. Whatever nutty things he has said in the past have long been forgotten since he was sent to an anti-Semite reeducation camp in the Borscht-belt. His new group (consisting of honkeys on bass, drums and guitars) forged a more believable hybrid of rock and rap than Kid Rock and Limp Bizkit could ever muster. After that we were treated to a sneak preview of Flavor Flav's forthcoming solo album, but I left after two songs, because it was late and Flavor wasn't wearing his big, oversized clock. Yo Flav, what time is it?!?!

Day Three, Thursday, July 22, 1999
I hear Bush is playing a second night at Irving Plaza and decide to skip it once again. I head to Tramps for a line-up of bands sponsored by Spin Magazine.

The Mooney Suzuki were first with a Yardbirds-style rave-up of kick-ass rock and roll. Dressed in black and hopped up on garage-music spiritualism, they played like James Brown fronting the Velvet Underground.

The Groovie Ghoulies had a cool monster theme going, with skulls and monster dolls all over the stage. They played some good solid punk. Although they fancied themselves as a hard-core version of The Munsters, the only standout moment in their show I can pinpoint was an above average cover of Billy Bragg's "A New England."

Delta 72 also tapped the evening's punk mainline, albeit with a Philadelphia-soul needle dripping with chittlins. The keyboard player's Jenga-like teetering stack of organs pumped out wackified Booker T and MG grooves as the singer/guitarist P whipped his guitar and delivered quite possibly the best response to the yelling of "Freebird" from the audience that I've ever heard. The heckler was flipped the bird and then told, "That bird is free, but the next one will cost ya."

The Donnas, despite being the headliners, provided the musical low point of the evening. I'll admit, I was suckered in by the pictures of them. Fuck Britney Spears (I would if she were 18), here was some hard-edged jail-bait music I could really sink my teeth into. Four hot Californian girls in tank tops and skin-tight jeans playing Ramones-style power punk. Well, that's exactly what I got, so I guess I have no one to blame but myself. They aped The Ramones to the point of monotony and played the same damn punk chords over and over again. They'll have repetitive stress disorder in the years to come. Carpel tunnel syndrome aside Donnas, if you're gonna play punk, you gotta inject some kinda originality into it and not just coast on the fact that you're a bunch of red-hot mommas. The only cool thing they pulled off was a warm-up of Queen's "Another One Bites the Dust" before their last encore, but it was unfortunately stopped before its disco breakdown.

Closing Night, Friday, July 23, 1999
Guided By Voices' frontman Robert Pollard is like that alcoholic uncle at family reunions who tells long, meandering stories with seemingly no point. Then he gives you a swig from his plastic cup of scotch, and drops the tale's punch line on your fragile melon, leaving you thinking, "Yeah, this guy knows what the fuck is up!"

Musically, Pollard is a rock-and-roll thoroughbred, sired by a thousand juke boxes and used record bins from which he draws his inspiration for GBV's songs. Borrowing, cutting and pasting from so many sources that the end result is wholly his own.

I arrived at the Bowery Ballroom just as the band was going on. They started off with "I Am a Tree" off 1997's Mag Earwhig!, "Tractor Rape Chain" from 1994's Bee Thousand, "Teenage FBI," "Things I Will Keep" and "Liquid Indian" off the new album Do the Collapse, and "Game of Pricks" from 1995's Alien Lanes. These song titles probably mean nothing to you, but compared to most other music from the last five years, they are musical gems in a sea of rock-and-roll cubic zirconias.

As usual, the band was gloriously, shambolicly and exuberantly drunk, yet were able to play a near perfect set. They swilled more beer and liquor on stage then The Replacements in their heyday and even passed around their private bottle of Jack Daniels to the audience, because they don't care about cooties, they care about their fans, damn it!

"Maggie Turns to Flies," "Shocker in Gloomtown," "Motor Away." Like I said, these songs probably mean naught to you, but visit yo fave CD-hawking Web site and give 'em a quick listen. Every song has 100% of the US RDA dosage of kung-fu, feng-shui, power-chord-driven mini-anthems. For those about to rock, GBV salute you!

August 1999