DOA and various - by Nick the BookMan, May 28, 2014
Well, howdy and blessings sahibs and memsahibs.There's a lot to get done, so here's a foretaste starter. Jim and Tamara are hosting a
classical Indian music night at Open Space this coming Saturday night (31/5). Tablas and sitars I believe followed (I hope) by a variety of DJ's to take us all on a magical mystery musical melee/melange of tunes to the dawn of Sunday time. No football until the WC2014 starts early June, so no real distractions to prevent you from coming along and enjoying yourselves, Tamara has asked me if I'd like to play some "Psychedelic Stuff". Sounds like a good plan. Here's hoping... Anyway, there should be more details up on this Lamma site by now.
Speaking of 'delic delerium. I enjoyed the
MAD Paint Party at 7venth Avenue last Saturday. Specifically, watching
Bottom Dwellers live and kicking. I caught a hybrid version playing the Power Station Beach for
Jessie's birthday party in early April. Part Bottom Dwellers and a smattering of Defiant Scum. Good sound and lights by Parksy. A decent bar and some Mad Hatter costumes. And a mystery UFO with red/green lights, hovering about 100 metres above the festivities. Probably a small drone cam operated by someone in Hung Shing Yeh.
Anyway there seemed to me to be a happy undercurrent lysergic buzz about the gig. The band were joyously ramshackle, yet loosely jamming. Tight like the early Warlocks used to be. They provided the soundtrack for the early Trips Festivals in western USA in late 1965/early 1966. Back when acid (LSD) was still legal. Thanks, Ken Kesey (rip), the rest of the Merry pranksters; Dr.Gonzo, aka T. H. Stockton (also rip, Suicide 20/2/2005); Stewart Brand, Tim Leary and his fellow East Coast fuddy duddies; Augustus Stanley Owsley III, aka "Bear", maker of the finest quality LSD known to man since Albert Hoffmann took his immortal bike ride through Basle in 1943. Acid and the atom bomb came älive" before the end of WW2. Meanwhile, Owsley "adopted" The Warlocks, built most of their equipment, supplied their internal inspiration and changed their name to The Grateful Dead. The First Summer of Love was coming.
Sorry, the coffee seems to be working overtime. Right, the band. In no particular order and combining both gigs they are. Richie on bass. Pete, acoustic guitar. Ben, the mighty (tiny) CHAOS machine. David on ukulele. Juan on decks. Aaron on keyboards and fellow jammees, Rose on flute and Rosemary on pi'pa. There are about 3-4 songs going on at any one time. At one point there's a fine mashup of meandering vocals for "Walk On The Wild Side" meets "Forever Young" jamming with "No Woman, No Cry" and tears are shed as you realise "You Can't Always Get What You Want". Plus a ramble through local favourite "Kowloon, Hong Kong". The The The "trips"magic comes from Ben manipulating the sound through the CHAOS machine. Vocals rise and fall. Soundbites are scattered and strewn throughout the set. Noises echo and swirl and distort and still the beat goes on.
The equipment is far better now. An entire studio can be more or less contained in a laptop, hell, even an IPOD. Techknowledgy rules. Still, there were some cool forerunners of Bottom Dwellers on Lamma in the early nineties. Does anyone else remember(?) attending a fancy dress party at Deep Water Bay Yacht Club. It was a trek and a trip to get there, but the results were day-glow brilliant. The music menu was composed and orchestrated and generally fucked up by random members of what became the groups, Ado (not Lamma based), Mothership and the dearly missed Adaptors. Kumi and her drums and a nascent Sisters of Sharon also high in the mix. I had some way cool buddies from the good ole USA staying with me and they were very friendly with the lysergo-chemists who kept the Grateful Dead train rolling and wobbling along its celestial orbit. Their largesse was generous indeed. And no one got hurt.
Other highlights of that time include some of the legendary teepee parties en route to Pak Kok. And a voodoo-riffic, swamp-a-delic purple haze inspired Halloween night at the Beach Hut in Lan Kwai Fong. Mad crowds though. Dangerous barricades, hemming people in. Weird hysteria and a rising panic as people strove to see other people dressed up in Halloween costumes. Lots of shoving and pushing. It led to the 1991 New Year's Day tragedy in Lan Kwai Fong where a dozen or so people died. I wasn't there. I'd already figured that Halloween night was a black shadow forecast of an upcoming tragedy. I was shocked, but not surprised it came exactly two months later.
Meanwhile, it's the end of April 2014 and
Defiant Scum are opening for Canadian band DOA. Brought to you by the ever entertaining Songs For Children. Thanks, Mike and Jane. Another classy night. It's DOA's debut and swansong in HK. They're playing here and Beijing, Shanghai and Wuhan before returning to Canada and calling it a day. They've spent a couple of days relaxing on Lamma before their show at Backstage on 30/4/2014. Incidentally, they're the second hardcore/punk band to stay on Lamma. Fugazi were first. Brought here for a gig (which I missed. My fault. Circumstances occurred. I couldn't make the show) by Shazza Music, if memory serves.
Anyway, the band are Joe (founder member) on guitar and vox. Paddy, the newest member on drums and vox. Dirty Dan on seismic bass. And Abe, their friendly and capable fixer-upper and travel companion. Probably chief roadie too.
Their set varies. There's some ferocious 0ld Skool Stooges style riffs. Some thrilldrillspeed guitar. Barked vocals. Paddy bashes almost all of his drums to buggery and even sings "The Message" by Grandmaster Flash at one point, while Joe fixes his guitar. It's a shortish set, punctuated by much swearing as is vogue. DOA are delighted to be here. Everyone is thanked multiple times. The mosh pit is heaving. Exuberant, but not aggressive. Big belly slams to Richie, Moy, Luke (who thinks he may have broken his toe) and Canadian Dave. Big hug and kiss to Vlatka who always makes the good gigs and the gigs good.
Ooops, in keeping with the chronologically scrambled framework of this story, I now introduce you to
Defiant Scum. They played a set that sounded like Doppler waves to me. Standing on a train platform, you'll hear the train coming along. Sort of a neee-yoo-hoop sound. Well, that's what Julian the drummer sounded like to me. Relentless and fast. Bang, bang, bang. Next song, song, song. Mozz is spitting out the vocals. More angry rant than sweet falsetto sugarvox. Pierre is the heart of the sound system. Great riffs anchoring the tunes and breaking free in flurrys of scuzzy note and bits of drony feedback. Or maybe that was just me. And a special tip to Pierre, the stand in bassist for the night. Slotted in perfectly. Most of the set was original, but there were also two covers. "I Don't Care" by Antitdote and "Someone's Gonna Die" by The Blitz. Punky thrash Nirvana is achieved.
One last note to finish. Commiserations to DOA on the recent death of your former guitarist Dave Gregg (1960-2014) I saw the item in Uncut"s June issue. Twice. A remembrance by Bob Mould (ex-Husker Du and Sugar) and the obit at the back. Uncut says Dave's "drillhammer riffs provided DOA with much of their fearsome reputation. He was a kinetic presence in the Vancouver hardcore band during the 80s. Especially the Hardcore 81 tour which is regarded as a template for this stuff". Thanks Uncut and RIP Dave. This is the end for now so happy trails until we meet again. ntbin