A live bootleg from one of my favorite San Diego bands, way back in 1999. They sound a lot more polished and also a lot more diverse now, but I'm very fond of the purity of the bleakness of the first couple albums; and, a couple of the shows I saw back then are among the best performances (whatever that means) I've ever seen, at least in my own mind. This recording could be one of them.
The background: San Diego's underground music scene, like any town's, is eternal and ever-changing. Nowadays I wouldn't know much about it, having been gone for 6+ years. But when I was a kid I assumed it was only just starting. (Never mind the legions of 1980s bands, which included a vast crowd of stylish 60s-garage-rock-revivalists, all of whom were getting old in the early 90s; never mind all the experimentalists of the 1970s, or before. I knew nothing about them then, and know very little now. As far as I knew it all started in 1990...)
I picked up a CD compilation of local bands when I was in high school, and tried to like it. Most of the sounds were a desert-meth blend of post-punk aggro and arty more-changes-are-better mathrockisms. Which I hated then and don't have much interest in now. But a few bands struck me as fascinating: a Syd Barrett-meets-thrash unit called Dark Globe, a mathy Wire derivative called
aMiniature, whose guitarist/singer was Korean-American (then rare in the indie-rock community) and whose lyrics and guitar playing were compressed, inventive, and odd; the thoroughly wierd duo
Bug Guts; the harmonizing pop-prog-punk
Heavy Vegetable, which later morphed into
Thingy; and, most relevant to this post,
Three Mile Pilot, who had no guitarist, only a gifted chord-arpeggiating bassist and a solidly smart drummer, and a singer given to thin wails as he worked through cryptic and mournful songs. When I started going to shows, I sought them out; I bought their second record, covered in hand-sewn burlap bag, the day it was available. Eventually the singer, Pall, picked up guitar, but it was always a markedly non-grunge band, focused on mood and space. I saw them in cafes, bars, giant festivals, and opening for
Crash Worship, who can't be adequately explained in this post. I was a fan.
Eventually (San Diego was a small town, culturally) I got to know Pall, since I worked with his girlfriend at the hipsterest of SD's coffeehouses. My band shared a practice space in an empty warehouse with Three Mile Pilot and a rotating cast of other bands. I talked to him a few times and the fandom was tempered by actually knowing a human being. He's a nice guy, and not just in the 'he wasn't rude' sense. Actually very sweet. Now he runs a recording studio, and seems like he'd be good at the sort of patience that requires. Mellowness, though certainly not in a stereotypical San Diego way.
Three Mile Pilot eventually became sort of inert, after a brief time on a major label subsidiary, and then a post-industry-crash slump (though I see they've now reunioned!), and the rhythm section joined Rob Crow from Thingy to become
Pinback; Pall joined forces with a pianist and began making comically overstatedly dark broken-hearted love dirges, as
the Black Heart Procession. The lineup was usually drums, piano, musical saw, some trumpet and/or organ and/or subtle synth. The songs were invariably about broken hearts, usually with the word 'heart' prominently placed; the band wore battery-powered glowing hearts onstage. The mood was beyond sombre. The music was gorgeous. Any irony stayed in the concept-- the sounds themselves were pure sorrow.
At one of my favorite shows, at San Diego's primary underground-music venue
The Casbah (a hole in a wall under the flight path, and a noble experiment that's kept music alive in SD for decades), Pall defused a couple of guys who were generating drunk assholery in the front of the crowd by quietly, mid-song, off-mike, speaking directly to the jerks causing the disruption; they immediately left, looking embarrassed. The song continued as if nothing had happened. Neat trick.
A couple years ago I went to see
the Castanets, a partially San Diego-derived unit, open for the Black Heart Procession, who now can fill the Bowery Ballroom. Beforehand I saw Pall out front and chatted with him. It was genuinely nice to see him, as someone I'd known long ago and missed running into; at the same time I was awkward, a little bit; I was a fan. I told him how much the old shows at the Casbah meant to me. Feeling like a fool, I handed him a
Rad Unicorn CD, hoping he wouldn't think I was just talking him up to get him to make us famous. (As if that were even possible). He was gracious of course and seemed pretty relaxed.
The show was great; but, midway through, someone yelled out from the balcony, "I saw you at the Casbah in 1998". I was mortified: it was too close to what I'd said before, only someone was hollering it from the balcony. Pall seemed sort of nonplussed. "Great", he said.
I assume he now thinks I'm the kind of dick who tries to impress people by hollering at him from the balcony.
Anyhow, enough rambling. The band almost certainly has better albums than this (I'd recommend starting with the newest, which I haven't yet heard but imagine is wonderful); but this one, live from UCSD's Che Cafe in 1999, is close to my heart. Sound quality's pretty good.
