It's snowing for the first time since my moving to Portland three months ago, and I couldn't be happier. The streets are covered in the pure stuff, and it is indeed a beautiful Sunday morning in the wilderness... or at least this quaint tea and crepe shop where I'm listening to Dead Meadow which coincidentally cued in my playlist just as I began this article. Apropos, as my ears are still ringing from last night's show with the band and their Portland buddies the Rebel Drones, a new all-star project made up of Matt Hollywood (the Brian Jonestown Massacre), Jason Anchodo (the Warlocks), and Peter Holmstrom (the Dandy Warhols). I've never before experienced such a long exposure to temporary tinnitus, but I'm hoping for the best, and--in the end--it was definitely worth it.
Yesterday was productive until the snow began and there were still people milling about on the street asking for change or requesting a few moments of my time to tell me about the environment, the state of our country's civil rights or the union auto bailout thingy. The former part of the day began with a great deal of writing work, followed by a bus trip to the East Side. After getting swept up into a sea of Santa Clauses drunkenly shambling out of the Union Jack Strip Club, I had a fine dinner--my first--at the famous Doug Fir Lounge, and finally made my way to the East End... right after a bit of Wild Turkey at My Father's Place, a lounge where the waitresses have apparently refused to serve anyone since Elliott Smith moved away and killed himself.
Clearly, it was an odd night already, and the actual show was yet to start. Now, we were told the bands would be on stage as of nine, but at the door of East End's downstairs in the kind of very cramped, divey, lounge-basement of sorts, a gentlemen informed me that the opening band would probably go on some time around 10ish, and that Dead Meadow would make it up there around midnight. I leaned over to a squirrelly looking fellow, a kind of fashionable street urchin on the loveseat under the stairs, and asked him for a cigarette. He decided to invite himself to my table--it was large enough--and immediately started telling me everything about himself and his incredible fascination with Dead Meadow... and the Rebel Drones... a band that I had known nothing about before meeting this kid. I was now so excited by the notion that not only would I get to see Dead Meadow live in such a small, intimate location, but that Matt Hollywood was going to be playing as well, that I let the kid continue chewing my ear off and hand me cigarette after cigarette.
The Rebel Drones are the kind of drugged-up druggie music that druggies need to hear. Plain and simple. Slow, droney, psychadelicate rock that smacks of atmospheric feedback noise and never quite stops until the end of the show. What is Matt Hollywood saying? Who cares? The music surrounds us, brings us in, keeps you swaying and shaking your head in different directions. The crowd shoves closer and closer still, Hollywood breaks a string and the rest of the music continues without missing a beat as a barfly hands Hollywood someone else's guitar from offstage. It's pure nudge-nudge, buckety-buckety, close-your-eyes and slide away music. And then it's over, Hollywood and the rest of the boys leave without a "hello" or "goodbye," though I do take an opportunity to lean over, tap him on the arm and thank him for the music. And Matt Hollywood said, 'Thanks!'" Yeah, right. But, a good story to tell.
Dead Meadow finally got up around 12:30 and their sound--with their incredible drummer who resembles the unholy union of Jim Henson and John Bonham, in both appearance and substance--makes one at last glad he is a young man adrift. And there's everyone behind you, along for the ride. We're still so close to the band that the kid's friends keeps knocking into the mic stand, and I have my choice between watching frontman/guitarist Jason Simon's closed eyes and fast-moving hands, bassist Steve Kille's greasy hair slung over his instrument in head-lowered ecstasy, or drummer Stephen McCarty himself pounding away before me.
I had lost myself totally, and had finally come to a real Portland show, a special event that I may not again experience... but, that's OK, because I certainly did it right. I wrote in my notebook at some point: "Found it. Wait... no, what did I find?" As true today as it was when it was written, and what a perfect encapsulation of what we're all going through together right now, isn't it? It is, and it was brought upon by a kind of music that, I'm sorry, but can only be described as "orgiastic." No doubt about it, and by the time they played their rollicking and droney "Sleepy Silver Door" toward the end of the set, they owned the scene completely, and we were indeed all in it together, as one body, mind, and soul.
It felt as though we were at a bonfire on the Cliffs of Whatever, and they were there as shamans to lead us through the evening... up until a little past 2am. There was no way they had energy for encores, and were all fatigued ourselves. It was over and done, Dead Meadow left without saying a word, and the night ended.
by Mathew Klickstein
[Photos: Laura Jennings]