Nostalgia is a silly thing. It feels so nice to look back at the past and remember the fun you had when you were younger. But at the end of the day, and you might feel emptiness in you. How did you used to enjoy something so much and have that fade away over time? Luckily as I’ve grown older, advice I’ve kept up the ability to enjoy similar music to that which I listened to when I was younger. Last week at T.T. the Bear’s with the lineup of Lovechild, here My Fictions, Mountain Man, Itto, and Moonraker, I felt a rushing wave of fulfillment of my musical journey over the last ten or so years.
Moonraker from southern Cali kicked the night straight to fifth gear with their Descendants-reminiscent punk. It was fast, melodic and had the small but growing crowd moving early on. At one point their guitarist broke a string, which usually leads to an awkward “can I borrow your guitar?” plea to the other bands on the bill. Instead, he decided to run outside to their van and grab his other guitar, returning much more quickly than I imagined. I pictured an awkward five-minute moment of stage banter to pass the time. Thankfully this wasn’t the case. The last bit of their set was the strongest with faster paced songs showing off serious skills from the drummer.
Next up was Itt? from Chicago. They took a long time to set up their equipment, and their set was just about the length of their setup time. Although these factors sound like they were working against their performance, Itt? played a powerful string of tracks showing off their screamo yet mathy sound. Shout out to the drummer for wearing a Limp Bizkit shirt (hopefully not ironically).
Mountain Man from Worcester was the most interesting act of the evening. Two drum sets were set up on stage, and I thought it was to speed up the set up between the next two bands. I was totally wrong. This band actually has two drummers. This sounds like a great opportunity to do some interesting drum work, create a call and return vibe, or for the drummers to work together, playing different patterns but forming one cohesive sound. I think the concept was there, but the drummers didn’t quite reach their full potential. Most of the time, the drummers were playing the same beats. It just sounded louder and not more interesting, taking away any of the presence of the bass, guitar, and vocals on stage. The vocals were lost completely in fact. I think with some more time and play, they could turn this two drum kit concept into something huge and take over the hardcore scene.
The bill was shook up a bit, and My Fictions played next. They played the tightest set yet of the evening, which is funny, because the singer said they hadn’t played together in a while. They must have an enormous creative bond between the four members. They were heavy but without any gimmicks, just a straight up great hardcore band. They let out a spoiler that The Hotelier was going to play at the end of the night, which was exciting even though it meant staying out way later than my grandmother-like bedtime. No one in the audience seemed surprised at that bit of information. The band has a new full-length out on local label Topshelf Records on July 1st, which you can pre-order now on their site.
Our dear Allston Pudding readers might remember Lovechild from our most recent mixtape, and after stumbling upon them via a Bandcamp black hole, I was anticipating the day I would finally see them live. Their performance lived up to my high standard of expectations (read: my expectations aren’t really that high, but this was totes legit). The band celebrated the recent graduations of two of their members from college, and the lead singer was wearing an almost business casual outfit. The juxtaposition of this against their fast, hardcore songs made me giggly. Hardcore bands are the best, because they can play a set of 10+ songs and still have it around 25 minutes.
They just released a “full-length” album of 11 songs that fits on a 7” – talk about bang for your buck.
They let another secret of the night slip: The Hotelier actually weren’t playing the show. No one in the crowd seemed too bummed out by this news. The audience was into whatever music was being performed in front of them. At times, I would watch the crowd of kids mostly under 21 years old enjoying the shit out of some live music. I feel jaded when I go to countless 21+ shows and forget how hard it is to access amazing live music in this city. It was fun to see the audience enjoy their night, even if it was still a school night for most of them.
The moral of the story is: don’t grow old even when you’re growing older. Does that make sense? Fuck nostalgia, because if you keep enjoying the fun things in your life, it doesn’t exist. You can’t be nostalgic for a feeling you never lost.
