Squares - Davis and Central

Tuesday night I headed into the Boston area to have dinner and then see Chapterhouse perform at The Middle East. I met Erik around 6 pm at Redbones, and we caught up over a kick-ass dinner and a couple of beers. I had hushpuppies and catfish fingers (they were out of fried oysters - damn!), and then a small rack of St. Louis style ribs, accompanied by two bottles of one of my favorite beers, Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA. We took our time, and then hopped the T to Central Square.

We wandered over to The Middle East, but when we got there, we found out that the first act didn't even go on 'til 9, so we headed out into the rainy night to hit a few bars. First stop: The Asgard. When we got inside this rustic Irish bar, Erik headed to the can, and I ordered for us both. Erik wanted something with pumpkin, so the waiter recommended one (I forget which), and I wanted to try a new IPA, so I had a Peak Organic from Portland, ME. It kicked ASS. Best beer I had all night, hands down. Then it was off to the Cantab Lounge. There was a decent folk band (Carter Creek Revival) playing onstage while we had our beers (I had a Long Trail IPA - worst beer of the night, though usually pretty good), and Erik even filmed one of their songs on his cell phone (in between frequent checks for news of Randy Moss' impending trade to the Vikings). We finally left around 9:15 for the club, and the three bands we'd paid to see.

When we arrived, the first band, 28 Degrees Taurus (a fantastic local Boston band), was already into their set. The lead singer Karina had on a white tank top with a huge kitty face plastered across her breasts (which she pointed out to us), and it mesmerized us as she played her bass, belted out her lyrics, and tinked her chimes on the final song. What a great band! Jinsen killed it on guitar, and the drummer went nuts. They were full of energy, and the songs were a motivating mix of thoughtful shoegaze and power thrash. Karina spent the rest of the night buzzing around & through the crowd in an alcohol haze. Erik even chatted her up a bit! Next up was Ulrich Schnauss, who fed us a non-stop 40-minute mixture of pulsing ambient and psychedelic dance music that I couldn't sit still for, but which much of the young, "hipster doofus" wannabes ignored (their loss!). I even spent a few minutes with my eyes closed, just enjoying the "alone in a crowd" sensation. Check his music out, it's amazing.

Finally, it was Chapterhouse's turn! I played these guys' music to death back in college, and had most of their EPs and full-length albums in heavy rotation off & on for many years after. To this day I have the "Mesmerise" EP on my iPod. Long story short: I never got to see them play live back in the early 90's, but tonight I did, and it was SO worth the wait. The entire set was loud and pulsing (though the sound was off a bit at times), and you'd have needed a sandblaster to get the grin off my face when they played "Then We'll Rise" and "Precious One" back to back. Seriously. I was in heaven. They even came out for a two-song encore, which was icing on the cake. What a show. It's definitely in the top ten for this decade, at the very least.