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Smooth sailing on a rickshaw: Foreign Born and Fresh and Onlys
By nick g | February 25, 2010
Foreign Born 2/24/10 Rickshaw Stop, Sf. Photo by nick g.
Last night brought a twinge of nostalgia. Foreign Born played with The Fresh and Onlys at Rickshaw Stop in SF last night as part of the Noisepop festival. I swear there was a touch of Dick Dale and Nelson Mandela in the air.
Fresh and Onlys was not a blip on my radar screen, but they were surprisingly good. And I didn’t even have any beer at this point. Their sound is some straight-ahead rock, but with lots of spring reverb on the lead guitar and a bass that knows when to carry a melody. I love that. It’s very SDRE. And the guitar actually said something. It was possesed by an angry, unintelligible spirit.
Their music is a little surfy at times, with that fast 8th note note ride cymbal and double tap snare beat coupled with the whammy bar and reverb combo on lead guitar. It was good to have a rhythm there backing it up, because it was a little too spacey at times. I was always looking forward to what was coming up next, though. It kept me on my toes.
Fresh and Onlys, 2/24/10, Rickshaw Stop, Sf. Photo by nick g.
Since I have no frame of reference, I can’t say if they played “all their good songs” or if this was a “really good show for them.” But I do know I enjoyed the music and bought a 7″, which I thoroughly enjoyed this morning.
Foreign Born was headlining, as they should be with a 7-piece band. You gotta pay all those people, you know. Maybe not the keyboard player, though, who was holding down one or two notes most of the time on a little axiom midi controller. He should get less, maybe. Just background noise, honestly. The conga player did a lot more.
They played well. It could have spiraled out of control into jamband madness, but didn’t. Everyone knew their parts and stuck to them, but still added little flourishes. Very professional, and enjoyable. The dancing carried over from the Fresh and Onlys’ set, so the crowd was moving.
The Rickshaw Stop is a great place to see a show. The room is a wonderful acoustic environment and the engineer knows what he’s doing. The bar isn’t ridiculously expensive (on a Wednesday, anyway), and it’s got a lot of kitsch that keeps the non-music lovers interested. Though I was not able to get a rickshaw ride. Maybe something to hope for next time.
Topics: BAY AREA, Events, Reviews |
March 6th, 2010 at 11:47 am
lucky-recently got really into them.
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