- Show Reviews
- ALL
w/ ARMSTRONG / SOMEDAY I / WRETCH LIKE ME
July 19, 2002
The Mercury - Austin, TX
So I get off work in San Antonio at 7 and the doors supposedly open at the Mercury in Austin at 8. I race up there, get there at about 8:15 or so. The club doors are locked....what the hell. Turns out the show dosent start till 9:30 or something, ok. They proceed to rape me at the door with a surcharge for being under 21, it ends up costing $15. There goes my t-shirt, so all I get is some stickers. Anyway, the first band was called Wretch Like Me. They put on a very solid set, very rock and roll. The singer was posing out and stuff, he was a real showman. He did some backflips onstage, so that was pretty cool. At one point he's like "Is everyone having a great time?? Well tell your face!!" I thought this was pretty funny because upon looking around, there were maybe 10 people in the place. And it wasn't a very small place either, making it worse. I stood up in front because I felt bad for them. But they were pretty cool. The second band was called Someday I, and by this point I was sitting on the side (I had been up since 5:30 in the morning). They seemed alright. I realized that the crowd was mostly the other members of the bands. Maybe I'm at the wrong show? No, Stephen Egerton was the sound man for all the bands, except for ALL of course. He kept running from the soundboard to the crowd to make sure it sounded ok. I must say, he did an excellent job, the sound was great. He's a real worker though. The third band was called Armstrong and they were pretty rocking. The singer was really funny too. He was saying how it was really scary that this guy was across the street sitting on a stoop with Gene Simmons makeup and red fishnet stockings, banging on a plastic drum. He was right too, I walked on the other side of the street from that weirdo. There's a lot of dykes in Austin too, the kind that harass you to read their propaganda. Oh, and dirty, smelly hippies. Anyway, back to the show. I really respected the other bands because although there werent many people there, they werent pulling rock star attitudes or anything, and before and after they played they were right there in the crowd with everyone else. So at this point there's about 50 people in the place, and sure enough ALL takes the stage. There really wasnt any slamming, there werent enough people....there were a number of old people too. Oh yeah, I met these 4 kids from Japan before the show...they barely spoke english. All one of them could say was "All". At this point we share a bond. Yes. Anyway, one of them weighed about 300 pounds and he tried to start a pit. He knocked pretty much everyone down. It was great. ALL played, see the setlist below to find out what. They played a number of old songs, and unfortunatley I didnt know many words to these songs. But I'm sure as hell working on it now. They also played 4 Descendents songs, which was excellent too. After their set Bill Stevenson took to the mic and talked about the other bands. It's pretty funny how soft-spoken he is, for being a real big guy. They came back out for an encore where they played whatever people in the crowd wanted, including a real obscure instrumental that they said hadn't been practiced in awhile, but they pulled it off. There's a member of their road crew that looks like a cross between Milo Aukerman and Rick Moranis, circa Honey I Shrunk the Kids. Real geeky looking guy. The last song they played, Bill Stevensong told him to take the mic. It was some hardcore song, I think it was a cover. This guy ripped off his shirt and was running all over the (very small) stage screaming. Then he jumped into the crowd and started rolling around on the floor screaming. It was very very punk rock. I think he freaked everyone out though because everybody took a step back. It kind of reminded me of that movie where that dork gets onstage and sings "Paradise City". Then everyone thinks he's cool or something. Anyway, a great show all around. ALL was amazing, moreso than I could have imagined. Go see them when they come to your town. NO! ALL!
SETLIST:
cause
teresa
breakin' up
carnage
weinerschnitzel
world's on heroin
cyclops
suburban home
paper tiger
copping z
nobody's
original me
educated idiot
life on the road
i want out
frog
i wanna be a bear
lock 'em away
crazy
instrumental
she's my ex
hope
(some hardcore song with the road crew singing)
w/ ARMSTRONG / SOMEDAY I / WRETCH LIKE ME
August 16, 2002
The Ottobar - Baltimore, MD
Acheiving ALL in Baltimore seems to be alot easier than in Texas and DC from what I've heard. I heard that those 2 shows had a very small turnout, so I figured it would be the same way when they played here. I got there around 8:30, doors were at 8:00, and there was like... 4 people there. I overheard the door guy say that the first band wouldnt go on until 9:15, and that ALL wasn't going on until midnight... what the fuck? And to top it off, I went to the show alone, so I was very bored. Anyways, the show didnt even get started til around 9:30 and by that time the place had actually filled up quite nicely. Armstrong went on first to a very drab audience, the singer seemed to think it was because Baltimore is an "emo town" and went on to make fun of emo for the rest of their set, very funny. He also said at one show a girl slipped him a folded up piece of paper that said, "when are you going to play clean sheets?" hahaha. As for their music..... I can't remember. But the next band, Wretch Like Me, they took awhile setting up, b/c the singer had to rig up this CB radio microphone from the rafters, I didn't understand at first b/c he was using a real mic too. But as soon as they started playing, the singer exploded all over the stage, it was awesome. He was doing backflips on the small little stage, and letting the mic stand fall into the audience, almost hitting this girl in the head, right before he yanked on the cord to pull it back. They sounded kinda rock-a-billy/straight rock music, but the best part was the singer by far. On a side note, all the bands used the same drumset, just changing cymbals and snares, which seemed to be a pretty cool idea. The drumset itself looked like it was made out of metal too, and it was secured on a big piece of wood, with notches drilled in to hold the stands in place... pretty industrial, im sure Bill Stevenson had something to do with that, haha. Someday I came on and they rocked... well at least thats what everyone else thought. They were trying to pull off some kind of "we play a whole different type of music (that isnt that exciting) and that makes us cool," but it didn't really grab me. So then began the infamous 30 minute soundcheck that the Descendents/ALL are known for, but that's what you get from 2 sound engineers that been in the music biz for 20 years. But as soon as they hit the first chord, it was like "ahh... sounds just like the ALL sound I know." Stephen was doing sound for the all the other bands, but when he was on stage the dude from Someday I was at the helm. At one point, he turned Stephen's guitar up like 2x louder, and then completely off, while Stephen was giving him the most confused looks. Which was the same expression I had when Chad Price came out. GOOD LORD, who let the fucking hippie on stage?!?! At one point Karl said, "Hey Chad, I'll give you $200 to cut yoru fucking hair... oh what the hell, it's no use..." hahaaha. They gave a great set, even though I didn't know many of the songs they did. But it was cool when they did some Descendents songs; let me take this time to clarify something.
A lot of people just think of ALL and The Descendents as the same band, even the guy at Reptilian records when I was buying Descendents - Liveage! and he was like, "Are you gonna go see them tonight?" I was like no.... I'm seeing ALL tonight. My point being, that they are two different bands. And yes I do believe that the singer makes all the difference in this case. I mean, Descendents are all about being silly, and writing songs about girls and coffee, where as ALL is much more serious.
Ok, anyways. When they came back on for the encore, Bill got up and said a few things about the tour and the label and basic chatting with the audience. Then someone yells something like, "Hey, shut up and play!" and then all of a sudden the happy go lucky Bill Steveson gets all kinds of pissed up and shouts out, "SHUT THE FUCK UP, I will come over there and kill you! I've been behind the drums for 23 years and I come up here to talk for 45 secs, and you tell me to shut up?!?!" Oh man, that was great yet so shocking at the same time. Then they all switched up on instruments, chad-bass, bill-guitar, karl-vocals, and stephen-drums, and they did a few more tunes. They busted out Coolidge, which was fucking great, some other song i didnt know, and then they closed it with Billy Idol's Rebel Yell, which was awesome. Half way through the song, Karl starts disrobing himself, and by the end of the tune has half of his ass facing the crowd. ALL in ALL, it was a great show.
Photos from show - taken by Rob Perry
Wretch Like Me 1
ALL 1|
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All pictures photographed by:
Rob Perry � 2002
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