I didn’t actually think anyone was going to be at this show to see BOAT, since A) what kind of following do The Presidents of the United States have at this point and B) who comes to a show at 8pm? The answer to the first question was mostly a mix people in their late 30’s with their kids and dorky teenagers, all of whom are apparently pretty prompt (to answer the second question). Pretty good-sized crowd, and it was awfully fun to see BOAT on a big stage with lights and terrifyingly loud speakers.

I’m not sure how into them the crowd was, which is kind of odd, as they’re the same kind of goofy power pop, but I had a great time. I stuck around for about two minutes of Jared Mees and the Grown Children, but that was altogether too much mandolin and violin-driven rock.

I didn’t find out until shortly before the day of the show that The Gossip was the secret opening act (they were billed as “Pie Ghosts”), but managed to get some tickets online before they sold out. I hadn’t seen The Gossip since 2004 or so, and I kind of wanted to see them, despite not having listened to any of their albums since Movement. We showed up early and settled in in the balcony (which was a good choice, since the floor was getting mobbed). Asss were, despite their unbelievably terrible name, pretty good. Nice rhythm driven textural stuff. Good use of skronky sax and distorted and looped vocals.

The Gossip took the stage and started in on one of the worst sets I think I’ve ever heard. Apparently, since I saw them last, they’ve become a disco band. A disco band that likes to inexplicably insert covers of completely unrelated songs into the middle of their songs. I think, over the course of a roughly 40 minute set, we got five or six semi-covers, plus, of course, the inexplicable (but very faithful) closing cover of “What’s Love Got to Do With It.” Also, I should probably mention that Beth Ditto’s stage patter consisted mostly of how she had just peed on herself and how excited she was to see her absolute favorite punk band, The Yummy Fur. She went on and on about what a seminal punk act they were that I started to wonder if there was, in fact, another Yummy Fur than the one I knew about. I mean, I guess there’s a bit of a post-punk influence in there, but I would not really describe them as “punk.”

Anyway, The Gossip finally cleared off the stage, and it turned out The Yummy Fur were the band I knew. Really excellent set. They sounded great, especially for a band that hadn’t played together in years prior to this tour. The only real weirdness was the crowd. Obviously, the people that came for The Gossip was fairly different than the people that might otherwise come to see a semi-obscure British indie pop band from the 90’s. Different enough that it led to fistfights. Certainly made for a lively evening, but I probably would have enjoyed the show more without the guy who, I assume due to Ditto’s attempts to convince the crowd a punk act was about to come on, tried moshing through most of the songs (and yelled out “Play something I can mosh to” in between songs). Still, the crowd really wasn’t as obnoxious as they could have been, and, as I said, the band was great. I could have done with Beth Ditto’s time-killing interruption mid-set to talk some more about how much she liked the band. You’d think she’d be more interested in hearing them play some songs, but what do I know?

I’m not really sure how I feel about this show. On the one hand, I’m glad Mecca Normal is still doing the same sort of vaguely uncomfortable rock they’ve been doing for as long as I can remember. It’s fairly impressive that Jean Smith is still interested in spending her spare time getting up in front of a crowd and staring at them disconcertingly while reciting intensely personal lyrics. Admirable, but I’m not sure it entirely makes for a pleasant evening’s entertainment. The new material is very heavy on stories from her efforts at online dating, which would be fine if they were delivered in anything remotely resembling song structure. Mecca Normal’s never really been a pop band, but the songs at least used to have choruses and hooks and such. Now it’s basically David Lester playing a riff (and, I should point out here, he is still one of the most entertaining guitarists to watch – no one dances with his guitar the way he does) while Jean recites spoken word about her dating life. They wrapped with “I Walk Alone” and “Throw Silver” which were nice to hear again. And, really, I do enjoy watching Jean Smith leap off the stage and scream “I Walk Alone” at unsuspecting bar patrons in the adjoining room.

I’ve had a lot of bad luck lately with reunion shows, so I was a little hesitant to go check out whatever version of Ya Ho Wa 13 is currently performing. Not only has it been many years since the albums, but, without Father Yod, it seemed like it wouldn’t really be the same thing. Fortunately, they announced a free in-store performance at Jackpot, and we braved the snowy roads to go check them out. The current lineup is a trio, and produce a pretty good, full sound. They’re perhaps not quite as bizarre as they were back in the day, but they’re still a pretty good psychedelic rock group. They only played three or four songs, all improvised, one inspired by a word suggested by audience (“marshmallow”). Very enjoyable, but I didn’t really feel a need to go check out the expensive evening show.

I arrived a couple songs in Devon Williams’ set, but I’m pretty sure I got the gist of it. 18th Dye set up pretty quickly and proceeded to play an awesome set. I had always been a fairly casual fan of 18th Dye. They struck me as enjoyable, if unmemorable, melodic indie rock. I sort of lumped them in with Sportsguitar.

But I was pleasantly surprised to really enjoy their live performance. The drumming is superb. The dual guitars are impressively dense. Sebastian is perhaps not the most dynamic live performer, but Heike more than makes up for it by totally rocking out for pretty much every song. There wasn’t much of a crowd, but everyone there seemed very excited and managed to coax them back out for an encore. They seemed pretty pleased that someone called out a request for a song off their new album (“Soft the Hard Way”). I’m fairly sad I didn’t go seem them thirteen years ago, but hopefully I’ll get the chance to see them again sooner than that.

I feel bad saying bad things about bands, but I really don’t understand the thinking behind having Graves play this show. I’m not a big fan of dinner jazz, so they’re clearly not my thing, and I have no idea why someone thought they’d be a good band to open for BOAT and Aquaduct. Anyway, we spent most of their set outside, wandered off to get some drinks, etc., then went back in for BOAT. They played as a four-piece (with Ricky on guitar, sax, and keys), but this was probably the first time I’ve actually been able to hear the sax parts (most likely because I was standing about one foot from Ricky). It’s a nice touch, and I look forward to hearing the sax-enhanced tracks on the upcoming album. Didn’t stick around for Aquaduct, since it was late and I’m old.

We showed up just in time to catch the last half of the opening band’s final song. Sort of too bad, as they sounded pretty decent, but they’re local so I’ll presumably have future opportunities to see them. Anyway, a fairly fun BOAT show. They managed to get nearly the entire audience on-stage for “Lately I’ve Been on My Back,” which is perhaps the best song they’ve written to date. Again, not to second guess their business acumen, but seems odd to do a huge crowd-pleaser like that to close the set but not have it for sale. Perhaps they’re just laying the groundwork for the next album…

Since the other show we were attending was showing signs of starting pretty late, we ducked out to catch Katy Davidson playing in someone’s basement. When we got there Ash Reiter was playing. I have no idea how many songs we missed, but she went on for quite a while. Not bad. Very reminiscent of Jolie Holland. She seemed intent on playing endlessly though, which, given that we were under the impression the show was supposed to be over at 11 and she was still going strong at 10:50, made us a little grouchy.

Katy eventually chased her off-stage and began tuning, which turned into some guitar freestyling, which turned into her set. She did maybe four or five songs as a medley, mostly material I wasn’t familiar with. She was apparently operating on about two hours of sleep, so seemed a little out of it, but still a pretty good set. Playing solo seems to keep her from doing the really lengthy psych jams that have occupied much of the last two times I’ve seen her. I’m debating whether to go see her again on Friday.

I had some pretty serious concerns about Kelly’s since A) it’s downtown (so lots of suburbanites and little parking), B) the website brags about the quantity of motorcycles on the ceiling, and C) I had been warned it would be exceptionally smoky. Really, it wasn’t nearly as bad as expected. I found easy parking right around the corner. The motorcycles (and most of the smoke) were in the main room of the bar, and the room with the stage was pretty nice. Decent sound, reasonable layout. No real complaints, aside from the smoke.

We arrived immediately after the first band, which seemed like excellent timing as BOAT was scheduled to go on second, with Minmae headlining. There was a last-second change, and Minmae (which wasn’t actually the band, but just Sean Brooks) went on before them. I’m not particularly familiar with Minmae’s work, but his solo material was not compelling at all. One friend commented it was reminiscent of Willie Nelson, which I can kind of hear, but is also kind of insulting to Willie Nelson.

BOAT took the stage quickly and proceeded to rock put on the loudest show I’ve heard them play. My ears were ringing for a couple days afterwards. This was the same lineup as we saw a few months back, but much higher energy.

Honestly, I find it kind of hard to keep writing up BOAT performances without sounding like a drooling fanboy. Also, it’s hard to distinguish between different levels of awesome. Perhaps I’ll just include the video that Curt shot and leave it at that.

What a weird venue. The top floor is pretty much an enormous open stairwell, with some tables and a bar around it. The downstairs is more tables and bar, all vaguely chi-chi with art on the walls and a general yuppie vibe. And then there’s a door off the side of the lower level leading to a total dive bar space with a stage at one end. Very odd. Also heavily populated by people in black leather jackets.

Anyway, first band up was Fist Fite who were awesome. I’m always a sucker for bands who want to sound like The Screamers. Also bands who use telephones as microphones. The lead singer spent much of the set berating the rest of the band for being boring. And periodically making rude gestures at the crowd. And complaining about some show at Lewis and Clark College for which they didn’t get paid. Outstanding. They also appear to have a diminutive, 50-year old superfan wearing a suit.

Panther was horrible. I made it about halfway through the first song, then walked out. I’d been warned in advance, but, even still, this was bad.

The Mae Shi were kind of odd. I mean, they were very good and sounded very much like I remember them, but, personnel-wise, it’s almost entirely a different band. Only Jeff (the guitarist) remains from the band I saw a dozen or so times while living in Los Angeles, but, on the older songs, the vocals really didn’t sound that different, which was very disconcerting. Ezra’s delivery was pretty idiosyncratic, so having someone else mimic his cadences so well sort of made it feel like I was seeing a Mae Shi tribute band. The newer material was free of this problem, of course, so I was able to enjoy those songs without reservation.

I should also mention that the friend of the guy who shoved Eleanor at the Jens Lekman show (with whom words were exchanged) was also at this show. And once again, he was standing in the front row blocking the view of some shorter ladies. I don’t know what his problem is.

Oh, also, the handoff to the headliners was outstanding. As usual, The Mae Shi ended with “Repetition,” handing out instruments to various people in the audience. While they did this, the next band was able to set up and begin playing while The Mae Shi were still finishing. Very nicely done.

Finally, and this has nothing to do with the bands, the bartenders (at least in the dive bar portion of the venue) were surprisingly friendly and willing to tell me what they had on tap without sighing or sneering. I’m so used to hipster bar bartenders being openly hostile to patrons this was kind of jarring, but a welcome change.