Fuzz Solow/The Black Jetts/Bob Log III - The Dive Bar 7-31-13

I had to work extraordinarily late this night so I was bummed to have missed the fantastic Fuzz Solow, and got to the Dive Bar in time to catch the last few songs of the hard'n'heavy Black Jetts. Loud as hell but with a surprisingly good balance - you could make out Beth's keyboard parts around the twin stun guitars of Gabe and Roy and the throbbing rhythm section of Davis's bass and Larry's drums - and vocal sound (John Kirby does a heckuva job), these cats and kitten blasted through a few numbers and closed with Roy posturing and rockin' out with his hand-held theremin! Great band, great show!

I had never seen or heard Bob Log III before, though I have heard about him for ages and was glad to finally have a chance to see him. This one-man-band plays an old acoustic-electric guitar through a small Voxx amp while wearing a skin-tight glitter jumpsuit with a motorcycle helmet that has an old-fashioned phone headset (with cord!) attached to the face-plate as a microphone! A wild look, to be sure! He plays bass drum with his right foot, has a pedal for a cymbal on his left foot and utilizes two drum machines for extra rhythms and noises! His guitar style is basically a frantic, claw hammer picking, often used in conjunction with a slide - a mangled Delta blues mixed with punk rock.

Throughout the show he rants'n'raves at the audience, takes trips through the crowd and outside the club, has young women sit on each knee as he plays guitar and drums and flails away at a wacky electric banjo. The crowd was with him right from the start and were still right there when I had to leave at about 2:00am!  One helluva performer and it is pretty amazing what he can do with such a stripped down set-up. Go see him if ya can - as well as the Jetts & Fuzz!