Memphis/Gonerfest Part Seven - The Gizmos headline Hi Tone with tons of cool stuff

I'm sorry to say that between Graceland and sound check, I missed the copious day shows. The Gizmos all met up for the first time at check (as members dribbled in due to traffic and airline troubles) and ran through as much of the set as we could considering that we didn't have enough equipment for all 7 members!

Ran out for a quick bite to eat and back in time to visit a little and see Obnox start the night in his unique way. He opened with three rap numbers done to backing tracks before picking up a guitar and adding a female drummer to make some punky blaring rock. He used some open tunings and had some droney sounds as well as some blues influences, making him one of the more different acts of the weekend. Lots of people love this cat - look for him to do plenty more!

We had met Natalie (guitar) and Madison (bass) of NOTS at various ventures throughout the weekend and they were incredibly sweet and soft-spoken and friendly. So, when they hit the stage with a monstrous sound, shrieking vocals and an overload of power, we were taken back a bit! "Not" what you would expect from such nice women! Abetted by Charlotte and Allie (keys and drums), they put out a post-punk/punk rock blast not unlike previous all femme bands like L7, but with their own touches, of course. The crowd went absolutely berserk for the ladies and the band were highly visual and volatile, as well. It was too much of a madhouse to get close enough for any good photos, so this is the best I could do!

Again, as old men, we needed some time to cool down and tune up before playing and we were graciously given a cool side room, used normally as a photo studio, with tons of great backdrops and props. Hence, the preponderance of photos with wacky backgrounds below! As we did this, we missed most of the other bands before us, other than popping our heads in once in a while - not enough to make a coherent review, though.

A fantastically enthusiastic crowd met us right from the start and sang along, jumped on stage, crowd-surfed and generally went pretty darn nutz throughout the set! Of course, I couldn't really take pix during our set, but had to get a shot of our drummer Kelsey (of Deezen) picking up a guitar for "Pumpin' to Playboy"! None other than Bim of Obnox sat in on drums and showed off his skills there, as well. Had to take a selfie of me with Craig Bell of the infamous Rocket From the Tombs, also! Members of Sick Thoughts and Gooch Palms joined us for "Human Garbage Disposal" and chaos generally reigned supreme! We were thrilled by the reception and happy that people still want to hear our version of sloppy, teenage punk rock (played by old men).

Back to the hotel for a few hours of sleep before we all met up at Goner Records to go our separate ways - Deezen folks (Craig, Kelsey, guitarist Sam and roadie/general cool cat Mike Rippey, along with Giz-manager Marvin Goldstein) with Ted, Kemne off to Boston on a bus, and Eddie & me & Melanie with a little free time so check out the record store, have a bite to eat and run off to the airport. Eddie got to stick around for the closing ceremonies, which looked to be quite entertaining, and it seems that we could have seen it, considering how late our flight was, but that's a whole 'nother story!

Thanks for the millionth time to Erir, Zac and all of the Goner folks and all of the volunteers who pitched in to help with the huge number of details and especially to whoever supplied us with all of the rockin' amps so that we could make some noise! This was a truly wild weekend that we will never forget!

There are some videos posted here, including the Wild Emotions, crazy closers the King Brothers and the Golden Pelicans and Ausmuteants. Hopefully, more will appear. I would love to see what the Gizmos really sounded like!