One punch when you see a Goth. One punch for a black leather triple-studded punk rock belt. One punch for a backwards baseball hat. Manic-Panic-ed hair? You got it. One punch. One punch when Amanda leans back as she plays guitar -- if they all lean back, three punches. If Amanda says, "AHSS," drink a whole beer. If El Dangeroso shows up, smoke a bowl.We were ready. Ben and I get there, and some lame local band (Carfax Abbey) is tuning up. We head upstairs, and the bartender totally ignores us. No service, even though we're sitting at the bar. The live music begins. Right from the bad Goth start, the drummer is shirtless (even though the drum machine is working overtime) and the singer, who looks like The Rock, is doing those Chinese fist-in-palm martial arts bows after EACH SONG. Ben is like, "Can you smell what the Goth is cooking!?" It smelled like suck. The bass player is all Korn-like and aggro, going "BOMP" as the drum machine is double-bassing and doing all the work, and it was just terrible. It felt like they played for an hour and a half. Finally we went downstairs to see it close up, and it was just SO BAD. The crowd was 4-to-1 guys to girls, and they were scary farmer-looking guys, not hot guys. But I bought a CD (which totally says PRODUCED BY PAT SMEAR in huge letters in the center) and said "hi" to Chimene and Marnie, the tour manager lady. Marnie told me that some unnamed person had put them up in a hotel. Vague, yes? And yet I didn't want to press. Chimene drew back and didn't talk to me. I was a little surprised. I mean, SOULCRACKER were nicer to me, and those guys are assholes. Maybe I should have formally asked for an interview, or, you know, kissed their asses, or mentioned Mighty Big TV, or that I'm a journalist. But my instincts said not to. They both seemed like they were very tired -- Marnie said they had five more shows before they had a day off. Dang. They had driven from Pittsburgh to play Philly that day, then had to drive to Boston the day after. Not fun! So, Ben and I split back to the upstairs bar, where the bartender decided to serve us. Aww. The beers were cold and necessary. Finally the first band stops, and we learn that ANOTHER BAND is playing before Harlow goes on. No. Please. No more. These guys really suck -- leather pants and a henley on the singer, and they were all sloppy and lame. Ben is groaning so loudly, Marnie can hear him by the t-shirts. And all this time, HARLOW is not hanging out. They were just not at the bar. But who was? A handful of lame, tired Goths -- maybe fifty people total. Not packed like we thought. Not packed like the FLICKERSTICK shows Sars and I saw. Finally, HARLOW takes the stage. Like, maybe thirty people go down to watch. They play all the hits ("Blue Lie," "Mike Hunt," "Serial Killer Hangover," you know them from the thirty-second snippets on the show). No one heckles, no one dances. Eventually Amanda starts asking the audience to buy her beers. I consider buying her one, but Ben says she should have brought one from the dressing room. And I bought a goddamn $15 CD, so I gave to the cause. The best musician is Chimene; she played her melodic bass lines super well and had a great voice. But I think Ben said it best when he called them "tepid." They all looked great! For those wondering if Harlow played in Halloween costumes, the answer is yeah. They dressed up as L7. No, not really. Why would four beautiful women dress in costume? Or they want to be taken seriously, or something. The outfits were as follows: Rebecca: Red pants, black sleeveless top. Pigtails for drumming. Rayshele: Black jeans, boots, long-sleeve top with a baggy t-shirt over it. No visible tattoos, because of the shirt. Has dyed roots dark to cover up the remaining green. Amanda: Sheer black shirt over -- what the fuck else -- an evening gown, black with spaghetti straps. Chimene: Strikingly tall, red streaks in the hair in full effect, wearing tall boots and a full skirt and a jacket, all in blacks and muted reds. Chimene was my favorite, very beautiful and the most musical, I think. Though they all are super pretty. Also, they had two very annoying roadie boys, one short and tattooed (shades of Danzig!), and the other tall and in a very bad black-and-yellow-checkerboard faux Versace shirt. As the band played, they both kept running to the middle of the room, then running back to the stage, to check the levels or something. Boys. Then it was over. Then I asked Marnie if she wanted to smoke a bowl with me, but she couldn't leave the merch. She mentioned that Harlow may come back to Philly in March, and I replied, "I'll be here!" But I meant that I'll be in PHILLY. I honestly can't say I can commit to a Harlow show again. They would have to play a better club, and with better bands. So we left. Very anticlimactic! No face time with the band! And I still have a shitload of beer! Oh, well. There could be a time.
1 2