Three Imaginary Girls - The Blood Brothers

Capitol Hill Block Party 2007: My Unofficial Review of the Blood Brothers

elle — Sat, 28 Jul 2007 17:55:10 +0000

27 Jul 2007

Although I was not assigned to review the Blood Brothers, I feel I should say something since I was right smack in the middle of the front crowd:

There is currently someone's sole imprint in my ankle, and there is an accompanying cut on the top of my foot. I must say, out of the four shows I've seen of the Blood Brothers in the past two years, this is one of the most energetic...for the crowd. I don't have a very good track record at mosh pits, so I was perilously dancing on a fine line at this show, right on the edge of the thrashing. I feared for the crowd surfers, as it was just the concrete street below the strangers they trusted to hold them up. When the kids started to run around and swing their arms I knew it was time to hide behind my 6'3'' boyfriend. For him, he felt awkward as the seemingly oldest in the dancing crowd [he is 23.] People were going crazy; shoes were being thrown, water was being splashed in the air, girls in bikinis were risking the mosh pit. A kid stood next to me with sweat with pouring off of him, so mercifully I gave him the rest of my water. I immediately sort of regretted that, since dancing like a fool in the hot sun made me sweaty too.

But... while the crowd was going crazy, the band was not. Johnny was still flittering around in his signature way, but Jordan was markedly reserved. Staying near the back of the stage during most of the set, he rarely went near the edge to pump up the crowd as usual. Musically, my friend put it perfectly: "They are playing the music...but they're not really into it." It was sort of apparent they're bored and burnt out. There was absolutely no banter between the band and crowd. The songs were played at noticeably slower tempos. And on a few songs, like "Love Rhymes..." the singing just sort of...died off before it was supposed to.

Perhaps it was just the hot weather, but it seemed the Blood Brothers were very tired and worn out with their music.

>> Read all Capitol Hill Block Party 2007 reviews on TIG

While the crowd was going crazy, the band was not.

"It's all okay till they open their fucking mouths"

imaginary dana — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 06:11:23 +0000

Imagine if Three Imaginary Girls met Pete and Ray and you'd have Breakfast at Sulimay's, featuring Joe, Moon, and Bill -- possibly the most entertaining music critics I've ever heard.

Young Machetes

Matt Johnson — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 08:00:00 +0000

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000ICLRKM/wwwthreeimagi-20

BloodBrothers06nov.jpg

It's hard to believe that The Blood Brothers have been at it for nearly ten years. Back in about '98 they were a high school age hardcore band with a penchant for cutesy vampire themes. And although their early Velvet Elvis shows certainly weren't musically groundbreaking, their ferocity was undeniable. I got tired just watching them. Obviously the band has developed a lot since then and I'd venture to say they're the most important punk(ish) band in Seattle right now.

Those fortunate enough to have caught the ‘90s hardcore under-underground will hear The Blood Brothers as a band that likely cut their collective teeth on Drive Like Jehu, a mish-mash of mid-late 90s Gravity or GSL bands, The Get Hustle, The VSS and maybe a little Fugazi.

Fortunately they've retained their own identity as they give their due props. But the difference between the Blood Brothers and their predecessors is that the Blood Brothers are willing to experiment with an accessible musicality that the others weren't. But we'll get to that later.

The overarching strength of this CD is in its cohesiveness. Not in the sense of marketing or production values (though each are notable) as much as Young Machetes being a collection of songs that gels thematically. The sound of loud, frantic, claustrophobic music at its base level should mean the same thing philosophically. So, when the Blood Brothers effectually say something like "we're all fucked" the music means it at the same time.

Of all the hordes of bands fueled by disagreeableness, far too many take the easy way out by targeting something obvious like bad foreign policy (which the BB's do pull off pretty effectively on "Street Wars / Exotic Foxholes" and "Huge Gold AK47"). Thankfully, Young Machetes is more complex than that; it's an exercise in opposites for the sake of gaining moral clarity. Yes, moral clarity. Observe: A lyrical image of something beautiful and pure is propped up next to the rotten corpse of its opposite. Take the following snippets as lyrical examples: Cemetery claws racking at the infant's jaws. Vacant as a womb that's miscarried. I couldn't see the love and affection, it was camouflaged as a jungle of erections. Skull shaped balloon. Dress my corpse in a low cut dress. We live in a glamorous mansion with napalm in the walls. Etcetera. Though the imagery may seem vile, in actuality — as has been said of Black Sabbath, William Burroughs and The Sex Pistols — the Blood Brothers are communicating moralistically. This depth is a far cry from the spoiled brat excess of most of their peers that are simply regurgitated teenaged tantrums.

Musically speaking the production work of John Goodmanson and Fugazi's Guy Picciotto on this album is stellar. Even though the tones are great I'd like to hear more guitar — they are a rock band after all — as the vocals sometimes sharply dominate the mix. Vocally both Jordan Blilie and Johnny Whitney have come a long way. At one time — pre Crimes era releases — it was as if they were using their voices as weapons rather than instruments. For straight hardcore sometimes that's the most appropriate approach but the Blood Brothers have thankfully moved into more creative vocal textures. Between the dual shrieking — which is either the most caustic substance on earth or a punk kid's take on the shrillest black metal vocals you've never heard — Whitney and Blilie trade off on the "melodic" parts to great effect. Whitney has a sort of sauntering, snotty cabaret style while Blilie vocalizes in a lower register in a sort of soothing albeit perverted phone call at 2 am kind of way.

Neither one of them ever rarely carry a conventional melody, but I'm not convinced they're trying. While I can't attest to Blilie's ability to "sing well" Whitney has a way of teasing you as he plays with a vocal phrase. In the vocal/keyboard breakdown of Camouflage, Camouflage Whitney uses a breathy falsetto and aptly hits every intended note, but during the closing when both vocalists double up, Whitney purposefully sings, not sharp, not flat, but somewhere in the middle. It's almost as though Whitney is intentionally singing in quarter tone intervals which can make for a pretty disorienting listen.

But the Blood Brothers strength is a double-edged sword. I love me some noise violence but sometimes the no-wave anti-music noise freak-outs that follow the melodious, danceable segues are a little too obvious. It's as if they're trying to remind the listeners that while they're introducing more accessible elements into the mix, they won't be pigeonholed. And the remedy? Momentarily destroy the song with noise. But given the overwhelming onslaught of their previous material, it's exciting to hear the tension that's created as they're learning to self-edit. This inherent tension may have been created by the value the band has put on the need for a democracy. Egalitarian band ethics is great when it works well but a strong song should be written as if the song is the star, not the individuals in the performance. Sometimes that means that a certain player's opportunity to impress the listener with musical ability has to take the back seat for the integrity of the song.

Similarly the lyrics are interesting in a hallucinogenic-deranged-nightmare-Naked Lunch-beat-poet kind of way, but each song lyric packs about three songs worth of content, which becomes a little overwhelming. It's not the dirth of the content that's the problem though it's the density of it. But then maybe they're going for excess to make a point.

A band aiming to subvert conventional ideas of music should be willing to steep in that conventionality. That way the subversion actually means something to an audience larger than a few dorky intellectuals with bad cases of genre fetishism. I know that the angular haircut Spock Rock circuit that lay claim to bands like the Blood Brothers would probably disagree but the more poppy and conventional this band gets, the better. Not because I don't like disjoined, loud, a-melodic music — I do, as my music listening habits attest to — but because they've already done loud and frantic well, maybe it's time to move on. Imagine if Sonic Youth, Blonde Redhead, or even the Yeah, Yeah Yeah's kept putting out the same records year after year. Sure, they'd keep their "cred" with the scene police but they'd also have to settle for preaching to the choir.

"Imagine where we could go with music," bassist Morgan Henderson ponders in the Blood Brothers press kit "if we always said 'yes' and not 'no.'" To that I say imagine where the Blood Brothers could go with music if they said 'no' a little more often for the sake of the song. But most importantly as this great band continues to develop, they should learn how to strategically say 'no' because they're too damn good to disappear into arty hardcore obscurity.

...as this great band continues to develop, they should learn how to strategically say 'no' because they're too damn good to disappear into arty hardcore obscurity.

Top 50 Northwest Releases of 2004: the Imaginary Readers' Poll Results {40-31}

three imaginary girls — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 08:00:00 +0000

#40 Cantona — 3x4
(self-released)

{official website}

#39 S — Puking and Crying
(Suicide Squeeze Records)

{official website} * {buy it}

#38 The Girls — The Girls
(Dirtnap)

{official website} * {buy it} * {tig review}

#37 The Jeunes — 4 Song EP
(self-released)

{official website} * {buy it} * {tig review}

#36 Daniel G. Harmann — The Lake Effect
(Post436 Records)

{official website} * {buy it} * {tig review}

#35 Graig Markel — Tall Tales on Tape
(Sonic Boom Recordings)

{official website} * {buy it} * {tig review}

#34 Mark Lanegan — Bubblegum
(Beggars Banquet)

{official website} * {buy it} * {tig review}

#33 A.C. Newman — The Slow Wonder
(Matador Records)

{official website} * {buy it}

#32 Blood Brothers — Crimes
(V2)

{official website} * {buy it} * {tig photos}

#31 Tegan and Sara — So Jealous
(Vapor Records)

{official website} * {buy it} * {tig interview

The top Northwest releases of 2004 as voted on by you, our readers (see winners #40-31 here).

Akimbo, The Blood Brothers, and Pretty Girls Make Graves

S. Enni — Sat, 15 Nov 2003 08:00:00 +0000

14 Nov 2003

akimbo.jpg

The Akimbo/ Blood Brothers/ Pretty Girls Make Graves show was a lesson in mathematics: the tricky equations of getting down and rocking out. The University of Washington HUB had transformed one of their dining areas into a surprisingly functional venue, and the concert completely sold out earlier that day. This was evidenced by the terrific line I waited in anxiously, not wanting to miss any action.

Akimbo was up first, and I was amongst the majority in that I had a terrible seat, and could see nothing. I scavenged around for the highest/closest/most convenient place to sit or stand or swing from, but no such luck. Eventually I found an area where I could see the occasional flip of the singer's tight curls, and the occasional flailing guitar neck. I decided to take the zen approach and focus in on the audio — I was not disappointed.

Don't you love it when opening bands set the tone? Akimbo rocked like an adrenaline shot to the heart, with breakdowns the likes of which I haven't seen since Farrah Fawcett was on Letterman. These professors of math rock kept things interesting, and their set was like a tightly wound punch. When they introduced their last song, "I am a Fucking Ice Giant" I was ready for a tour-de-force. And indeed, the lengthy number gave me guitar solos I could crunch, and made me feel like my footsteps could collapse mountains. I think the Hulk would be a fan of Akimbo. That's some wicked shredding.

After Akimbo's energizing set there passed the length of an aria, while the Blood Brother army gathered as close to the stage as possible, and tension mounted. When The Brothers finally took to the stage and swung into "Cecilia and the Silhouette Saloon" the crowd burst, or imploded, depending on where you were standing. The energy was thick and I wanted to rock out, if only I could move... I went with the wildly crushing flow, side to side, backwards and was then slingshot to the very front, where the fans were actually standing on the stage. Somehow I sidled to my right and wound up standing next to photographers from who-knows-what publication, standing awkward and astonished at my incredibly fortunate view: it was like the Brothers were jamming in my basement.

Standing behind the speakers meant I sacrificed much of the sonic quality of the experience, but it was more than worthwhile to see the Brothers' overwhelmingly energetic performance so close. The surge of people was consistently stepping on the Brothers' toes (Bros Toes?), pushing them up to the ceiling and shoving their amps helter skelter across the floor. Ah, I thought, but this is a rock show! Chaos is welcome! Madness abounded! The crowd sang along like it was Dashboard Confessing, reaching a fever pitch with "USA Nails." The Brothers' explained that this was the last show in Seattle for a long while, and that once they played here again they expected to have an entirely new arsenal of music with which to rock you, the ever-hungry rock fan. They retired the stage after an admirably long and rigorous set, leaving the crowd a sweaty, frenzied, adoring mess.

I spoke with guitar player Cody after their set, and he told me he'd had a really great time playing, despite the occasional fan being launched into his face. He also told me that the most exciting thing about being in the band right now was making their new album, which, he estimated, would hopefully be out around springtime. Later on, however, he confessed to not having a favorite Spice Girl — "I just don't know any of them..." I told him it was alright. He's a rock star; he doesn't need any more spice.

Once Pretty Girls Make Graves was finely tuned and ready to go the mob had somewhat depleted, but those who stuck around were treated to some lovely fist-pumping jams of the grrl persuasion. Yet again I found myself occasionally leaning up into tip-toe position just to catch a glimpse of any — please any! — movement onstage. After all was said and done I was exhausted. The turtleneck I had thought so chic and functional on the walk over was now stretched and wet with sweat I was almost certain wasn't mine. But I walked home with my brand new Blood Brother's T-shirt and the knowledge that yes, Virginia. Rock is alive. And it's living its day today in Seattle.

The Akimbo/Blood Brothers/Pretty Girls Make Graves show was a lesson in mathematics: the tricky equations of getting down and rocking out.