The Good Time Dispatch: Live Life Loud Continues To Bring Killer Rock Shows To The Valley
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Frontman Dean Brittain brings pure Hadlock metal to the Lantern with his band, Tonight We Knife. [/caption]
Event reporting by Nigel O’Shea
What: Live Life Loud Presents: Dryland (Bellingham), Key Party (Poulsbo), and Tonight We Knife (Bremerton and Hadlock) with DJ E Rok
Where: The Quilcene Lantern, 7360 Center Rd, Quilcene, WA 98376
When: Saturday, November 16, 2024
How much: $15 NOTAFLOF*
Drank: 2 Silver City Tropical IPAs (I’m a terrible punk, I hate Ranier)
Ate: My kid made me french toast and I washed it down with a short gin and tonic
What should I wear?: I dunno, A black watch cap and some Vans?
Evening weather: Hold on to your hats, Look out for breaking tree limbs!
Most represented guitar: The Gibson SG
Overall time had: 7.5 sweet, rather nostalgic for this old timer
*another acronym for the brain pan, mutual aiders: No One Turned Away For Lack Of Funds
It was a windy drive to the first right past the 104 overpass. It is easy to miss but for faint lights strung over Tarboo Creek. Parking was to the left and a string of lights led us to the venue on the right. The crowd was ample for a night that might have been better spent under the covers, but they only opened the south side of the barn for the event. A cozy woodfire under the tarpaper and wood-slat ribs of the open ceiling kept out the windchill.
First on the bill was Tonight We Knife playing their first show. Dean Brittain of Trash Fecta and In Droves has put together another smoking act. It’s hard to describe their set as anything other than a barn burner (sorry). While the guitar leads sewed a thread of Metal and Crossover, the sound harkened back to the melodic Hardcore of the 80s (the politics of Bad Religion, riffs like Dag Nasty, Bad Brains, GBH, Descendents, and a bouncing bass line like the Lookout! Records crew) A thoroughly enjoyable performance with songs like Five Knives and You’re Angry going by way too fast and the closer All Downhill leaving me wanting more. Epic first show.
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Key Party adding extra doom to the evening. [/caption]
Key Party (not to be confused with the yacht rock band from Santa Barbara) brought rhythmic skronk that embraced rich discordance and noise more in line with The Birthday Party or Big Black (a looser Shellac?) versus modern noise acts like Blood Brothers or No Age. More ambient songs like Crisis gave a nod to Sonic Youth and Fugazi as well. It was a joyful noise that brought pounding chaos to quieter moments and then back again like any good noise rock act should (I don’t know if I’ve seen a ride cymbal so punished).
Ironically, the greater portion of Dryland, a band named after a Waterworld reference, almost didn’t make it across the water because of the high winds. Saint Ronny James Dio apparently cleared the weather with a Rainbow in the Dark and the Bellingham travelers made it to the Olympic Peninsula. The galloping riffs and head slams on opener Goblins was a great place to embark. Certainly influenced by Black Sabbath, with lots of heavy changing parts and melodic guitar lines, the plodding rhythm and shifting time signature of songs like Arteries of Wrath seemed to evoke fellow woodland goblins Melvins or Tad. Singer and lyricist Bradley Lockhart painted a picture of primordial nature and celestial connection with grim fantasy and earthly peril. It was Stoner Doom Metal at its most literary.
Going to see folks play punk and metal in the woods is a long pastime that birthed a musical zeitgeist in the Pacific Northwest. It warms my heart seeing bands from around our homewaters still connecting. It’s good to know that our humble beginnings haven’t changed so much: We are all still heading to the dark woods to see some music and create some light. We will be so lucky if the Quilcene Lantern keeps its flame lit so we can keep doing so.
All photos by Nhatt Nichols
