Reflections on the Rileys 2nd Anniversary Show - By N.L. Belardes
It’s been a week since Jessie Deluxe, The Hero and the Victor and The Rolling Blackouts invaded Riley’s second year anniversary party. It’s been a week of reflection, of pondering just what to write about such a heated show, and how to express my thoughts of such great music having poured into Bakersfield on a heat wave night… right smack into a long weekend of seeing shows and watching bands in this lonesome cowpoke town of desperados, Buck Owens wannabes, and post hardcore Korn-syrup bliss…
But this was the Indie scene at Rileys. This wasn’t the heart of countrydom, or the very spot where Korn sprouted, got plucked, and ended up in LA: the land where bands grow on every street corner like little bird-chirping weeds (just add water and then go watch the Little Shop of Horrors and feed those bands!).
I saw Jessie, pronounced her name correctly this time, and was very flattered by what she had to say. She had read a little piece I wrote in a previous blog about her band Jessie Deluxe and the Binges storming into Buck City, “She was almost melancholy herself at times as she performed and perhaps wondered about herself, her music, everything spinning just then in her own Bakersfield Bukowski artistic moment…” Oh yes, and it was true as Jessie said, “No one ever wrote about me like that before.” Well, she didn’t deny it. I think she liked such a phrase because she smiled very quaintly and said “Thanks.”
I dared to tell her, in not so many words, that most folks are like a little crystal ball to me and I’m just some Harry Potter magician-novelist wannabe with my big dumb glasses and staring out from them trying to figure what might tick inside of folks like her. It’s what I do hiding behind a camera, watching, pondering, dreaming, listening to music, getting what Jessie said is “the feeling in music is that easy to communicate.” She’s right.
Jessie Deluxe cupid arrow guitar...
But then I look deeper and that might have been a little scary and exciting to her, that a writer doesn’t just say, “Jessie shreds”, but writes that Jessie reflects life in a series of lyrics found within songs like, “Shimmy Shake”, “Whiskey”, and “Hellfire”. And, why is that? Because a song like “Shimmy Shake” represents an excitedness we all feel as adrenaline rushes through our bodies for a host of reasons brought on by lovers, friends, artists, music, life… “I wanna shimmy shake, shimmy shake!!! Oh Yeah!” Or her song Whiskey, which she tributes to all whiskey drinkers in the house before she performs it… but isn’t really about whiskey at all… but a deeper point of recognition in the human spirit that touches through ideas, song, a song title, music, art, people wanting it all, knowing what’s true but denying, and then wanting to scream it out in song; a song that pauses like a long breath of denial and then stabs, “You know it’s true what you do!”
Jessie, that bassist sweetheart, Tsuzumi Okai, and that angry-looking bald drummer were all in an exceptionally brilliant mode of rock and roll at Riley’s last Sunday night. It shown in their music, in their attitudes, in a few smiles sheepishly thrown out by Tsuzumi (she never broke form—but in such moments recognized the friendliness of the Bakersfield crowd with the crack of a humble smile), in Jessie’s self-wonderment and showmanship where for a moment you might think she is a quiet, nice girl just happening to be carrying around this enigmatic black guitar shaped like an arrow; but then her songs have such power you realize she’s shoving that guitar-arrow straight into your heart—a cupid to her own sound—if you don’t like her music that is; that doesn’t matter because she makes you fall in love with it.
The crowd in the back of old Riley’s pub shuffled together, crowded around the stage and whooped and hollered at Jessie Deluxe. There was one big mac daddy who passed out drinks to the band and there were smiles all around. I was disappointed when Jessie Deluxe played their last song, but then was happy that she took a few moments to talk to me. I of course invited her onto the Buck City Podcast… and I’m holding her to that.
I was in the house with the boys from Norfolk. But there were many music-driven folks around Rileys that night. Nick/Tyler from Liars and thieves was in an exceptionally boisterous mood, dancing, and generally doing a two-step that had people wondering just how such a tall lanky fellow could move like that and not tip over or get his legs all in knots. He mostly did that during the Rolling Blackouts set.
Oh and then there was The Hero and the Victor jamming in the house from Santa Barbara. They had an interesting set-up with the drummer facing the band… Unfortunately I missed a lot of their set as I tracked down Jessie to have our conversation.
I was back for the Rolling Blackouts. Leslie of Riley’s fame had been telling me about this band since I started writing in the music and art scene back in February. I remember, her and I had met up at the Mint and she talked and talked with such enthusiasm for music and the Indie scene. I listened with childish glee because I hadn’t listened to music in a few years, so all this band excitement was new to me.
When I entered Riley’s last Sunday Leslie introduced me to Daniel from the Rolling Blackouts. I shook his hand; here was a guy nice enough, thin enough—isn’t that all of us starving artists at one time or another? …he was grubby enough too, with a slight beard and a head full of dark hair; he was friendly to the point of getting me to think I should sit and talk to this LA guy. But I had been on my way to track down Jessie Deluxe…
I kept hearing The Rolling Blackouts had received accolades from the LA Weekly. I did some research and sure enough, they were voted Best Rock Band in 2005. Starting up right away I realized I needed to snap out of any Bakersfield Bukowski dark mode I might have been in. Nick/Tyler was fired up, dancing it up and Daniel, lead vocalist and guitarist had a big red rose on his guitar strap that was as pretty as a little Mexican dancing girl in a red dress. How could he go wrong? He had all of our attention as soon as the band started up.
The Rolling Blackouts are a high-energy tight group of hard rockers—none of them are sub-par, or take up slack for gaps in music-making efficiency. These guys have a rich sound and exciting guitar-driven vibe that doesn’t leave any doubt as to their rock star potential. Their guitarist, Jarrod, is mild mannered but has such a command over their big guitar sounds that I at least found myself staring at how he worked the frets… Best band in LA? These guys are one of the best bands I have ever seen, period. No wonder Nick/Tyler was dancing a mad jig even before they started tearing it up. Amazing that such a great band like the Rolling Blackouts would grace a little Bakersfield pub on a hot Sunday valley night...
After their set I spoke to drummer, Gabriel. Now this guy is one of the best drummers I have ever seen smacking the snare and toms. He smokes on the drumset and has an emotional intensity that isn’t undisciplined at all, but rather disciplined to the point that he makes drumming look like something as easy as tapping your fingers on a steering wheel. My only beef? Gabriel promised me a shirt that never materialized. A small price to pay for great music. I’ll buy one next time…
The Rolling Blackouts are making a new album and I will be one of the first to get it here in Bakersfield that’s for sure.
I then had a nice talk with Dylan from The Binges who told me he reads N.L. Belardes: Music Gossip and the Arts. I am undeserving of such rock star talent reading my few misplaced words…
Afterwards I drifted back into Bakersfield Bukowski mode. My mood grew a little sour as I listened to some of the barflies flitting about outside talk of working in diners, buying clothes in thrift stores, how to give restaurant customers a hard time and about pie as they drifted through a strange dialogue.
“I love pie, any pie, unless it’s Lemon merangue pie. Who wants to eat that? But then it gets so hot at my place I sit in the shower because we have no air conditioning.”
“I have Popsicles in my freezer.”
Oh yeah I would love one. We walked to the store. We walk all over the place now. Now, ice cream, that’s something I never get enough of. You know I love food. But there’s all this drama. Our computer Internet is down. Our phone isn’t working. But we’re happy. We’re as happy as we can be.”
“Happiness is the most important thing.”
“Yeah, well…”
But this was the Indie scene at Rileys. This wasn’t the heart of countrydom, or the very spot where Korn sprouted, got plucked, and ended up in LA: the land where bands grow on every street corner like little bird-chirping weeds (just add water and then go watch the Little Shop of Horrors and feed those bands!).
I saw Jessie, pronounced her name correctly this time, and was very flattered by what she had to say. She had read a little piece I wrote in a previous blog about her band Jessie Deluxe and the Binges storming into Buck City, “She was almost melancholy herself at times as she performed and perhaps wondered about herself, her music, everything spinning just then in her own Bakersfield Bukowski artistic moment…” Oh yes, and it was true as Jessie said, “No one ever wrote about me like that before.” Well, she didn’t deny it. I think she liked such a phrase because she smiled very quaintly and said “Thanks.”
I dared to tell her, in not so many words, that most folks are like a little crystal ball to me and I’m just some Harry Potter magician-novelist wannabe with my big dumb glasses and staring out from them trying to figure what might tick inside of folks like her. It’s what I do hiding behind a camera, watching, pondering, dreaming, listening to music, getting what Jessie said is “the feeling in music is that easy to communicate.” She’s right.
Jessie Deluxe cupid arrow guitar...
But then I look deeper and that might have been a little scary and exciting to her, that a writer doesn’t just say, “Jessie shreds”, but writes that Jessie reflects life in a series of lyrics found within songs like, “Shimmy Shake”, “Whiskey”, and “Hellfire”. And, why is that? Because a song like “Shimmy Shake” represents an excitedness we all feel as adrenaline rushes through our bodies for a host of reasons brought on by lovers, friends, artists, music, life… “I wanna shimmy shake, shimmy shake!!! Oh Yeah!” Or her song Whiskey, which she tributes to all whiskey drinkers in the house before she performs it… but isn’t really about whiskey at all… but a deeper point of recognition in the human spirit that touches through ideas, song, a song title, music, art, people wanting it all, knowing what’s true but denying, and then wanting to scream it out in song; a song that pauses like a long breath of denial and then stabs, “You know it’s true what you do!”
Jessie, that bassist sweetheart, Tsuzumi Okai, and that angry-looking bald drummer were all in an exceptionally brilliant mode of rock and roll at Riley’s last Sunday night. It shown in their music, in their attitudes, in a few smiles sheepishly thrown out by Tsuzumi (she never broke form—but in such moments recognized the friendliness of the Bakersfield crowd with the crack of a humble smile), in Jessie’s self-wonderment and showmanship where for a moment you might think she is a quiet, nice girl just happening to be carrying around this enigmatic black guitar shaped like an arrow; but then her songs have such power you realize she’s shoving that guitar-arrow straight into your heart—a cupid to her own sound—if you don’t like her music that is; that doesn’t matter because she makes you fall in love with it.
The crowd in the back of old Riley’s pub shuffled together, crowded around the stage and whooped and hollered at Jessie Deluxe. There was one big mac daddy who passed out drinks to the band and there were smiles all around. I was disappointed when Jessie Deluxe played their last song, but then was happy that she took a few moments to talk to me. I of course invited her onto the Buck City Podcast… and I’m holding her to that.
I was in the house with the boys from Norfolk. But there were many music-driven folks around Rileys that night. Nick/Tyler from Liars and thieves was in an exceptionally boisterous mood, dancing, and generally doing a two-step that had people wondering just how such a tall lanky fellow could move like that and not tip over or get his legs all in knots. He mostly did that during the Rolling Blackouts set.
Oh and then there was The Hero and the Victor jamming in the house from Santa Barbara. They had an interesting set-up with the drummer facing the band… Unfortunately I missed a lot of their set as I tracked down Jessie to have our conversation.
I was back for the Rolling Blackouts. Leslie of Riley’s fame had been telling me about this band since I started writing in the music and art scene back in February. I remember, her and I had met up at the Mint and she talked and talked with such enthusiasm for music and the Indie scene. I listened with childish glee because I hadn’t listened to music in a few years, so all this band excitement was new to me.
When I entered Riley’s last Sunday Leslie introduced me to Daniel from the Rolling Blackouts. I shook his hand; here was a guy nice enough, thin enough—isn’t that all of us starving artists at one time or another? …he was grubby enough too, with a slight beard and a head full of dark hair; he was friendly to the point of getting me to think I should sit and talk to this LA guy. But I had been on my way to track down Jessie Deluxe…
I kept hearing The Rolling Blackouts had received accolades from the LA Weekly. I did some research and sure enough, they were voted Best Rock Band in 2005. Starting up right away I realized I needed to snap out of any Bakersfield Bukowski dark mode I might have been in. Nick/Tyler was fired up, dancing it up and Daniel, lead vocalist and guitarist had a big red rose on his guitar strap that was as pretty as a little Mexican dancing girl in a red dress. How could he go wrong? He had all of our attention as soon as the band started up.
The Rolling Blackouts are a high-energy tight group of hard rockers—none of them are sub-par, or take up slack for gaps in music-making efficiency. These guys have a rich sound and exciting guitar-driven vibe that doesn’t leave any doubt as to their rock star potential. Their guitarist, Jarrod, is mild mannered but has such a command over their big guitar sounds that I at least found myself staring at how he worked the frets… Best band in LA? These guys are one of the best bands I have ever seen, period. No wonder Nick/Tyler was dancing a mad jig even before they started tearing it up. Amazing that such a great band like the Rolling Blackouts would grace a little Bakersfield pub on a hot Sunday valley night...
After their set I spoke to drummer, Gabriel. Now this guy is one of the best drummers I have ever seen smacking the snare and toms. He smokes on the drumset and has an emotional intensity that isn’t undisciplined at all, but rather disciplined to the point that he makes drumming look like something as easy as tapping your fingers on a steering wheel. My only beef? Gabriel promised me a shirt that never materialized. A small price to pay for great music. I’ll buy one next time…
The Rolling Blackouts are making a new album and I will be one of the first to get it here in Bakersfield that’s for sure.
I then had a nice talk with Dylan from The Binges who told me he reads N.L. Belardes: Music Gossip and the Arts. I am undeserving of such rock star talent reading my few misplaced words…
Afterwards I drifted back into Bakersfield Bukowski mode. My mood grew a little sour as I listened to some of the barflies flitting about outside talk of working in diners, buying clothes in thrift stores, how to give restaurant customers a hard time and about pie as they drifted through a strange dialogue.
“I love pie, any pie, unless it’s Lemon merangue pie. Who wants to eat that? But then it gets so hot at my place I sit in the shower because we have no air conditioning.”
“I have Popsicles in my freezer.”
Oh yeah I would love one. We walked to the store. We walk all over the place now. Now, ice cream, that’s something I never get enough of. You know I love food. But there’s all this drama. Our computer Internet is down. Our phone isn’t working. But we’re happy. We’re as happy as we can be.”
“Happiness is the most important thing.”
“Yeah, well…”
This entry was posted by N.L. Belardes, on
Sunday, July 24, 2005.
You can leave your response.
leave a response