My gawd y’allz. As crazy shows go, last night was one of the craziest I’ve seen. The Unicorns are three fresh-out-of-high-school young guys who do whatever the hell they want on stage. After watching nearly the whole show with my mouth open and a “what the hell” expression on my face, I thought I’d write about it a bit. For me, the show was confusing, funny, unbelievable, and entertaining as anything. Musically, it often seemed like the songs were teetering on the edge of collapse, but I think maybe that’s just how these guys play. Let me do my best play-by-play to try and get across what I mean.
We went to the show to see the Unicorns. There were three opening acts, so we knew we were getting ourselves into a late night. Two of the three openers were “meh,” while one – Irving – showed a lot of potential. When the last opening act left the stage, it was about a quarter to eleven. The Unicorns took their sweet time getting on, not taking the stage until somewhere around 11:30pm. That’s when three guys took the stage. One guy, will call him the long-haired one, was decked out with a pink matador’s cape, pink pants, and pink suspenders. The other guy, we’ll call him the curly-haired one, had on a pink tie and pink Boy Scout style belt over grey slacks, no shirt. The drummer, we’ll call him the drummer, had a white dress shirt and pink pants. All three were barefoot.
The opened the show with “The Clap,” which set the tone for the “we’re either gonna fall apart or get through these songs” vibe that stuck around for most of the show. The two “front-men,” long-haired and curly, switched between guitar, bass, and keyboard – each having playing all by the end of the show. The drummer worked with a regular drum kit, a drum-pad, and an AKAI MPC2000 sampler. As for the band’s on-stage histrionics, where do I begin?
They came out, did a brief unintelligible banter with the crowd, and then launched into song one. Apparently there was some guy heckling from near the front of the crowd, and he and the band exchanged some good-natured barbs at each other. Throughout the next couple songs, I guess this guy was still ribbing them – and I could hear him comment after each song. By the third song, the band was telling him to “eff off you eff-hole” (and yeah, that’s what they said). Before the fourth song, they told they guy (or everyone, who knows) that if he didn’t shut up – this would be their last song. Sure enough, as the song ended, the club turned on the vamp and the band walked offstage while shooting each other confused looks. To me, it looked like they didn’t want to leave – but the club started vamping like the show was over and they just did. About a minute later they came back onstage. The long-haired dude took the mic and addressed the heckler (or whatever he was), saying: “Hey, we just talked to the boss of this place… and apparently you don’t even work here. You work for me now, I own you, you’re fired.” I had no idea what was going on. All I knew was that, if I waited 45min for these guys to take the stage – they had better at least play that long in return.
Anyway, the rest of the show was just as strange. In summary: In the middle of songs they broke into Kylie Minogue and 50 Cent covers. At one point the long-haired one accepted a joint from a front-row fan and proceeded to smoke marijuana throughout an entire song, on stage. After which he started clutching his chest and conferring with the other band members – who announced to the crowd: “Our friend here is having an ‘uncertain’ reaction to the marijuana… we’re gonna give him a few seconds for it to wear off.” Then he ambled up to the mic and asked the crowd for some “nachos or chips.” Someone was kind enough to throw a box of fig newtons onstage. Long-haired stoned dude snatched them up and ate one, showing poor manners by telling the crowd, while eating, that: “Fig newtons are chewy.” There was bass guitar humping, go-go dancing on speaker stacks, a bottle of vodka, and even a show’s-over crowd surf by the long-haired dude. Certainly an entertaining show, if somewhat insane.
That’s all I have the heart to write today, any more and I’d be forcing it. Bye.
Also written on this day...
- chill and bright - 2010
- stuck in the thicklebits - 2009
- sweating out the bennies - 2007
- play-by-play - 2006