Friday night at the Funhouse, the hottest spot in the great city of Seattle, The Spits are barreling back into form as they headline a lineup that's assured to tear the house down (only metaphorically) like only The Spits can. With Erin Wood now residing thousands of miles south in Los Angeles, it's a much rarer treat than usual, and with their fourth full-length album recorded but still unreleased as of this writing, it's got everyone anxiously waiting for the next batch of gut-level moronics to fall from the heavens, and brighten the lives of poor and underprivileged children all across the world. Aside from a few random appearances in Austin, Texas, their hometown of Kalamazoo, and a West Coast tour with the Black Lips last fall, in general over the past few years, seeing The Spits live has sadly become somewhat of a rare occurrence. Taking the simplest parts of Devo's overlooked quirky nuances and smashing them into Joey Ramone's rarely copied vocal style (something all the pop-punk bands just never were smart enough to grab onto) has been The Spits' key to world dominance for over ten years running, and with the recently unearthed 1995 demo of "Die" that's been pressed onto their latest 12" offering (check out the 19 Million A.C. EP CD LP on Wolfdog Records) as a bonus, it just goes to show how far ahead of the curve these guys really are/were.
Opening up the night's entertainment is the oddly-paired combo known as TV Coahran, who tinker with budget-level Sparks song structures, kept above room temperature to encapsulate one of the oddest corners of the "indie rock" universe to date. It might not be the most parallel event planning, but along with the night's other acts, it seems to contribute to the fine art of variety that was so prevalent in punk booking before genre-specific mentalities took hold and segregated the underground as a whole. Android Hero are another Seattle three piece who have put in time over the years in such other bands as Treepeople and Mea Culpa, and serve up a metallic and caustically crushing hard rock sandwich that might be a little hard to swallow if it wasn't for all that glorious beer that you'll have at your disposal. Also up on stage tonight are the equally mysterious Meepers, so don't fall back into that old brown paper sack and get your enlarged ass out to the Funhouse on Friday night for another fat lip of rock'n roll salvation that The Spits can surely deliver.
Check out a video clip of The Spits' song "Tonight" from their upcoming LP filmed live at the Echoplex, courtesy of conbigote, right here...
