The Pink Hairs played three instrumentals before they got around to doing a song with words, last Thursday at the Bullfinch. And that song only had three or four words, depending on how you spell. “Gimme! Some! Now!”
So we gave them some applause, then, and drinks afterwards, and became fast friends with this young suburban sensation who claimed they “could not have been more nervous” but didn’t show it. Perhaps it was because we were looking at their pink hair (wigs) without noticing quivering shoulders or such.
In adorable new-band fashion, PH played every song they knew, then one of them again. their set was sped up (nervousness, natch) so they filled in the extra time with half-practiced tunes they hope to have improved upon when they play The Bullfinch again sometime next month.
One thing the Pink Hairs might not have next time: pink hair.
“The wigs got in the way. We never rehearsed with them. We’re not that good,” claimed singer Cassie Wary. “I need to look at my fingers when I play and I couldn’t sometimes because the wig would fall forward.
The band is not changing its name. They Pink Hairs insist that they will find another way to work pink hair into their act. We drunkenly suggested a few ways ourself, and we’ll just have to see if they take our suggestion.
Tonight: Outline of Sanity and Do We Agree at the Bullfinch… Queen of Seven Swords at Hamilton’s… Gloria in Profundis at D’ollaire’s…

The Running Hits are becoming bolder and bolder with their hit-and-run rock shows. They’ve played in the middle of Main Street—literally the middle, on that little island by the church—and in the food aisle of the Dollar Store. They’ve played in a classroom (between periods) at the high school they all attend and in a tree on the Town Common. All in the last few weeks and all unannounced in advance. What a letdown, then, for The Running Hits to be playing a club stage. It’ll be the Bullfinch on Thursday.
Tonight: Mask of Midas and Platitudes Undone at the Bullfinch, while some of those bands’ ex-bandmates, The Prophets of Orthodoxy, are at Hamilton’s. All part of the same neo-this-or-that scene… Sidelights of New London and Newer York at D’ollaire’s; sidemen you haven’t heard of from bands you have…

Purplephiles plowed through a record 72 songs in their 45-minutes set Thursday at the Bullfinch. It wasn’t to win a bet, and it wasn’t their usual set. It was a demonstration of how they rehearse, in what they call their weekly “bull band” sessions. Someone calls out a classic tune, they slam out four bars or so of it, agree that they know it, and move on. At the Finch, they took requests from the audience, stipulating first that this wasn’t to be a “stump the band” nite and they were fine with saying no to outlandish requests. But they did still know an awful lot of songs, including a few real obscurities (“Ill Lad” by Ho and the Myrrhs, anyone?) which friends in the crowd knew they knew. A stop/start night of premature ejaculations and shortened expectations, but a dazzling show of prowess. Anybody else rehearse like this?
Tonight: Mini Twinge at the Bullfinch… Caster and the Polaks

Manny Louse had lost his lead singer, so he begged Greek Chieftains to lend him their back-up vocalist Penny. She wanted to do the gig, but the whole band had to vote on it because of some very real scheduling conflicts. Guitarist Uli, who’s always been protective of Penny, raised such a stink that the negotiations fell through. Turns out Uli had some bizarre ulterior motive, and happily came around once Manny had promised him everything from doing his household chores to writing the GCs a new song. Then the obvious happened: the bands joined forces, and are doing two sets at Hamilton’s Thursday. (Why are all the good stories at Hamilton’s this week?) A whole new band is in the works, and a star named Penny is born…
Tonight: Sea Nymph at the Bullfinch… Thee Immortals at Hamilton’s… King Lycomedes at D’ollaire’s, with a pick-up band…

The Poor Turns’ debut disk got an unexpected early release—or an impossibly late one, depending on what side of the road you’re on.
The delays were all in the studio—scheduling mishaps, equipment breakdowns and at one point the breakdown of an engineer (poor Mark Hammersmith’s heart episode). That’s par for the studio course, except that this was a spring-themed album (Turn of the season, see) and was thus kind of on a deadline.
Miraculously, time was made up on the production end, where the cancellation of a big-label order meant that a lot of in-limbo projects got rushed through.
Good thing, since “BGB” is already getting radio play. Also good since the band had scheduled a CD release party at the Bullfinch, then taken the “CD release” status of the gig, and can now put it back on again.
Now if only it would stop snowing.
Tonight: The Percy Phones at the Bullfinch, with the cool retro synths…Private party at Hamilton’s, no music so didn’t even bother to crash… Or Refuse at D’Ollaire’s, with an all-new set that will totally turn off their above-ground fans…

The Saint Whores finished their debut disk Body of a Horse with a bout of puking, but they’re not really that kind of band. They’d all caught the flu and didn’t want to cancel a session. You can totally hear the illness bubbling up on the album’s longest track, the unearthly jam “Pirit Hous.”
Tonight: O.C. Rhoe at the Bullfinch, solo acoustic… The all-star band Pluto Jupiter at Hamilton’s, doing covers unworthy of them… An Evening With Prophetic Strain at D’Ollaire’s…

It was a garage waiting for a band.
A little old lady on Songbird Street noticed it first. She’d gone to her garage, which she seldom used, and found a pile of musical equipment there. So she called her grandson, Dippy of Dippy & The Bad Dreamers. (She knows him as Lawrence.) He had no idea what the stuff was doing there either. So he did the right thing and called the authorities. The gear was quickly identified as coming from a guitar-store heist several states over. As a reward, the band was given some of the instruments which the store owner deemed too knicked-up to resell. It was all perfectly playable, as you’ll see when Dippy & The Bad Dreamers play Hamilton’s tonight.
Tonight: You already know about Dippy & The Bad Dreamers & The Nicked Equipment at Hamilton’s… Grazy Klue is at the Bullfinch, solo acoustic… An Evening With Cut Finger at D’ollaire’s…

There’s an old blues song:
“I’m in love with
Wanna marry
wanna marry wanna
marijuana.”
We don’t partake of sense-altering substancing other than loud bass parts. But there’s legalization noise in the community at the same time there’s marriage equality legislation. Ballots are being readied. So the blues community is rallying around both issues, and the above-mentioned drug song, with a “Wanna Marry Marathon” Saturday in the

They wanted to use a school auditorium or civic building but weren’t allowed to use one. They wanted to interest a lodge or society but could not. So they’ve taken their action to the alleyway behind Arthur’s Art Store on Main. It’s a comfy place, protected pretty well from the elements, with electricity provided by the store through an open stockroom window.
The back-alley atmosphere should provide an interesting angle for the event. A mock marriage is planned. So is a mock smoke-in.
It’s hard to know if folks will even find the event, let alone be swayed by it. But the blues community is adamant. They want to do their part.

There’s an old blues song:
“I love you baby but no more of that.”

Tonight: The Dumb Ox at the Bullfinch. Return of one of the religious farm bands… The Everlasting Man, short set at Hamilton’s… The Colored Lands at D’ollaire’s. Expect a protest…

Dusty Death and the Walking Shadows are playing tomorrow at the Bullfinch. Strike that. They’re playing “Tomorrow” at Hamilton’s tomorrow, and playing the same song the next night as well. The poor players have been convinced to do three hour-long happy-hour sets in the same week because some idiotic manager thinks it will make for a good story. Well, here’s your story. It’s a meaningless gesture. It robs Hamilton’s regulars of variety and opportunity. There’s every chance that we’ll be sick of DD&WS before we’ve even gotten to know them. Take your time, why don’t you? Creep at a petty pace…
Tonight: Pad Site at the Bullfinch. Two sets, one of Build to Suit covers… No Turn on Red at Hamilton’s, old love covers… An Evening With Blast of Hydration at D’ollaire’s…

The Cryptogrammarians sing only in code. Some of their songs only have meaning if you connect the first letters of each line. Others only add up if you remove certain letters from words, creating other words. Then there are the ones which don’t sound like words at all, because they are letter-substitution ciphers.
We love doing the little puzzles on the comics pages while waiting for bands to come on at the Bullfinch. But actually hearing a band sing and play those puzzles is an exercise in frustration. It hard to make out song lyrics at the best of times, and it’s completely futile to try to do so even with the foreknowledge that there are hidden meanings.
The Cryptogrammarians aren’t doing this for us, however. They’re having fun among themselves, and making us sit through it. Their labored intros to the songs, which basically explain that we’ll never get what they’re trying to say, haha, is more infuriating than the lousy drumming. They are clever college students showing off, and townie bars be damned dummies.
Yet we don’t seem to be alone in our concerns. Interest (resentment?) among the Cryptogrammarians’ fellow coding students has led to the issuance of a photocopied, stapled, lyrics compilation that doubles as a puzzle book. The booklet will be available at future gigs, starting with this Thursday’s at the Bullfinch.
With most bands, we put down the puzzles when they start playing. With the Cryptogrammarians, we will pick it up. Glad they solved that puzzle. Now to solve the other one: Can’t you find a better drummer?
Tonight: The Floating Admiral at the Bullfinch; punk sea shanteys… The Well and the Shallows at Hamilton’s, another college-on-the-hill smarty band… Winged Euonymus (the Burning Bush line-up) at D’ollaire’s…