Day Party Crawl
By Audra Schroeder, Fri., March 18, 2005
Arthur Magazine Party
Church of the Friendly Ghost, Thursday, March 17
As the best source of info on all the music that's loud and weird, Arthur magazine has a responsibility to its readers: to enrage as much as entertain, and to do it in a smart way. To be saviors, so to speak, from shitty mainstream pap. Thursday afternoon's showcase at Church of the Friendly Ghost was packed to the pews with folks waiting to be seduced by Arthur's lineup. Brooklyn quartet Psychic Ills kicked off the services with a mostly instrumental maelstrom of moody space rock, and with the singer having his face wrapped with a dark scarf, obscuring his profile, their dark compositions seemed even more sinister. Next, Harvey Sid Fisher took over to remind us you can write a song about almost anything. While he's become a cult figure for his astrology songs, Fisher dropped some knowledge on the congregation, singing songs about picking up girls, the importance of a healthy diet, and why Pisces are sometimes assholes. Then, five diminutive fellows from Padova, Italy, took the stage, and introduced themselves as Jennifer Gentle. For the next 45 minutes, the Church was filled with a mellifluous patchwork of poppy psych from their Sub Pop debut, Valende, and a couple of 10-minute-plus guitar freak-outs. D.C.'s Dead Meadow took care of the closing prayer with their Blue Cheer-sized eruption of feedback and wah-wah. To top it all off, there was free beer and vegan hot dogs. It was a noisy little slice of heaven in East Austin.
