Rubble, Green Milk From the Planet Orange, Gary Floyd’s Buddha brothers
Room 710, June 12
On the last night of Room 710’s fifth anniversary celebration weekend, three bands used beat-up guitars to walk in outer space. It began with dick: Austin’s punk past, Gary Floyd, who reunited Armadillo busters the Dicks the night before, sang his heart out with his latest SF act, the Buddha Brothers. Floyd, a chubby fellow with the voice of Janis Joplin, schooled the rosy-faced if sparse audience as his fourpiece dropped thick, warm riffs and he got low for guttural roots by Memphis Minnie, Roky Erickson, and old-school punk. Lifting songs from Black Kali Ma, Floyd’s last band, the Buddha boys bled through a set that was both Germs and Muddy Waters. Japan, apparently, is irrigated with LSD as Green Milk From the Planet Orange took the stage next and bugged out with pregnant prog rock. The baby-faced trio sounded like the Boredoms cracked out on Mogwai at 78 rpm, playing 20-minute hail storms from their recent disc, City Calls Revolution. Jumping into the crowd screaming, laughing maniacally, and taking a page from Gibby Haynes’ megaphone manual, GMFTPO’s yelps and hardcore thrusts demonstrated that Gary Floyd’s punk ethos remains alive and well. Another hardcore with a debt to the Dicks, the Butthole Surfers’ King Coffey, materialized next with his new band Rubble, a fivepiece earthquake shaking down Texas psych into a black hole of guitars. Coffey’s masterful thumps aside, Rubble sounded like Acid Mothers Temple on Robitussin – sonic gas without discernible form. The singer screamed the short set into a dead mic before the band ground to a silent halt at the stroke of 2am. A holy Sabbath, where punk history rubbed elbows with rock’s future.
This article appears in June 17 • 2005.