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Faster Pussycat Jewel Manchester, N.H. July 31, 2017
It probably defeats the purpose of vacation to be looking for a gig to attend before you unpack. Ah, well, a guy gets antsy. I have a methodology: take out the old geometry compass and draw a circle through a town an hour drive away. Anything inside the area is fair game for a roadtrip. This time the circle passes through Portland, ME, Berlin, NH and creaky but kinda cool Manchester, NH where Faster Pussycat was holed up on a tour of every rock lovin’, second class Worcester east of the sun and west of the moon including Etobicoke, Ontario. I figure, “what have I got to loose?” I’m on vacation, right? Other than the “maybe it’s time for that intervention” looks from my family, this Russ Meyer retrospective scratch ticket was worth the nickel’s wear and tear.
Ok, Faster Pussycat did look like the house band in Tortuga at the end of the world. They’re a crew of not so brand new Nashville Pussy sleazegrinders who may have grown up with a pet Ratt in a trailer park run by Arthur Kane and Johnny Thunders on a side street behind Hollywood Boulevard and were kitted out by a teenage Vivian Westwood and led by Al Jourgensen’s light industry doppelganger. Things looked way more fun than the pink shirt, khaki and flip flop crowd in Wolfeboro. It’s Monday night. The room is half full. This could go south faster than a 3 pm slot at the 4H Grange Fair in Tufftonboro - but it doesn’t.
Maybe it’s the portable pole dancer set-up in the parking lot. Maybe it the Harleys. Maybe it’s 4 buck tallboys or the walking phosphorescent green jello shots. Maybe it’s that Jewel looks like an archaeological dig where design elements of its last five lifetimes overlap in the strata. Somehow it all comes together. The crowd is on the inside of the in-joke. Most know the fist pumps - Slip of the Tongue, howls - Don’t Change that Song, lift that phone lighter and emote moments - House of Pain and they know words - to everything. They’re showin’ big love and the band responds in kind.
Faster Pussycat throw a lot of shit into the blender but they know the key to a fine concoction is choice ingredients. The lyrics keep their nasty tongues in their witty cheeks. Ace Von Johnson’s guitar leads are strung out, short and taste metallic. Xristian Simon’s rhinestoned rhythm guitar crunchs the punk. Drummer Chad Stewart left bruises and Danny Nordahl’s low end was clipped and pushy. Taime Downe’s gargle with thumb tacks voice was shredded throughout. Everyone banged in on the choruses and left the crowd sweaty and ready for another go. Downe took a quick break while the band took a Stewart led run through AC/DC’s apropo Sin City and Nordahl took the vocal on Supersucker’s karma ditty, Pretty Fucked Up. Bathroom Wall, with that wicked hooked up little guitar figure and surefire dating advice, sent the Jewel crowd running to add a contact to their iphones. So, next time you go on vacation, don’t forget to pack you’re geometry compass.
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