Show Date: March 3rd
Last year YOTS rocked The Twilight Sad, Frightened Rabbit, and We Were Promised Jetpacks at Dante’s all in the same night. Scottish rock night. Frightened Rabbit certainly was the high point of the night, but We Were Promised Jetpacks brought the raw fun of shows of our youth. That gritty who gives a fuck of a local rock show.
Hitting the Doug Fir with Chris. Again!
Wednesday night and the Fir is pretty juiced. Nice, nice showing. Portland in the motherfucking house. Crowd ate this band up. Lots of sing along, head banging, and some girl climbed up on her man’s shoulders during the last song. Hells bells. People cutting loose and having fun at a rock show. .
Oh. Yeah. Except for the bucket of warm douche behind us.
“I wanna get into a fight and have some nachos.”
Surprised this hasn’t been stolen yet as a marketing campaign.
Maybe it is a Jack Johnson song I’m not familiar with.
As an aside. What is up with PDX concert crowds? For a town that prides itself on staying weird and doing your own thing, the lack of self conviction to smoke pot openly at a rock show is mind boggling.
Anyways. Venue smells like weed. Didn’t see anyone smoking. Probably piped in.
We Were Promised Jetpacks are your rock n roll four piece. Dressed like four unassuming guys on a Saturday. This music is rock, but not for everyone. Definitely not pop. No easy choruses. In fact, the opposite. Minimal harmonies. Not going to say it is necessarily punk (what is?) but it is good. All that fucking matters.
So, what do you get for your ten bucks then?
Singer/guitar center, bass is your right. Other guitar your left. Lead singer (Adam Thompson) is like a bulldog. Spitting heavily accented lyrics, attacking guitar, and just screaming vocals. Not sure if he will have much of a voice left in a couple years. He’ll sing some verses off mic and he’s clear as a bell. Spitting. Screaming. Sweating. Angry.
Totally reminds me of the shows of my youth. Which is why I like We Were Promised Jetpacks. They aren’t the best band in the world. Who cares. Tonight they were. Anytime these guys play a small room in a town I’m in? There.
