Our thoughts: Muddy River Smokehouse (Portsmouth NH)

February 6, 2009

w/Hatchetface and the Vipers, Ghouls Night Out

For some reason Portsmouth is not a rock friendly town. A waitress at a local eatery blames the town council. Regardless, the one venue in town that has shows regularly (The Muddy) tends towards hippie jam bands, but when an associate of mine got the gig booking there, we hit him up for a show. Apparently he is also an associate of Peri’s from Hatchetface and the Vipers, so between us he caved to Portsmouth’s need for real rock and roll. Ghouls Night Out from Mass was gracious enough to round out the bill.

Unfortunately, HF&TV had a last minute illness and planned on performing as a 3-piece. We went on first to a surprisingly large crowd. Sound onstage was great, and the audience was churchmouse quiet, as usual. Due to the lighting, we couldn’t see any faces, so we couldn’t tell if they were doing the usual “listen carefully” thing or they were bored out of their skulls. I like to think it was the former. Jack’s Brother Mike brought a lot of his friends & co-workers, and our fan Joe the mechanic drove 2 hours to see us! That’s dedication.

Bass-less HF&TV were as entertaining as the regular version. Peri’s got such a great voice and she and Salli are quite the raconteurs onstage. Their new cd is really good as well, so everyone should buy it! Most bands couldn’t function without a full line-up, but they pulled it off great. I hadn’t seen Ghouls Night Out before, but they were an all girl surf/goth/rockabilly trio, all quite leggy with morbid lyrics, and quite entertaining. Unfortunately, it was late on a cold night, so most of the crowd had drifted away by the time they went on, but they still rocked out. At some point I must go see them on their home turf.