Friday, January 15, 2010

The best single of 2000

10 years ago I was thoroughly smitten with a local band called the Subtonix. Here they are at South Of Market bike messenger bar the Tempest doing their single, "Trophy". I know it's way too dark and the sound is wonky (you can't hear the sax for the first few seconds), but their blazing, audacious brilliance is not a bit diminished. I'm glad to see this online. I'm pretty sure I was at this show.



They used to go onstage smeared in fake blood and wearing dresses made of garbage bags and play the catchiest, most uninhibited reverb-slathered gothy post-punk with catchy sax riffs, spooky keyboards and whooping vocals. Plus, they were all really nice people, which never hurts. Several of them have gone on to become more well-known: yes, that's Jenny Hoyston, later of Erase Errata, on guitar. And the sax player is Jessie Evans, who then fronted the Vanishing for a few years and went on to become a star in Berlin. On lead vocals and bass is Jessy Montaigne, who moved to Portland and now leads the Magick Daggers. Drummer Cookie Tuff is doing some sort of burlesque performance art thing, and I don't know what happened to Adrienne the keyboard player. Hope she's doing well and being creative somewhere.

Can it be that an entire decade has passed since the Subtonix walked the earth? Glad I didn't miss it.

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