[Photo courtesy of Jon Melnick. See his Flickr stream [HERE]]
Music is passion. Music is anger. Music is triumph. Music is sorrow. Music is love. Somehow a Fucked Up show manages to incorporate them all. To love Fucked Up is to understand the wonder and beauty of the clean, rising chords of “Let Her Rest”, the multilayered, joyous dueling-guitar attack of “Running On Nothing”, and the gravel-scrubbed squall of incomparable frontman Damian “Pink Eyes” Abraham’s vocals. What makes sense about a Toronto band with an absolutely crack rhythm section, who puts out double-LP rock operas (their latest, David Comes to Life), whose focal point is a hefty, shirtless man screaming into the mic (when it’s not passed into the crowd), carrying crowd-surfers on his back, and cracking off disarming riffs on everything from his weight to his penis? Yet there’s something that does. It works, in part, because Abraham may be – if not the best vocalist – the best frontman in rock right now. He is self-effacing, magnanimous to a fault, funny, and kind. And positively magnetic to watch, as he presides over the chaotic mosh pit party that his band’s music creates. After an earnest, intense set (and one of their best possibly ever) by Titus Andronicus where they paid tribute to the events of the day at Occupy Wall Street, I’ll admit that it was refreshing to crack a smile at Abraham, talking about his recent weight loss. “I felt better fatter” he said, “I don’t want you to think I’m selling out, that I’m changing”). Even talking about OWS, Abraham managed to be funny (listen to the banter tracks to hear his thoughts on OWS and why you shouldn’t “bend over”.. or as he rephrased it, “lie down”).
As noted, while Fucked Up’s sound is nominally “punk”, there is nothing simple or unfocused about its players, whose densely layered guitars are the sea in which Abraham and his antics swim. Already hailed as one of the most ambitious punk bands ever, David Comes to Life raised the stakes with a four-part opera told from the viewpoint of multiple unreliable narrators. From most bands, projects like these come off as weak gimmicks. The difference here is that Fucked Up have the chops to pull it off. This show at Warsaw in Greenpoint – a venue I had not visited in awhile, but is now being booked by the tastemaker Chris Diaz of the Knitting Factory and sure to have more great shows – was the second of two NYC shows in which the band performed the entire record straight through. And what a record it is – obvious as the band whipped through its piles and piles of pop hooks with punk seethe with occasional breaks in between series of songs for Abraham to chat with the crowd. After the encore break it was time for the deep cuts, including a very special performance of a song called “Unrequited Love” with bassist Sandy Miranda on vocals. After closing out the set with the track “David Comes to Life”, Abraham stuck around on stage to help one fan get his phone back, and another person to get their jacket – even after the house music went up. By the time I had broken down my equipment and left quite a bit later, I found Abraham standing outside the venue – still shirtless, on a fairly cold night – chatting with fans. Music is love, indeed.
I recorded this set with an excellent soundboard feed from the Warsaw team, plus the Schoeps supercardiod microphones on a high stand. The sound is excellent. Enjoy!
Thanks to Chris Diaz and the members of the band for arranging permission to record. You can also download my previous recording of Fucked Up at Maxwell’s in Hoboken last year [HERE]
We are excited to announce that this recording is now hosted on Fucked Up’s bandcamp page. You can stream below, and clicking that link will take you there to buy/download
Fucked Up
2011-11-15
Warsaw
Brooklyn, NY USA
An acidjack master recording
Recorded and produced by acidjack for nyctaper.com
Soundboard + Schoeps MK41>KCY>littlebox >> Edirol R-44 [Oade Concert Mod]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Audition (mixdown)>Audacity (limit peaks, set fades, amplify and balance, tracking, downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )
Tracks
01 Let Her Rest
02 Queen of Hearts
03 Under My Nose
04 The Other Shoe
05 [banter1]
06 Turn the Season
07 Running On Nothing
08 Remember My Name
09 [banter2]
10 A Slanted Tone
11 Serve Me Right
12 Truth I Know
13 [banter3]
14 Life In Paper
15 Ship of Fools
16 A Little Death
17 [banter4]
18 I Was There
19 Inside A Frame
20 The Recursive Girl
21 [banter5]
22 One More Night
23 Lights Up
24 [encore break]
25 [?]
26 [banter6]
27 Unrequited Love
28 [banter7]
29 David Comes to Life
30 [outro]
If you enjoyed this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT F*cked Up, visit their blog, and purchase their official releases, including David Comes to Life, directly from their page at the Matador Records website [here].
Thanks again for the recording. Cannot wait to hear this, as the Chicago set did not include the album in its entirety.
You doods are really doing the Lord’s work here. And a special nod for the write-up, which really captures much of what makes this band so special.
Thank you – the kind words are much appreciated, esp on the writeup. It’s kind of hard to explain in words exactly what the experience of these guys is like…
Well, AJ, you really nailed it.
All I can add, as a relatively recent convert to this band, is that a Fucked Up show can really reinstill one’s faith in the transformative power of live rock ‘n’ roll. If any of the old-schoolers think they’ve seen it all or are experiencing those jaded feelings that come up from time to time, just make a point to see this band. They will lay waste to yer cynicism.
The album of the year gets another layer!
Ace work
Thank you so much for this
Great work as always, acidjack! Is the Titus set going to make an appearance?
Titus didn’t allow us to record that night. If they had, I would love to have posted it.
Hey!
Thanks so much for recording their set, I run the Fucked Up Facebook page and I will be getting this up on there ASAP.
Cheers
Joe
Cool! yeah, please spread the word!
Thanks for this, great recording and nice to hear a couple of tracks off the David’s Town comp.
Track 25 is ‘Do You Feed’ (The Curry Song)