Breda: There's smoke in the bar

What is there to say about the show in Breda:

Well, the soundsystem couldn't handle the amount of noise of the bands. And I think smoking should be prohibited in all bars. Just when I got used to the cleaner air at shows, bars seem to allow everyone to smoke inside again. YUK!

Despite speculation on the way to the show Malfunction doesn't sound like a Cro-Mags band. They rather have a Trash Talk, early Ceremony thing going.

State Of Affairs guitarplayer Rowan is pretty good on the drums as well, though guitarplay Wilco really should get more knowlegde of his amplifier.

Cracks In The Wall do sick covers of Infest and Black Flag which makes people mosh and they have their demotape available in all the colours of the world. Yet vocalist Theun shouldn't listen to Deep Purple in the car when I'm going along, because I can't stand long songs with boring solos.

Static Radio are from New Jersey, play a great Saves The Day cover and do have quite some memorable songs of themselves as well. I'm glad I have finally seen this band and think everyone into Lifetime should pick up their record.

This Routine Is Hell is probably one of the better Dutch hardcore bands around at the moment. They ripped the bar apart and had lots of people dancing, singingalong and whatnot. Despite all that they're also nice fellows and great neighbours at the merchtable. Best thing is that the bassplayer is a Dr.Pepper fanatic.

Some pics taken by Iris van Turnhout:
Malfunction



State Of Affairs:



Static Radio NJ:



This Routine Is Hell:



More pics can be found here.

Static Radio NJ - An Evening Of Bad Decisions

There were three bands I really looked forward to seeing on this years Groezrock festival. H20, because they are always a great band to see live, unfortunately they cancelled. True Colors, I was curious how they would hold up on a very large festival stage. (Which they managed impressively. It was like seeing Youth Of Today. Tons of singalongs, moshing and stagedives). And last but not least Static Radio NJ.

I already heard good things about that band and the tracks on their myspace were awesome. So I was bummed when they also had to cancel their tour. Little did I know that at Groezrock I would meet Phil who runs the Black Numbers, the label Static Radio NJ is on. (And also the label who put out the Purpose discography but more on that in a later blogpost).

Phil also had a couple of Static Radio NJ - An Evening Of Bad Decisions with him. So I didn't hesitate and picked one up. If I can't see the band I damn well will listen to their songs at home.

Good decision making there.

Sorry early Saves The Day, Shook Ones, Set Your Goals and tons of other bands. You might have been compared to Lifetime once, but that was just other bogus because of a lack of a really worthy band to fill in that void.

People we now have that band. Static Radio NJ combines later day 'Jersey's Best Dancers' melody with the earlier Lifetime stuff and sounds more like Lifetime than the band itself on their self titled reunion record.

Sure there are now songs about dancing with flowers in an SSD shirt. But Static Radio NJ brings the same kind of emotions and heartfelt songs without coming off as another emopop band.

I sure hope the band will make it over to Europe soon, for real.

Myspace: Static Radio NJ