#FLVRHAUS

[dentalrecordsmusic]

Two Shows, One Night: Just Say No (Or Don’t)

Alien Boys frontperson Sarah lolls with the crowd. All photos by Joshua Kingston.

Let me give you some advice.

Someday, you are going to want to go to two shows on the same night. Maybe you promised your best friend you’d go to their band’s show, but now your favorite touring band is playing one night only across town. Maybe, like a certain friend of mine, you committed to reviewing two shows but didn’t realize they were at the same time because you never fuckin’ learned how to read.* In any case, it’s going to happen. And I’m here to tell you: it’s a terrible idea. Also, you should do it anyway.

Two months ago, I went to two shows in one night, accompanied by photographer Joshua Kingston. It was so exhausting that I think I’m still washing fatigue out of my ears, but it was also so god damn worth it that I’d do it again tomorrow if I could.

On February 9, FLVRHAUS released their new album. On February 9, Alien Boys released their new album. We made it to both with a combination of reckless driving, weirdly synchronous intuition, and sheer force of will. Both shows were great and I’m not sorry. And if you want to do the same thing, I’ve got some suggestions for how you can make it happen and not die.

FLVRHAUS is not as ominous as they may appear.

My first piece of advice to you is that it’s going to be way easier if your two shows are displaced by at least an hour. Otherwise you’re just going to have to split both sets down the middle, and you’re going to feel like a sad traitor to both of them. You’ll feel a little like a sad traitor anyway when for one show, you only get there in time for the headliner and miss all the openers (that is, if you are a decent human being who supports opening bands.) But with even a little wiggle room in your two shows’ start times, you’ll mitigate a lot of that guilt. Fortunately, FLVRHAUS opened the doors at 6, and Alien Boys didn’t let anyone in until 7, so we almost had time to breathe in our mad dash between the two.

I got to the FLVRHAUS show nearly at doors, an hour early for actual music, because somewhere in my lizard brain I decided that me getting there earlier meant the show would end earlier so I could peace out to Alien Boys on time. Of course, since I am neither a member of any of the bands involved nor an employee of the Astoria, this subconscious feeling had no bearing on reality. 

The show went on.

It was a great show. I haven’t seen a weirder band than Molly Be Damned in many moons, and their sporadic drums scattered across the stage, madcap ukulele, and peculiarly self-effacing stage manner put me in exactly the surreal headspace that is required to transition between two wildly different shows in one night. It really is a unique headspace. Even before the reality of the packed schedule truly hit me full force, I was in the zone, floating along on the music and glancing at my watch every ten minutes trying to imagine where the Alien Boys show was at in the lineup. It was even more surreal because my watch is a phone. Molly Be Damned was extremely conducive to my feeling deeply weird about the evening’s plans, and I still appreciate them for that.

The rest of the opening acts for the FLVRHAUS album release did not disappoint me as I surfed that musical mindset tide. It’s hard to stay grounded in the music when you know you’ve got somewhere else to be. So there’s another bit of advice for you: don’t even try. Let yourself drift in and out of the sound. You can experience music in all kinds of ways and none of those ways is wrong.

Everyone yells at the FLVRHAUS show, that’s how you can tell it’s fun.

Letting the sound buoy me in and out let me hear all three openers and be pleasantly surprised as the strongest elements of each disparate sound grabbed me by the ears and pull me back into close listening. It was a varied show. The Highsides sound nothing like Molly Be Damned, but their quick, tight pace and their pleasantly jarring pauses caught me right back up in the punk rock mood. And when I heard the first jangling notes of Stranded Hikers’ “Hangin’ on the Telephone” cover, I couldn’t look away from the rest of their set. It’s okay to be distracted, as you certainly will be with two shows on one night because the music is there to drag you around as long as you let it. That’s the point of punk rock. It’s a bodily experience. It grabs you and throws you around whether you want it to or not.

This was no less true of the deep-down grunge sound that FLVRHAUS unleashed. This was where the real guilt began because my sense of distraction got higher and higher as we got closer and closer to when I knew Alien Boys would be starting their headlining set across town. I had to let go of that guilt, though, because FLVRHAUS was such a jam that I couldn’t not be there for it. I knew we were going to have to blast out the door before the applause for their final song even had a chance to start, but I could be there in the moment because of their sheer enthusiasm for the new CD they had just released. Their music was infectious, an echo of the dancing disease myth tells us spread throughout entire medieval towns. Advice nugget number three: don’t do two shows in one night unless you know the bands will be so good they’ll keep you invested no matter how distracted by timing you get.

FLVRHAUS has everything: flannel, grunge, a banner for a different band.

The thing is, no matter the investment, we did have to dash, and that meant missing the final act of FLVRHAUS’s night: Russian Tim and Pavel Bures. That was, at least in anticipation, the biggest stain on my guilty conscience. They are, possibly, my favorite band in Vancouver (I know I say this about a lot of bands, but it’s true every time). But here comes the fourth piece of advice: overbooking your evening with punk rock shows goes a lot better when you’re in a small scene and everyone knows each other. 

About halfway through my time in the Astoria, I found myself standing directly next to Russian Tim himself - a character you may remember from such films as that thing I wrote about Rocket From Russia FEST last summer. It was between sets and all my neighbors were tugging out their earplugs (since we are responsible adults who wear protection). Tim hugged me, which is not surprising because at a show where there’s Tim, there’s hugs. As he did, though, I told him, “I’m gonna miss your set! I have to go cover Alien Boys later, I have to get to the WISE Hall.”

Because punks are excellent people who are friendly and understanding and care about each other, Tim refrained from reinforcing my guilt. “It’s fine, I understand!” He said, hugging me again. “You’ll be here next time!” So we ran out the door and we missed that set. But you know what? Vancouver is not a large scene, and I’ll see Tim and his outrageously joyous Russian pop-punk again.

Outside the Astoria, it was a half block dash to my car, somehow in a legal and free parking space in Vancouver. This, my friends, is another learning moment. Your advice: if you have to do this, bring your automobile and a propensity for vehicular miracles, because the bus isn’t coming any time soon and it’s going to screw up your tight schedule.

With my extremely responsible driving, we made it to the WISE Hall in under ten minutes. Here, of course, was the downside of driving between two overlapping shows, and also of living in Vancouver. I absolutely parked illegally. Next lesson: it’s possible you may have to break the law during this process. But that’s okay. You’re a punk.

Look at Alien Boys’ god damn stage presence. LOOK AT IT.

The vast crowd we found outside the venue was a good sign. For those who are unaware: the mass smoke break means we’re between sets. I knew we weren’t going to miss any of whatever was happening next. I hoped to God it was Alien Boys and not some secret post-headliner I had also missed by not remembering to read some damn Facebook events before accepting assignments like a true professional.

We elbowed through a dense hallway and very nearly collapsed at the door. After the short “we’re on the list” hand stamp moment, which never fails to make me suddenly feel like a grown-up with a real job, we noticed another miracle.

I love any punk rock band with tiaras and you should too.

By sheer coincidence, we had arrived in the venue just as the five members of Alien Boys stepped onto the stage. About three seconds later, a few bars into their first song, I felt it. Two shows, one night: actually a great decision.

Because here’s the thing: I wouldn’t have missed that Alien Boys album release for anything. Though I didn’t know anyone in that bill, as I did with the crowd back in the FLVRHAUS crowd, the music was just as overpowering, the atmosphere even more shiningly surreal. With my vision lit up by string lights and chandeliers drifting across the ceiling and shifting stage lights my exhausted mind insisted had come to Vancouver by way of the fairy realm, I felt their charismatic energy and forceful, enthralling d-beat with my whole self. It was transcendent.

The journey there was arduous. It was a night of early-onset carpal tunnel from journalistic scribbling, of logistical Tetris and wild sprints between vehicles and venues. It tore me down into a blank slate onto which music could pour.

Would I do it again, for another double booked punk rock work night? Absolutely fucking not. Would I do it again for the soul of the music? You’re fucking well right. *(P.S. The friend was me all along. Obviously.)

Cae Rosch will never write two live reviews, a cover story, and an album review while editing a full magazine section in one month for her part-time job again because she will probably keel over and die. Follow her on Twitter or Instagram.

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