Reverend Horton Heat @ the Roxy, Boston 11-13-2008

[music | Saul Williams - Skin of a Drum]

Deja-vu. Almost exactly a year after the last trip to the Roxy to get Religion, we're back with the Reverend and Nashville Pussy. Aside from me losing my toenail last year, I think I had just as much fun.

Horton Heat, photos, difficulty: IN THE PIT

Reckless Kelly opened and was really good, lead guitarist reminded me of Boston people to a degree, just a few notes strung together would make me think of Joey Santiago, or the way he bent a chord made me think Throwing Muses. I don't know why that is, they mentioned he went to Berklee, but still it's just coincidence, but he's that sort of guitarist. They're good loud fast country music with better lead guitar than most. We liked 'em. Last year's lineup had Nashville Pussy as the first opener, then Hank III (holy shit). I'm really happy with the fact that when Rev. has two opening acts, they're two REALLY fucking good opening acts. I'll probably give these guys $15.

Nashville Pussy fucking rocked like they do, crowd went crazy, like they do. Ruyter Suys just shreds, they're loud and fun and the two times I've seen them they totally wound the crowd up for the Reverend. There could have been some concept of vocal mics, but who cares, like Saul Williams said, we're not there to hear lyrics, we're there for the drum. And the guitar, Saul, don't forget the guitar.

We have seen Rev. Horton Heat 3 times, once at the Middle East downstairs and twice at the Roxy. I thought it was a once in a lifetime the first time, and that he keeps coming around pretty much yearly makes me hugely happy. I never smile as much at any show as I do when I see Jim Heath's smirking mug shredding non-chalantly. I have to say that for this, I kind of prefer the Roxy to the Middle East. It just doesn't seem as claustrophobic and there's more room for more Pit.

I think the Reverend is kind of camera shy, since at the last two shows they had big signs everywhere that if anyone saw a camera, you were getting ejected, I really hope I didn't piss him off too much. I'm very happy that wasn't the case this time, since I've got an unhealthy obsession with Jimbo and the Most Beatiful Instrument You'll Ever See People Standing On. And with the huge plastic grin as Jimbo introduces him at the end of the shows. I'm really glad I got pictures of that, no matter how blasted.

Covers included but were not limited to:

Stray Cats - Rock This Town (he said "heres the least creative most cliche rockabilly song ever, shows no imagination in picking this for the set", etc. We all loved it)

Sabbath - Paranoid with the drummer, Paul Simmons, singing.

Ace of Spades with Blaine Cartwright from Nashville Pussy, crowd went nuts again.

PICS, many more at Flickr:

Reckless Kelly:

Nashville Pussy:

Reverend Horton Heat:

Fly, JIMBO!

He's goin' off the rails:

Jimbo plays during this:

This is an accidental Panorama, which just happens to be one of my favorite shots from the set. I had meant to take my camera off of manual settings and just take a quick shot of the bass, but the panorama setting looks almost identical to the "Auto" setting. What ended up happening was that I panicked and started taking pics of the floor just to make it stop. Then the camera stitched them in the most amusing way.