Live: The Bronx with Screaming Females and Menzingers @ Riot Fest 9.8.12

I was pretty stoked for this show, as I was going to be able to catch up with old friends, see The Descendents and get the hell of Dodge at a reasonable hour, as Gogol Bordello were closing the proceedings. I ended up catching the latter part of a pretty aces Menzingers set and kinda sorta even enjoyed The Screaming Females after six or seven unintentional sets. I'd still like to hear her solo in anything close to a key, but they do seem to be growing on me. I'm sure they are all sleeping considerably more soundly with that JS-NYC decree. Here's to their continued success.

The Bronx are another band that I very much want to like, but never have really taken to. I've seen a couple of their shows and thought they were ok. Mariachi El Bronx I really liked, but people like Rut and the like talked so highly of them I had hoped for more of an epiphany. This show started to turn the tide a bit more. Despite borrowed backline, The Bronx Flag-ed it up for a solid 45 minutes, the latter part of which highlighted by the enormous thunderheads and lightning rolling in from the west that eventually cancelled the show; a move seemingly for naught after a 10 minute deluge but one that also garned a 100% refund.

It didn't make up for the move of Hot Water and Descendents to St. Vitus, an eventuality I was unable to get into even after a 20 minute bike sprint from Manhattan minutes after the announcement. The douche quotient outside was insufferable, so I can only hope that the line policing that kept JS-NYC out wasn't one that added insult to injury.

R