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Written by: klamkilla

In the past I have been known to do a few show reviews from time to time,
but this time I have gone all out to provide you the reader with the closest
to the closest thing you can get to being at the show yourselves (the
closest being a video and I really don't see that happening). For you
see I braved life, limb, and a pretty expensive digital camera to get
some high quality pictures recapping that cold December night at the Catch
22 show.

My tale does not start inside the club, but rather outside on the streets.
While waiting in line for the show to start in the cold 20 degree Providence
Rhode Island weather a bet was laid down to my friend Mike McKay. The
details of this bet were as follows, for a whole two dollars he would
stand shirtless in the freezing night air. Not one to back down from a
bet he begrudgingly accepted and off came the shirt.

Now this in itself was hilarious but the ante was upped so to speak as
another five dollars were offered to him by various onlookers to take
of his pants and stand outside in his boxers. Almost instantly he accepted
and the pants were off providing us with this first picture…

As disturbing as this image was, one of the members of Autopilot Off
(a supporting band) noticed the hilarious hijinx going on so he rewarded
my friend for being so hardcore stupid with a spot on the guestlist. He
was also rewarded later in the evening again (I will get to that later
though).

Finally we are admitted into the club where the usual small talk and
banter above the incredibly loud music that noone in the audience actually
listens to ensues. The lights dim and the first band, the River City Rebels
take the stage. These guys were just awesome and the lead singer, Joe
McCool had so much charisma. He would randomly throw down his mic and
join us in the pit from time to time during one of their songs leaving
a member of the audience to take over the duties of vocalist for the remainder
of the song. They were a crazy bunch of fellows indeed with their constant
spitting on each other and in what could be quite possibly the most disturbing
act I've ever seen the singer pulled down his pants and dry humped their
guitarist (no picture acquired). Oh yeah their guitarist was a very pissed
off young lad by the name of Adam who had the misfortune of being born
with a disfigured hand that looked like a claw. The claw was perfect for
playing guitar though. The guy seemed like kind of a jerk what with his
constant sling of profanities toward the audience after every song. I
suppose however I wouldn't be as happy as I am today if I had a claw for
a hand, although I would think he would be used to it by now. Musically
their infectious blend of hardcore, punk, and ska was great and they really
got the crowd into their set with sing alongs, stage dives, and the like.

Next up was the hardcore band Ensign. Earlier in the evening when the
River City Rebels were getting the crowd pumped up about all of the bands
playing that evening they asked if anyone was there to see Autopilot Off.
They were met with a pretty warm reception. They then asked is anyone
was there to see Catch-22. Obviously everyone went nuts. Finally they
asked if anyone was there to see the next band by the name of Ensign.
The place went silent so the River City Rebels singer said "That's
fucked up." Out of pity everyone cheered like they were their favorite
band.

Needless to say Ensign took the stage anyways. They were a hardcore band
and following suit they were incredibly hard to understand. That is my
main problem with hardcore bands at live shows. If I have never heard
them before it is impossible to get into them because I can't even pick
up the chorus. They did denounce the lame shit that was going on in the
pit though with huge guys just kicking the crap outta anyone in there
including girls.

Autopilot Off (formerly known as Cooter but had to change their names
due to a lawsuit filed by a country band named Cooter) took the stage
and this was where the show got interesting. Think back to the beginning
of this article when I replayed the story of waiting in line and the guestlist.
Well after one of the songs the singer wanted to call someone special
up on stage. This person was one of the most hardcore fans he had ever
seen. This person was my friend Mike McKay.

They called him up on stage, took note of the fact that he was wearing
pants, and asked him to perform a little striptease so that all of those
who failed to catch him outside could get a taste of what went down. The
bassist started playing this 70s funk porno bass line and just before
the pants came off the singer stopped the whole thing. Commenting that
it was probably illegal for this to precede he instructed Mike to jump
back into the crowd and it was at this point in time that the picture
was taken. Oh yeah I also think that the look on the guitar players' face
is great.

FINALLY Catch-22 set up their equipment and took the stage. Just like
two weeks prior to this they absolutely rocked the house playing a wide
variety of songs from their two LPs and a few songs off of their new EP.
I would like to give a shout out to the bouncers at the Met for being
kind enough to let me get onstage to take this picture. That would be
their bass player going nuts.

One thing that pissed me off about their set was the pit. Perhaps it
would be the size of the club and the fact that there were two random
poles in the middle of the floor that could take the blame but there was
just no room to do anything. Plus everyone in the pit were just being
lame and pushing/shoving. Two of my friends, a girl in a tie, some crazy
African American kid, and myself moved to the way back of the club near
the sound booth and started our own little skankin circle. We had a good
time. I also managed to pull off a few more decent shots of the band.

After the show we talked to Autopilot Off for a while and headed back
to the car where a cold Papa Gino's pizza awaited us.

That's about it for this week. Check back next time when alongside BoneStormer
I will be presenting my top 5 albums of 2001!