Melvins Lite pushes for a Guinness World Record by playing fifty states in fifty-one days; day thirty sees them in Hoboken, New Jersey.
Review by Daniel del Ben,
photos by Matthew Adams
The Melvins have gone through many, many bassists throughout the years. At this point they have three functioning lineups. On tour currently is Melvins Lite, which features guitarist King Buzzo, drummer Dale Crover and upright bassist Trevor Dunn. The trio is aiming to set the Guinness World Record for quickest US tour for a band by playing fifty states (plus DC) in fifty-one days. This comes with some controversy as George Thorogood is saying that that he did faster (fifty days) thirty some years ago, but the logic seems to be “fuck him”; if he did that, then why isn’t he in the record book?
This New Jersey show on October 5 was number thirty. All that aside, it was a really great show. Illinois duo Tweak Bird opened; they’re promoting their new EP Undercover Crops and they played most of it. Tweak Bird has a pretty crazy way of being heavy and spacey, while weird and straight-forward all at the same time.
Melvins Lite opened up the night with “Eye Flys.” If you don’t understand how awesome that statement is, you’ve got some homework to do. After that they went into “Captain Pungent” and “Berthas” from Stag, and then into some newer stuff. They played most of Freak Puke throughout the night, and Buzzo explained that they borrowed the album title from the Fugs.
In fact, there was an unusual amount of Buzzo talking during the band intros. We were also treated to a story from twenty years ago about some loser who got kicked out of Helmet that explained to Buzzo why the Melvins were awful and everything they were doing wrong.
Anyway, if you haven’t heard, Melvins Lite is anything but “lite.” They may have less equipment and members than normal, but they’re still heavier than most bands. They’re more of a jazz Melvins, but that doesn’t really sound right. There were some bass solos throughout the night and the final one ended with “Over the Rainbow” (you can read the story behind it here). After that, Buzzo and Dale joined in slowly to build to the night’s closer, “Shevil.”
