Pool of Frogs and A Black China, Live @ Oasis 9/18/08

Once again, I forgot to bring a camera to a live performance. I hope your imaginations work well, or you feel like plumbing through these bands' myspace pages for photos from that night.

Anyway, I had heard that friend Johnnie Wang's band A Black China was going to be playing last Thursday, so I decided to clear my calendar well in advance and hit New Paltz since I hadn't seen them play in something like 6 months or more.

I arrived at Oasis about 7 minutes to 10pm. Since the bands were not scheduled to perform until 11, I figured this gave me about an hour to sit around, drink myself at least mildly stupid, and at least entertain the fantasy of chasing attractive young women around the room. As it were, I hadn't gotten halfway through my first beer before members of both bands came in with a rather glorious mountain of gear. That parade of equipment continued for about 10 minutes.

First band up was Pool of Frogs. First thing to note is that they were pretty loud. They started with a very spacey intro, then moved into a high-energy alt/punk/folk/rock sort of thing. Note "high-energy": these guys were so active during their hour or so set you'd think they were blood relatives of the Energizer bunny.

This live performance was the first real experience with this band; since I'm not a fan, I can't give you a run down of songs played. When I first heard them, I thought to myself, "This is the sort of music Weezer would make if they had a set of balls among them." But, I know precious little about Weezer, so perhaps my first impulsive comparison isn't entirely appropriate. The first song played resonated with me; nothing ever changes indeed (it should be on their myspace, go have a listen when done reading). Pool of Frogs is highly erratic, wild, and fun. The players couldn't sit still while playing, which I like since so many bands consist of members who stay in one place throughout a show, as if their feet were held in place by cement. The bass player was jumping off his amp, the drummer kept climbing past his kit up to the frontman's microphone; they just would venture wherever the hell they wanted to at any moment. Spontaneity of performance is a good trait to have. They made good use of some strategically placed feedback, and when singing backup, they knew how far away to be from the microphone to give a good effect.

I found their performance to be immensely fun. I think they had fun too. Pool of Frogs enjoys what they're doing, and it shows. For the approximate hour they performed, they were wild and goofy and just plain had fun. I especially like the Lite-Brite positioned on stage spelling out their band's name. It was a quite a fun show, and highly recommended.

Following Pool of Frogs was A Black China. I originally encountered this band through multiinstrumentalist Johnnie Wang. Last time I saw them perform, it was probably at the beginning of this year and they were still a three-piece band at that point. Since then, they have added another member. The current linup is: Jamal Ruhe (guitar/bass/keyboards/vox), Johnnie Wang (guitar/bass/keyboards/vox), Matt Grande (drums/vox), and Jesse Towey (bass/guitar/keyboards). During their performance, everyone alternated guitar and bass duties, with Johnnie handling keyboards.

Like Pool of Frogs, A Black China began with a spaced-out introduction, very mellow and not particularly suited to the late-night drunken bar set as the din of shouted conversations blended into the music in strange ways. There performance was marred by a classic problem with Oasis: the microphones needed to be turned up. It was difficult to make out vocals over the instruments. I don't know why exactly this is, but more than a few performances at Oasis are like this. Acoustic qualities of the room, equipement, who knows.

Aside from that, their performance was downright awesome. Their songs are a nice blend of romantic singer-songwriter, shoegaze, and, when needed, a solid thrash. There's a lot of wide-ranging influence in their music. They really brought out the thrash with the second-to-last (initially last) song. They were talked into doing one last tune, and brought out this soaring, sprawling, spacey trip into weirdness that lasted for something like 10 minutes (I think; I didn't time it precisely).

All in all, I'm glad I went out that night. Both these bands are quite awesome in their own ways, and I recommend catching them at you soonest convenience. Check their schedules and get out for a show.

Pool of Frogs website and myspace
A Black China website and myspace