Hadouken! in Manhattan, 2/8/10....

You can find pix of the show by clicking through here. The html isn't willing to display pix here from FB, so until I work something out @Photobucket or whatever, the click-thru will hafta do.

It was an early show at the Mercury Lounge, on Houston St. in Manhattan, and the first time I'd been there since breaking my ankle at the Germs show last summer. It was good to be back :-) The opening band was hand-distributing CDs whose cover design clearly showed some New Order aesthetic influence, which I didn't particularly note in the music itself. They were okay, but not enough of a distraction to prevent figuring out how to get a tab at the bar.

Hadouken!, though fresh off the plane from their surging popularity in the UK, were clearly a bit nervous about gigging the USA, according to James due to our immense national geographic size. Maybe they're just friendly anyway, but it certainly put them in the mood to be super-nice to their audience. So, if you catch them on this tour, you've a good chance of getting to say 'hi' and hang out with the band for a bit.

It was a lot of fun to see how excited they got as audience members sang along with some of their songs, like "Turn the Lights Out" and "Get Smashed Gate Crash." The latter in particular is worth noting for those of you who think you're still too punk to enjoy music with electronics in it, as the chorus goes something like "Welcome to our world / We are the wasted youth / And we are your future, too..." Dude. It's like an 80s synth band had a love child with Black Flag, or something.

A good time was had by all-- and I even met another visibly-lefty fella, who'd come all the way up from Baltimore, in this weather, to catch Hadouken!'s maiden tour of the USA. Who know what the future holds, but it reminded me of all those stories about some dozens of people at those first Sex Pistols show. Don't be one of the thousands claiming you were there later, because it turned out to be a significant moment in pop-musical culture, just because you were too lame to go out on a Monday night. Bring a buddy, s/he will thank u later.

In short, it was the best $10 show I've been to in quite a while. Good times!

PS: Hadouken! has a new album out, Hadouken! For the Masses.