A-Frames – May 28, 2010 – Mohawk, Austin TX

[Seattle, WA] so most of the bands tonight ended up being former members of the audience, easily identifiable since the audience started out pretty sparse – this band ended up being the guy next to me who had the shirt I was crushing on (“No Trends”) and the guy in the “NoTV” shirt – as you might expect, people who don’t believe in trends aren’t necessarily a lot of fun – the music was a distinct departure from everything else, no feedback and no distortion, just clanging slapping-your-face guitar, bass and drums – they intentionally chose notes that didn’t quite fit together and weren’t exactly rhythmic or melodic – more of a marching discordant sound – NoTV was the mid-40s bald-headed singer, and he sang spoken voice a la Henry Rollins – NoTrends was the bassist, proficient, but the theological ringleader from my perspective at least – the band was a cross between Primus and Cake but that\”s making them sound better than they were – they were abrasive and unpleasant – so I was all prepared to give this band one of the worst reviews (at least for a group of good musicians) that I have in a long time, until they suddenly changed face and started playing faster and harder and were fantastic – so I conclude that they’re your average intently nihilistic hardcore band, who having aged, can’t turn to country or to writing ballads, so turn to slowed down hardcore that sounds like crap