Well friends, we did not win our night of the Rumble competition, but we had an incredible time. The show, at The Middle East, was so sold out by the time we went on, that multiple people who had stepped out for a moment were not allowed back in. Many people who came out to see us were turned away (sorry for that if you couldn’t get in). The room was completely packed. We had friends and fans holding up awesome signs, using noisemarkers, throwing bras at us. It was ridiculous fun. We particularly owe our good friends in The New Collisions some serious thanks for surprising us by organizing a fan army for the night.
We played as hard as we could. I am sore, bruised, and literally, had worn my fingers down so badly that two of them were bleeding the next day as I sat on the subway on the way to work. It got me some dirty looks and butts wiggling away from me down the row of seats. All worth it. All great. We owe you all a lot for the support we received. We were happy with what we presented.
The judges called it for The Dirty Truckers. I think they may have been the right call given the categories, which emphasize slickness and technical prowess over other things. I have never been a great musician or singer and the band has never been about being super polished, so I am sure we lost some points somewhere in those areas. One of the judges came over after the show and apologized to me saying that it was very close. I am not quite sure what he meant, but it sounds like we did okay overall. Regardless, I think everyone there in the audience had a great time and we had an awesome time, so who cares about the competition aspect? There’s still the possibility of a wild card slot for us. I am fairly certain that a slot will go to the 2nd-highest scoring band on our night, which may or may not be us. The Fatal Flaw and Have Nots also tore up the night, so it’s not an easy call. Hats off to the Truckers and to the previous nights’ winners, The Luxury and Gravehaven. Anyway, it was a tremendous honor to be selected to compete in The Rumble and everyone at WBCN and The Middle East, particularly Anngelle and Shawn, have done an amazing job making this whole thing happen. If you haven’t been out yet, you’ve got three more nights of prelims to attend, then two semis and the finals. Do yourself a favor and check it out. Barring illness or natural disaster, I will be there every night.
Press coverage so far (some of our night’s coverage not yet up on these, but expected soon):
Boston Band Crush
Ryan’s Smashing Life
Hotline Blog on the Boston Herald
Sooz
Johnny Arguedas’ Photos
Selene Angier’s Photos on Facebook
Kelly Davidson captures The Motion Sick attacked by bra-tossers
Also, check out these great reflections about the nature of local and live music and the dangers of rumbling on The Limits of Science.
A group of us have also gotten together and sent a bunch of tweets on a Twitter channel at #rumble
[…] times and see some great photos of us, possibly the best live shots we’ve ever been in, at (recap) and […]