Hangun Man

Hangun Man by Tony Nelson. See more photos of the evening in Tony's slideshow.

This easy-breezy trio is worth its weight in the night’s free Triple Rock bacon. The band’s twangy, whisky-drenched warbling sounds like a southern fried Stephen Malkmus and is equally as charming. At times sounding like a cyclone in need of a strait jacket, the stripped-down fuzz is spiraling out of control much like the dry-humping orgy going down inside a beaten-up hula-hoop in the audience. Hangun Man does a powerful one-two stomp straight to the craw. The tunes are wildly unkempt, but massively pleasuring.

Kitten Forever

“This song’s about a cat who’s really sick. He ate something and it stuck in him. He probably ate bacon.” Liz Elton, the barefoot and yelping singer of Kitten Forever, is, of course, talking about the mighty Scout Growing Mountain. Scout is the band’s mascot and Elton is a little obsessed with him.

“He is not fat, but he’s 19.25 lbs and he is like a fucking linebacker,” she explains later through a choking cloud of American Sprit smoke. “He is like pure muscle. He is literally the size of a small beagle.”

Kitten Forever: badass feline enthusiasts

The band sings about equal parts felines, love, love of felines and vomit. It’s the kind of gnarly punk that steals your breath and makes you want to pass out, in an entirely good way. Kitten Forever is a surprisingly simple beast, with just bass, drums and vocals and lyrics that usually include the term “AAAAAAHHHHH.” But the trio has the magic to produce throbbing waves of whump that hit you right between the thighs before they make you smile, and leaves the audience dancing manic and uncoordinated jitterbugs.

Unicorn Basement

I think this dude ate wolves. Max Clark of Unicorn Basement is dancing like a bloody wolf claw is going to liberate itself from his stomach at any moment. It is only halfway through 11 when Unicorn Basement takes the stage in front of a now scantily crowded floor. But, who gets drunk on a Wednesday except the scours of humanity? That’s BIOYAF’s draw: the very fashionable dregs of society; the prettiest scumbags in the city. And the duo fits right in.

They may have awkward haircuts, but they’ve got lots of spirit. Free of instruments, except for one well-timed keytar appearance, Clark and Deanna Steege lunge and pounce in beatless formation to their programmed and croaking drum machine. They sound like electronic wonderlings Adult., only with less drugs and more sex, or a demon possessed radio that can’t choose a station, the songs shifting crassly eight times a minute.

Clark, posing in gold lamé tights, aptly sums up the evening. “This is a party for the souls of a horrific universe where only terrible things happen,” he says. If “terrible” means awesome, then well said.
--Erin Roof