This is a story of how local live music is great. It is not a story about how out of town music is not great, even though there are some hints here and there that might seem like that. Music anywhere is generally pretty wonderful, and C-U is lucky to have a healthy local scene that also supports excellent artists coming through from all over the world.
Last Thursday, June 20th, two touring bands were scheduled to play at Sipyard at this show. Both bands arrived at the venue early, chatted with some locals, requested a drum rug for their drum kit which a member of the local band on the ticket (Solar Shadows) started trying to hunt down, and hung out for awhile. Shortly before they were due to start playing, the bands left to check into their hotel. And then they never came back to the venue (don’t worry, they’re okay). Granted, this wasn’t a ticketed event, but some folks had come from out of town to check these bands out, and suddenly, no bands. And then a magical thing happened: as is often the case, several local musicians had come to the show as audience members that evening. And with barely any hiccup, the show went on.
Richard Miske of From Circumstances stepped in with a solo set, playing a bass with distortion/effect pedals. Miske was followed shortly by Grant Alexander, who is one half of Smoke in Space jumped on the mic, rapping over backing tracks. Solar Shadow played their scheduled set, and the night wrapped up with Nick Pitingolo’s metal vocals over a couple backing tracks.
Who knows why the touring bands (okay okay it was The Poppies and Sojii) decided to scrap a scheduled show. It’s a bummer, and by all accounts, pretty poor show etiquette. But what an excellent showing of local artists banding together (heh heh) to problem-solve, and turning a loss into a real win. Missed the show? Check out the video below for a look at Richard Miske’s spontaneous set.