BloodLust!

Blake Edwards (Vertonen) was kind enough to forward this review that he wrote about Saturday's event:

"s.o.t., bloodyminded, billy carter band, gays in the military @ bighorse, chicago

missed the first band so nothing to comment.bloodyminded had one of their most entertaining sets, despiteoverheating (and killing) the PA (and their set) at maybe the 15minute mark and not getting the volume they deserve. mark moved aroundin the audience quite a bit, which probably some folks hadn'tanticipated; not abusive, just festive. he also managed to knock theonly thing not nailed down--the mixer--off the table, but remarkablynothing came unplugged due to that. highlight for me would have beenthe second new song from their next CD, which had something in theprovisional title about an ex girlfriend who had schizophrenia talkingabout sexual abuse as a child. there weren't any lyrics per se that icould discern, but a solid dose of synth pummeling and microphonessquealing away from feedback generated from the PA. another pleasingaspects was ed also came into his vocal "element" more, which I'malways glad to see live, as the lad does have a solid set of pipes.billy carter band sounded a lot like lazy cowgirls circa 1989 to me asI listened to them from the outer room, as i didn't have any punkygarage rock jones to fill (and didn't feel the need to suck in moresmoke as the band did their stuff). they sounded fairlysolid/proficient, but I wasn't really down for their sound at the time.gays in the military is becoming more of a performance oriented dealwith each passing gig, or so it seems. this time, a handful of toplessand pasties covered ladies, plus a small coterie of scantily dressedgals with pseudo-seasonal outfits, were already roaming around thebar, no introductions needed as to their involvement with theevening's events. I was already prepared for somewhat of a lessenedshow since GITM's drummer was not with them anymore; corporal (orsergeant?) chris took over the drums. His drumming ability wasn't somuch the concern as was what would be the lacking synth and screaminghe usually provides. Once the festivities began, I almost felt theband sensed/anticipated people (read, mainly undersexed boys) would bepaying less attention to what the band was doing and more attention tothe "thrill" of seeing boobies flashed at them as the ladies paraded,shook what the lord gave'em, and flung porn DVDs and magazines intothe audience. heck, only one of the band members even got down to thecamouflaged swimsuit which once was standard for the band. In pasttimes, the fab four (or five) on stage were the object ofentertainment, not the supplementals in from of the stage. Don't getme wrong; the gal with the gingerbread bustier that people wereinvited to eat was amusing, and it was almost amusing watching thisone dude stand nearly motionless with a molester grin while staringlasciviously at this one girl's ass as she was piggybacking on someguy. But the fact that the highlight was the sheer novelty and chaosof their finale, a cover of Chicago's "25 or 6 to 4" with solotroffadding to the vocals made this probably my least favorite shows bythis otherwise entertaining ship of fools.

sep/dis"