[Jandek] Caroliner show!

[Shervin Fatehi]

The Caroliner show yesterday at the Café du Nord in San Francisco was  
just spectacular. By way of thanks for the recommendation, here's a  
very brief (and very superficial) review:

After four excellent opening bands -- Loachfillet and Hans Grusel's  
Krankenkabinet being the most impressive, with bizarre tape loops and  
a demented cover of "Master of Puppets" distinguishing them,  
respectively -- a curtain parted to reveal one of the more eye- 
bending stage setups I've seen in a while. Basically, it was like  
somebody had sprayed fluorescent Day-Glo colors over every surface  
(including the ceiling) in an old-timey filigree. Here and there you  
could see impressionistic portraits of the band's main inspiration,  
Caroliner the singing bull... The six musicians were in extravagant  
neon costumes, too: The drummer/trumpeter/saxophonist at left and  
back had what looked like a goat's skull over his head; a disembodied- 
double-bassist sported an enormously-enlarged, green head with a  
disconcerting, poofy, grey Fu Manchu moustache; the keyboardist  
(whose synth racks were done up to look like a calliope or pipe  
organ) had a giraffe head with what looked like dangling playing  
cards; the bassist and guitarist, both women, had a fuzzy goat's head  
with long blonde braids and a blacked-out face with some framing  
fabric; and the singer had a jack-in-the-box that opened to reveal  
everything from a whole octopus (neon meate dream of an octafish?) to  
what I think was the iconic bull's head. The guitarist even had neon  
orange nail polish. All of this, of course, was accentuated by  
blacklights shining in every direction...

As for the sound, it seemed as though GWAR had loved up The Residents  
and pushed out a psychedelic baby. Awesome.

Sherv