LIVE: Hardscrabble & Pyrite @ Cal's Fest 2006

Performer: Hardscrabble & Pyrite @ Cal's Fest 2006
Location: Cal's Bar / 400 S. Wells / Chicago, IL
Date: 08/13/06

Review: "Y'know, if you stand here long enough, the dumpsters start to smell like popcorn" my girlfriend said to me over the washboard stylings of Chicago's Hardscrabble. I can't think of a better quote for Cal's Bar, which sits a couple of blocks away from and a hundred levels lower than the Sears Tower. Cal's unassuming corner liquor store exterior has always been the kind of place where you find treasure among trash to me. Formerly closed on weekends and catering to Loop businessmen, Cal's now opens its doors on the Financial District Lords' days of rest in order to give homeless, hipsters and hillbillies a place to drink cheap, talk dirty and rock hard. Every Friday and Saturday, you can head down to Cal's and witness three or four bands of varying quality for no cover. A day's worth of collecting aluminum will score you a few drinks and if you end up liking the music, you can use your spare change to tip the bands (the only payment Cal's offers... and the employee's shirts insist on it). The success of this equation led Cal's to start their own music festival in 2002, dubbing it, simply, Cal's Fest.

2 days. 16 bands. $10.00.

Eat your heart out Lollapitchtonation!

I was on hand Sunday, Aug. 13th to see two of the fest's bands play. One hillbilly jug-style and the other a balls-out rock group. That brings us to the popcorn scented dumpsters.

Cal's fest isn't in a park or even in the dimly-lit, ash-coated corner of Cal's itself. This rock festival might be the only one that takes place in an alleyway lined with garbage bins. It couldn't be more appropriate. The far end of the alley contains a small stage and just beyond lies the onramp to the Eisenhower Expressway. With an armband (or in my girlfriend's and my case, a handstamp that read "100% SHIT") to let the girl pulling beers out of rolling coolers know you paid the gate fee and are old enough to drink, the mood isn't much different than those hot summer nights outside of your cousin's garage leaning on his Camaro. Only here, there's no Camaro, no annoying nephews running around with snot on their shirts and a lot better music than the classic rock station your cousin has pumping out of his trunk speakers.

Hardscrabble

$2 PBR in hand, I glanced around the alley to see thirty or so people mulling about, tapping toes, smoking and dancing in place. While I shook a few hands and said hi to a few friends, my ears perked up at a song utterly familiar to me, yet unrecognizable due to the washboard percussion and thigh-slapping rhythm that was added to it. An old-timey country whine chorus gave the lyrics I should have known a twang they'd never had before. It wasn't until a couple of days later when I had to have someone tell me that this song was the Tom Waits' song, "Jockey Full Of Bourbon." Despite my confusion, the performers on the Cal's Fest stage drew my attention.

Hardscrabble is a trio consisting of guitarist John Hasbrouck (Cracklin' Moth), washboard percussionist Lawrence Peters (Plastic Crimewave Sound, Velcro Lews & His 100 Proof Band) and brand spankin' new upright bassist Josh Piet (The Hoyle Brothers). Forget alt-country, Hardscrabble is a real country group right here in the not-so-country landscape of Chicago. Amidst all of the skyscrapers and fancy dressed hotdogs, these guys manage to pluck and scrape out a rhythm that can turn even the crustiest alley by the freeway into a saloon. The self-admitted "jugless jug band" had Cal's Fest attendees hootin' and hollerin' as they turned standards and classics into a country version of free jazz. One can tell that John, Lawrence and Josh are all competent musicians capable of playing any of the numerous songs they cover they way it originally sounded, but the freeform playfulness between them in their live show is what makes Hardscrabble stand out. If Django Rheinhardt had played a laundry appliance, this is the sound I imagine he would have made.

Pyrite

From the riverside rhythms of Hardscrabble, that both hipster and hip-replacement patient could enjoy, Cal's fest shifted without a clutch into the three piece garage rock stylings of Pyrite. With a disjointed and driving rock sound, this young band has a smattering of psychedelia on its edges and a great energy on stage. With tongue-in-cheek dirty-rock songs like "Arrest That Cop" and "Automatic Drip," Pyrite can't help but to project that energy into the crowd during its live show. Comprised of guitarist Mike Green, bassist Brandon Bayles and drummer Geoff Atkinson (Telenovela), Pyrite played what would have been a solid set if a bass string hadn't snapped during the second song. Bayles is the vocal strength of the group and plays bass more like he had a six string playing rhythm, which occasionally gives the aural illusion of two guitars. Green's guitar style reminds me of the 13th Floor Elevators or The Red Krayola by wavering in and out of tune intentionally. Atkinson, as I have pointed out before, is the consummate drummer, happy to avoid the onstage rock antics of his bandmates (which nearly ended in collision) and beat out more complex rhythms than Pyrite's songs require.

After recovering from a defective bass guitar, Pyrite scorched through a solid set of the kind of rock music a person comes to expect from a bar like Cal's. During their final number, Bayles broke the song down into a squelch of feedback and effects from the pedals at his feet. It's a sound I am perfectly content to listen to for the textures and raw power of noise, but hope to see these textures incorporated into Pyrite's songs at future shows.

With only two bands under my belt, I left Cal's Fest 2006 feeling as if only Cal's could offer me as diverse a festival in only two hours. When the scene gets old and Chicago starts to get the best of me, it is establishments like Cal's that survive in the heart of the city that cheer me up. There is still something pure beneath all of the steel and glass and it's holding a cold beer in one hand... and a guitar in the other.

Rating: 4 / 5

Cal's Bar: [ Website / Compilation CD ]

Hardscrabble: [ Website / Myspace / Buy Their CD ]

Pyrite: [ Myspace ]

Other: [ More pictures of Cal's Fest @ Consumatron's Flickr Stream ]