Gray Hair & Punk Rock
by GuyWithADate on 1/25/13The Sinclair - CambridgeWhat happens when you go to a club to hear a band you heard 30 years ago? Obviously everyone has changed, both on stage and in front of it. There are a lot of gray or shiny heads in the audience. One kid had a Mohawk but for a lot of the guys that’s no longer an option. The band members, too, now have lines on their faces and grizzled hair. A lot of fans from back in the day show up, but there is an equal measure of twenty-somethings. At one point the Mission of Burma drummer, Peter Prescott, asked the audience over his mic, “We’re in Cambridge MA on Church Street and it’s 2013, what the fuck are we all doing here?” The Sinclair is a newish purpose-built music venue rather than a converted restaurant or warehouse as many Boston-area clubs have been. It’s not a place to sit down; the design seems to imply dancing or participating on your feet. It fits a thousand or so patrons on the main floor and an upper gallery, and for the MOB show it was full. Perhaps as an indication of the relative age of this audience, slam dancing never quite got going, and only one drink container was thrown on stage the whole night. It was a friendly audience for this local legend of a band. Mission of Burma was one of the better-known acts during the heyday of the Boston music scene in the late 1970s/early 80s, headlining the clubs, getting air play on local radio and even on college radio stations around the country. They put out an album, Vs., and then broke up in 1983 as most of the bands did when that era came to an end. Decades have passed, but MOB’s fans are still out there, and last night they showed up in force. MOB re-formed in 2002, but it wasn’t a one-off reunion concert. They had written new material, recorded their second album in 20 years, and went on tour. They didn’t stop there either, they have continued and are now touring to promote their fifth album, Unsound. This is not your throwback or nostalgia concert; MOB focus on their latest songs, adding an old standard or two to please the gray-hairs in the audience. They’re still just as loud and energetic as they ever were. When old bands reunite there is the risk that they’ll be a pathetic shadow of their younger selves, aching and creaking through the hits they made famous in another time so that fans can relive their youth, like the Rolling Stones. Or they slow down and get mellow and traditional. Not in this case. No one should go to a MOB show for nostalgia; warmed-over good old days is not what you get. If you like them now you’ll have to do it the same way you ever did, as a frenetic original band whose songs are mostly unfamiliar. Though the hard and loud punk energy is still abundantly there, there has been some evolution. The latest songs are more 'experimental'; there is a lot of dissonance, as in “Fell-->H2O” and “Add in Unison”, and songs that carry one chord for looong moments like “This is Hi-Fi”. This stuff is not terribly accessible and may require some patience. Some of the more dissonant songs had a very un-punk feature – a horn section, consisting of guitarist Roger Miller's brother and a friend of the band. There are still a lot of songs however with the rapid chord changes and staccato vocals of great punk rock, among them “Second Television” and “7’s”. The only of their “greatest hits” Burma played were "This is Not a Photograph", and “Academy Fight Song” which came at the very end. Their most popular early song, “That’s When I Reach for My Revolver”, was not featured, nor was “Trem Two”. The emphasis was clearly on the new album Unsound. The first of the two encores was dedicated entirely to “One of the best Boston bands of all time, DMZ!” according to bassist Clint Conley. No sooner did they start playing a DMZ number than the mic was taken by former DMZ lead singer Jeff Connolly himself. DMZ was a 1970s punk band before short hair became the norm. Connolly’s vocals were great and he clearly still loves to perform, but there was something disconcerting about an overweight white-haired guy in a too-tight t-shirt jumping around knocking things over on stage. One almost feared for his health. The Mission of Burma members, though gray-haired, are still fairly athletic in appearance. Whether you’re a recent fan of punk rock fan or someone who has long preferred the adrenaline of loud chords, sharp bass notes played with a pick rather than fingers, and shouted vocals, Mission of Burma is as good as it ever was. My take-away is either that we're not such has-beens as I thought, or else being has-beens can be a whole lotta fun. Also, affordable, original live music in small clubs is still a sign of a great city.