Sometime ago, I heard from John Roman about a band called Whore Paint that he had described as one of the best bands in the country today. On June 8th they were going to be playing at the Shop here in Pittsburgh. Q booked the show; I was surprised he didn't do it at Roboto, but the Shop did make more sense for this one.
I got to the show early to hear that the Shop's PA was broken. Unstiched played first, or at least attempted to, but the broken PA proved to be a little too hampering for anyone to use. After using the PA for a few minutes, only to get some really tinny vocals, Unstitched switched to using a guitar amp. The amp sounded better, but it was far too quiet to come out over the rest of the band. I asked Q if he thought it was a good idea for me to go grab Roboto's small, secondary PA, but he only shrugged. After I asked some car owning peeps, Ian Semasko and I decided to go and get it. Q didn't know if it would work well and thought that we might be in the way to the show that was already at Roboto, and I had never heard or seen the little PA before, but we took the trip. Roboto was pretty packed, but I slipped through the crowd and found the PA in the back room. It was smaller than I expected. Ian and I got back to the Shop to find that Unstitched was finished and the Lopez were up next.
Before The Lopez started playing, Q and I set up the PA and connected it to a tiny mixer we found. The mixer had some crazy delay set up when we first hooked it up; it took a while to change the delay to a lo-fi reverb sound suitable for Steph and Jesse. The Lopez played a great set even with the little PA; it was definitely loud enough, but any more might have been pushing it. I was one of the few people in the crowd to dance.
Whore Paint played last. They didn't use the mixer. The guitarist had some trouble with her pedal board, and, while she fixed it up, the singer read from Valerie Solanas'
Scum Manifesto. Whore Paint played heavy, dancey no-wave (though again I was one of the few people dancing). The singer had intense vocals that reminded me of Pittsburgh's legendary Dress Up As Natives. The guitarist also doubled as a bass player, using two amps at once. The band stopped for a little bit after each song, inviting the audience to share humorous anecdotes about bros/Reddit fedora lamers or to read more of the
Scum Manifesto. Dru Bruce and I high-fived over not having a dad, and I accidentally kicked his beer when I was dancing. It was a good night.
Check out Whore Paint and buy their record:
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