King Buzzo - 7/17/2014 -Baltimore, MD

Home

HeroQuest

Scrapbook

Donations

GuestBook

Email Login

King Buzzo of the Melvins
This Machine Kills Artists Solo Acoustic Tour
With Special Guest: Mary Halvorson
July 17, 2014 @ Ottobar - Baltimore, MD

by Chris "What Am I Not Paying You For" Besaw - Photo guy for TomAroundTheWorld.Com

Well, I was in Columbia, Maryland for the week of July 13-18 training for work, when I took a look in what is the equivalent of Syracuse's New Times and noticed that King Buzzo of The Melvin's is perfoming at Baltimore's famous concert dive, Ottobar!
Now, I dont know about you, but after a long and grueling week of training on Cisco Network systems, I was in need of something to blow off some steam for awhile. So what did I do, you ask? I sent King Buzzo's long time road manager, Dave Curran a text to see if they were interested in having me come out a snap a couple pics and do a review. In which he replied, "Of course." So, once training let out around 4:30 PM, I made the mad dash from the training facility to the hotel, quickly showered and changed, grabbed my trusty Pentax Kx camera, and headed to Baltimore, and to Ottobar.

For those who have never been to Ottobar, its one of those hidden gems that if you blink you might drive right past it, like yours truly... lol. Once the car was parked, I stood in line with approximately twenty axious concert attendees who were excited to witness the devine acoustic brilliance/madness of Buzz Ousboure. Ok, lights dim around 9:15 PM(ish) and the opening act: Mary Halvorson takes the stage. Mary Halvorson is a Jazz and Avant- Rock artist hailing from Brooklyn, NY and has been active snce 2002. In addition to playing solo, Halvorson has her trio and quintent, and she co-leads a chamber-jazz duo. She is also actively involved in a number of bands with such members as Tim Berne, Anthony Braxton, Taylor Ho Bynum and Curtis Hasselbring to name a few. She opened with a cover of Ornette Coleman's "Sadness" and her friend Noël Akchoté's "Cheshire Hotel". In fact, she had mentioned that her whole set would be covers, which by the way if you get a moment you should check out her music, it's very edgy, soothing, and brilliant! She played a very intense set finishing up around 10:00 PM. At that time I had a moment to go outside get some air and get ready for King Buzzo.
Around 10:10 PM, the light went down, and the stage fills up with deep, dark, crimson red lights. (Curse you Buzz! lol) The audience of 100+ get ready as hBuzz Osborne, aka King Buzzo, slams into a killer acoustic version of the Melvins' song "Boris" and following up with a great ( I suggest you check it out) cover of Alice Cooper's "The Ballad of Dwight Fry."
I mean who doesn't like a good old fashioned Alice Cooper tune, right? Not to mention being sung by King Buzzo! After a couple more songs including "Dark Brown Teeth," off of his new album This Machine Kills Artists, he treated us to, as Buzz put it, "a pointless story about Iggy Pop."

Although I found the story about Iggy Pop quite hilarious, he states why Iggy Pop is a hero of his. To tell the short version of the story, the Melvins and Iggy Pop were part of a festival overseas ( he didnt state which one). While he was sitting side of the main stage with Iggy, Buzz noted that with every passing moment of the band that was onstage, Iggy got more and more pissed off. So, what happens next is just plain awesome. Iggy takes the stage, grabs the mic and shouts into it,"So, what do you all think of Weezer?" The crowd erupts intop cheers, and Buzz notices Iggy getting more pissed off by the second. To which Iggy replies " (insert explitive) Weezer!" Throws the mic down and storms off stage.
Buzzo notes that he was so impressed that Iggy would even play on the same stage as Weezer, didnt get paid and Iggy didnt even care! Just as funny as the Mike Patton story he treated us to in Syracuse a couple week prior. There were some other stories mingled in there about his adventures, but the Iggy one takes the cake. Buzzo played until about midnight, ending with two Melvins hits "Hooch" and "Revolve" and leaving the fans wanting more.
At that point, I went and thanked Dave Curran for the photo pass, stopped over to say thank you to Buzz, then jumped back in my car, and headed back to Columbia and the hotel, to crash out for the night.
- fin -

		PHOTOS BY CHRIS BESAW

TomAroundTheWorld Proudly Sponsored By