Live Review: Desertfest NYC 2024 Pre-Party, 09.12.24
Posted in Reviews on September 13th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
Before Show
Desertfest New York 2024 gets underway in less than an hour. The annual pre-party has been held at Saint Vitus Bar for every edition of the caricature festival to-date, but of course the Vitus’ being shut down precludes that, so it’s up to The Meadows to fill those shoes for the evening. That’s no small task. Show me somebody who doesn’t think venue matters and I’ll show you someone who has never felt like a rock show was home. In any case, I’m sure it’ll be fine. Desertfest hasn’t let its attendees down yet.
Four bands tonight. It’s Thursday, and though I find my eyes wandering over the next two days of the schedule above, tonight is a more than solid kickoff, with Legions of Doom celebrating their debut album, The Skull 3, picking up where The Skull left off following the death of The Skull frontman Eric Wagner, as well as Satan’s Satyrs and Mirror Queen, who both have new records out, and Mustafina opening, from whom I could find no audio streaming. Clearly worth putting sneakers on for, despite the sandal-ready weather.
A two-hour dove to get here reaffirmed my decision to stay in the city this year. That’s a choice not without some level of investment, but I tried to do commuterfest last year and it was hard and I sucked at it, so The Patient Mrs. was well on board with getting my ass out of the house during fest time rather than have me try to cover a thing with one foot in domestic life. I am loved and cared for. I will do my best to do justice to that love and care by not getting towed this weekend. Fingers crossed.
Doors at 6 was applied casually, but the line wasn’t bad by any means. I had a few minutes to stand around awkwardly and not know where to put myself. Shit that I should’ve learned before middle-age. Alas.
The night went like this:
Mustafina
They loosened up as the set went on, and the crowd warmed accordingly. Some connection to AmRep, maybe? Obviously it was my first time at the dance with Mustafina, from New York. They bill themselves as psychedelic punk, and that might not be wrong, but there was more to it than that, with quirk and bounce in the bass and a crunch of guitar tone that indeed felt NY-punker in its root — at least mostly; they hit into a couple bluesier nods as well, and that was welcome; “Metasin” might have been one, if I have it right on the setlist, which I assume I don’t — but a healthy dose of grunge mixed in with that and the dude standing next to me (his name is Eric, he’s from Tennessee, works from home, has a badass backyard and it was nice to chat) cited Mr. Bungle, so I guess it’s fair to say the sound was open for interpretation. That’s not a weakness as a new band gets going — and Mustafina are that, whatever else the members have or haven’t done on whichever legendary noise rock label — but there was a definite moment where it all gelled and from there the groove came easy. For knowing nothing about them going into the set, I felt like by the finish they gave a decent sense of their persona and scope, and I’ll keep an eye for the record when the time comes.
Mirror Queen
Their new album is called Dying Days, and its title-track and “Strider” — which guitarist/vocalist Kenny Sehgal said, “only has like 85 parts” — featured in the set along with the more familiar “Riders” and “Scaffold in the Sky” and a closing cover they said was obscure and sure enough, I didn’t know the provenance from which “Lizzy” came. They’re a reliable good time in my mind. I stood by the bass side of the stage, and dug into the bouncing classic progressive heavy that is such a staple of the NYC underground in my mind. Sehgal, who doubles as the head of Tee Pee Records, mentioned it was kind of a label night — which bodes well for Mustafina, I suppose — and the various releases out. It would be very easy to spend a lot of money at Tee Pee’s table this weekend. If I had any, I might be concerned about that. It was by no means the longest set I’ve ever seen Mirror Queen play, but they know how to make a song that has 85 parts (allegedly) still be a good time to a room that doesn’t already know it, and that’s not an easy thing to do or something to take for granted, even though, yes, I very much take Mirror Queen for granted. There has to be some tradeoff for that two-hour drive to get here. New York has to have an upside.
Satan’s Satyrs
Tore it up. That’s the long and short of it. Sean Saley on drums was a treat; 10 years ago I watched him bash and bash his kit in Pentagram on two successive tours, and tonight was the same story, only faster. I said hi. Plus Morgan McDaniel, who had just played in Mirror Queen, doing double duty. Neither is original to Satan’s Satyrs, but hell, the energy, the drive. Killer set. Big change in vibe from Mirror Queen, whose style is downright soothing in comparison to the brashness on display from the Virginian outfit, who were reborn around bassist/vocalist Clayton Burgess and guitarist Jarrett Nettnin last year after however long it was since they last did a thing. It wasn’t a huge stage at The Meadows, but they used every inch of it, Burgess back and forth like a ’79s thrash icon if such a thing ever existed or could possibly exist, and the swagger was backed up by the charge of the material itself; yeah, new album. I haven’t really dug into it yet — only so many hours in the day — but if it’s got a quarter of what they brought to the stage they’d still be readily kicking ass. I wondered how Legions of Doom could possibly keep up.
Legions of Doom
Then they came out with Karl Agell fronting the band and opened with “Dance of the Dead” from C.O.C.’s Blind record, which I’ve had in my head since I was about 10 years old, and I don’t know what anyone else did in the room, but I certainly lost my shit. In addition to songs from their aforementioned new album, The Skull 3 — a title that does better with context, yes — and bringing out Scott Reagers (original Saint Vitus singer; he shouted out Saint Vitus Bar) to do “War is Our Destiny” and to trade off fronting the band with Agell, they did a few Trouble cuts in “The Wolf” and set-capper “Psychotic Reaction,” and it was a celebration of all of it, including the new stuff and The Skull’s “For Those Which Are Asleep,” which was a highlight even among the highlights. Agell coming back out, “What are you still doing here? Don’t you have a pressing engagement with your cat or your couch?” They thanked Desertfest and Tee Pee and were a doomed pleasure to behold front to back. The place started to clear out as it edged toward 11PM, so maybe there were a couple couchly appointments to keep, but I knew I didn’t need to drive home after, so sticking around was no problem. I’m glad I did. Reagers and Agell sharing “Psychotic Reaction” was priceless.
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More tomorrow, of course, but it was a rousing start, to be sure. My back? Killing me. Gonna think really hard about whether I need the big lens tomorrow, but I’ve got time to dwell on it. Until then, there’s more pics after the jump, and thanks for reading. If you’re here, lucky you.
