THIS LITTLE UNDERGROUND
ShewBird and Rainy Day, Will’s Pub, May 6
ShewBird is an Orlando band that doesn’t play out all that often, and it’s been probably a handful of years since I last saw them. Though that encounter was brief, the impression it left has always clung to me like a beckoning ghost. After catching up with them again recently, the reasons are clear.
ShewBird are one of those bands with true aesthetic. Wearing a tortured heart with thick mood, they render hellbound Southern rock like Armageddon cowboys.
Even while singer David Minshew opens a vein and bleeds soul, the music just keeps ushering you deeper down below. It’s gothic country without camp, and its allure comes on like a hex. ShewBird are almost certainly the darkest Americana band around here.
Sharing the stage was Rainy Day, the local group fronted by scene vet Jim O’Rourke. There’s lots of garage, a little psych and some bright power-pop hooks in there, but it’s all rock & roll, babe. It ain’t the prettiest, but it was never meant to be. This stuff is cut rough and shaggy, pulsing with handmade vitality and nerve. It simultaneously evokes both times past and the spirit that burns eternal in the underground.
Making it a particularly immersive experience, DJ Smilin’ Dan spun between sets, weaving in a great taste of the later Uncontrollable Urge Sundays, the newish and rare foray into a dance night for Will’s Pub. It’s a music video party that really only Independent Bar does on the reg.
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Email Bao: baolehuu@orlandoweekly.com
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This article appears in May 2-8, 2018.
