At 8:15pm, the Nutt-sanctifying funk of FISHBONE (from the planet of NUTTMEG) started their set with a little bit of Jimi Hendrix's "Power of Soul"........Spacey T's lethal guitarisms smoked the speakers in the Wetlands (which will be soon be "condo space", unfortunately). After the Hendrix tribute, it was on to "AIDS and Armaggedon". From there, it was off to stuff like "Cholly", "Ma and Pa" and "Bonin' in the Boneyard", which featured a delicious, thick bass solo by the original Bonehead, Norwood Fisher!! During the first 30 minutes of the show, I noticed that there was a second guitarist (but I didn't catch his name). "Riot" was the song that drove fans into a crazed frenzy (somebody get Mr. John Steward a new set of drumsticks because his must be reduced to small twigs after the heavy drum assault) OR was that "Sunless Saturday"? "Sunless Saturday" shook the foundation of the Wetlands enough that I thought the place just might be shutting down sooner than I thought!!!! Other favorites included "Alcoholic", "Primadawnutt", "Just Allow", Dr. MaddVibe's "Jah-Jah on the Telephone", the anthem of Fishbone "Party at Ground Zero", and the show-stopping encore of "Servitude"!!

This Fishbone show didn't feature any Dirty Walt solo songs, but it featured a lot of new Fishbone songs. One of the songs had a hardcore punk-rock edge to it and sounded like "Frayed Fuckin' Nerve Endings"!! Another one, called "There's a Demon Among Us" (I hope that title is correct!) was da shit with some hardcore rock guitar riffs by Spacey T and some excellent, funky horn riffs by Angelo (lead vocalist/saxophonist) and Dirty Walt (vocalist/trumpeteer)!!
The Fishbone Nuttmeg experience ended at 10:00pm.

Review by Dr Brookenstein (http://www.pond.com/~dbrooks/fishbone-090901.html)

Missed Mary Prankster, but got there in time to catch most of Maximum Penalty. Relatively boring generic hardcore. Funniest moment of the evening came when two shaven headed behemoths attempted to start a pit by themselves and succeeded in scaring the living shit out of anyone near them. Oh well, they had fun anyway...

Ari Up, formerly of UK punk band the Slits was next. Looking exactly like Keith Morris in a dress, Ari proceeded to surprise the hell out of me by delivering a bumping set of dancehall reggae, complete with guest toasters and solid backing band. Unfortunately, the set was cut short (total of 35 minutes or so) by time constraints, as the club had scheduled a second show that evening.

Fishbone, to put it mildly, was on fire. Didn't write down all the tunes but I do remember that they played all the new stuff soldiers have been mentioning recently (Devil Made Me Do It, Demon, Nerve Endings, Get Out Of The City, Wid It, Last Days and a few others I didn't catch the titles of). Folks, these songs are so heavy and musically dense I just stood there in amazement. I can't wait until these tunes are recorded, as there are at least a few of the bunch that rank with the best of the Fishbone classics. BTW, they played a good amount of familiar stuff as well (AIDS, Bonin, Alcoholic, Party, Ma and Pa, Skankin, to name the few I can remember).

Great energy in the club, flying fish on all the familiar tunes, usual oppressive Wetlands temperature and bass heavy sound mix...This set ranked among the best of the 14 or 15 Bone shows I've attended. Not to exaggerate, but I can't think of a living band that plays better than this. Run, don't walk, to a theater near you...

Oh, also met Adam, who was busy filming most of the evening, and Andy from the list - first time live encounter of list members for me. Very cool people, as expected.

Now if only the hearing will return to my right ear, everything will be just cool...

Sorry for the sketchy details,
Ira

Yes I was there and I loved it!! It reminded me of some of the first times I saw them. Small place, got real close to the band, lively crowd.

I was in heaven. Songs that stick out:

Cholly - one of my all-time favorites
Sunless saturday
ma and pa
just allow
bonin
alcoholic

they ended with a rockin servitude

first time i have seen them with no keys but they did have a second guitarist but i didn't get his name

stewart and spacey were sick

only saw one nuttwork shirt - so who was it wearing a yellow/mustard color one? i only saw you when they were rushing us out

oh yeah - i totally forgot about all the new tunes.

wid it and devil made me do it were so good.

as for ari up - was anyone else bothered by her having her son on stage then showing her panties to the crowd?

petey

I forgot the guset guitarist's name. He came on for Servitude, the last song, which they extended the end of with long guitar solos (think they've done that the past couple of shows I've seen of them).

New songs were really cool, but I don't think they're completely up to speed on them. There were a couple of times when it seemed they weren't quite in synch with each other durring moments for some of them (mostly when there were tempo changes in the songs). Nothing horrible, just not quite the normal Fishbone tightness I've come to expect from them over the years (but hey, they're new songs so its to be expected).

Show opened with Armagedon & Aids. Crowd for the most part waited until the second song Cholley to get moving (Angelo jumped into the crowd for this one). They mixed up the set quite nicely between new songs and old ones. For the most part though the crowd was pretty mellow for the new songs, though its wasn't a vibe of "I'm not moving to this cuz its weak" but more along the lines of "I don't know this one, let me just listen". Heads bobed but nobody got stomped when they were played.

Overall a good show, but not the best I've seen from them. Then again, I've seen them around 40 times or so (I've lost count) and some of those shows are just hard to top (the Ritz in 88 where they ended with Change but extended the song by throwing in lyrics to the Who's My Generation, Halloween 88 at Stony Brook, Someplace called World Stage upstate just prior to Reality comming out, and the show at Tramps a couple of years ago were they played "Black Box" durring one of the encores were probably the tops in my book).

The opening bands were mixed. Ari Up I found boring (the band behind her was good, but her and the backup vocalists were just too loose and all over the place for me. Overall not tight enough as a unit). The hardcore band that was before Ari was also very boring imho, though they did pull off an exellent reggae jam in the middle of their set (seemed improvised to me, singer sang the lyrics to My Girl through it), and the two songs that followed were also really good, but didn't care for the rest of their stuff (think they went on long cuz a number of times they anounced that they were playing their last song, but they were friends with the people who run the place and were just allowed to keep going). Mary Prankster was fun, which surprised me. Mostly fast songs with very graphic lyrics about being a slut, but done pretty tounge in cheek (well I found them amusing). Announced one song as "the greatest love song in the world, and its called Mercy Fuck". She and her band were pretty tight too. I'll see if I can catch them again.

Fun show overall, and still was able to get home in time to go to bed and wake up for work the next day (think it was shortly after 10:00 when the show ended). I can kinda get into these 4:00 shows. Or have I just shown my age?

chris...

I rolled into Wetlands around 3pm and immediately met up with Alex Poppas who was one of the camera people at the Temple Bar shows 2 weeks ago. He flew out with the band and he, my friend Dan, and myself were filming the show for the documentary. Just to give you an idea of how cool Wetlands is and why it's such a favorite of musicians: Alex told me that the club actually paid to fly the band out and paid for their hotel accomodations while they were in town. How fucking cool is that?! If only more people would extend the band that kind of respect. Anyway, we shot a little bit of footage of the soundcheck and you could tell, even then, that it was gonna be a great show. They just seemed much relaxed than they were before the Temple Bar shows, when it seemed like they were all business.

I thought Mary Prankster were a lot of fun. Not quite sure about the cowpunk tag, but I'll go along with it. I thought it was cool when the lead singer mentioned seeing Fishbone and Primus in '91 and called it a life-changing event.

Next up was Maximum Penalty. As Ira mentioned, fairly generic hardcore/rap-metal. The reason they were afforded more playing time is because the lead singer works at Wetlands as a bouncer. I actually ended up taping their performance and giving them the tape so they'd give us a little more leeway when it came time to film the 'Bone.

I was kind of busy setting up while Ari Up was on stage, but what little I did see, I was very impressed. They had a great punky-reggae sound and I've always had kind of a soft spot for the Slits. I thought it was cool that Ari made it a family affair by having her son on stage with her, although I missed the undie flashing part.

And finally... what can I say? Fishbone were just plain ON IT. If this was a eulogy for the Wetlands, I can't think of a better band to help lay it to rest. I don't remember the setlist but I'd say the set was made up of about 1/3 new tunes, 2/3 older stuff. The new tunes just keep getting better and better, even though it's only been 2 weeks since the Temple Bar shows. And even though I was taping the show, I wasn't stuck in the back like in LA. I was right up on the sides of the stage getting, what I think is some really great stuff. I can't wait for you all to see it.

I'm not sure who the second guitarist was who played on Servitude but I do know he was working the sound board that was to the left of the stage during most of the show. I thought he was a great addition and really helped fill out the song well.

-Adam