Last night I checked out Chicago indie band
Califone at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco.
Bottom of the Hill is a little club in the
Portrero Hill district that holds about 250 people. Also on the bill were local alt-country band
The Dying Californian and Eric Johnson of
The Fruit Bats.
The doors opened at 8:30p and The Dying Californian came on at about 10:00. Featuring a triple Fender attack (rhythm guitar, bass guitar, and lead guitar) a drummer and a backup vocalist, their sound was pretty standard, albeit not entirely
unenjoyable, alt-country. The music was over-weighted with a country waltz feel, but songwriter Nathan Dalton's songs were nicely constructed entities with echos of Neil Young and Son Volt.
Next up was Eric Johnson who is the lead songwriter from the lovely acoustic outfit Fruit Bats. He began by playing numerous numbers from the beautiful 2005 Fruit Bats release
Spelled in Bones. Although the songs do not have as much "oomph" in just a solo acoustic rendering as they do on the album, it is also interesting to hear a new interpretation of familiar tunes. After a few tunes, he brought out the members of
Califone to perform a new song (I presume a Fruit Bats song), and some really cool sounding old-
timey style songs with fiddle, banjo, and acoustic guitar.
Around midnight,
Califone began their set. Their lineup included guitar (and sometimes banjo), drums, percussion (including guest percussionist Sheila) and multi-instrumentalist Tim
Rutili playing keyboards/
synth, acoustic guitar, and electric 12-string guitar (yep, no bass). Eric Johnson joined them for the first song on guitar and vocals.
From the get-go, they were in the stratosphere. The first song featured an extended "breakdown" with loads of distortion and feedback. This trend continued for the majority of the first set, with
Rutili's vocals being obscured by the fuzzy, noisy background drone that was a featured theme throughout. Even though that experimental sound is what attracted me to
Califone in the first place, I can only take so much feedback and distortion. By the time they played my two favorite songs off of
Roots and Crowns, my resistance had worn down so that I was longing for them to just go back to fiddle and banjo. They heeded my wishes when they played an encore with Eric Johnson and went back to the acoustic line-up.
My final impression is that this is a band with a totally unique sound that is staying true to their sensibilities. Ultimately I found myself appreciating their artistic creativity, but at the same time yearning for a groove to latch on to. Still, Roots and Crowns remains one of the best recordings of 2006, and this is a band to watch out for.
