10.26.2012: The Halloweening: False Idols at Continental Club and Big Top bar.

"On Friday October 26, some of Houston's best and brightest bands are making skin-suits out of some legendary rock and roll carcasses, all in the name of Halloween.

YOUNG MAMMALS (as The Pixies)

THE WILD MOCCASINS (as Madonna)

THE WHITE STRIPS (as The White Stripes)

LIMB and pals (as Kate Bush)

MIKEY AND THE DRAGS (as The Mummies)

WICKED POSEUR (as The Buzzcocks)

Two stages! (The Continental Club and Big Top)

Hosted by Dusti Rhodes, featuring DJ ADR and DJ TBA and balloon art by Amy Balloon

$5 WITH COSTUME! ($10 if yer lame) " 

In my attempt not to be lame I wore a make shift costume to this event mainly because I was lazy and partly because I just felt like it. My outfit consisted of a blue jean frayed mini skirt, beat up My So Called Life tank tee that I had made out of my undying love for the MTV show, and a pair of really thick black hipster? glasses and I went as a nerd. The elder doorman did not get it. Maybe a little bit after his time. Either way he let me in for free. Thank you so much, sir!

Continental Club: Panaramic View

This cover concert series spanned two bars on Main Street in midtown Houston: Continental Club and Big Top. I got there around 8 so I missed the first two acts. The first band I saw to play was called The White Strips and as you guessed it, they covered music from The White Stripes. The Meg White impersonatress banged the drums effortlessly with a painted white mask over a  stoic face, her likeness was pretty much spot on with the original drummette and just as talented as well. Even throughout her climatic drum solos it still seemed like a walk in the park to her which is really brilliant.  The Jack White singer's voice was almost identical as well. They opened with Dead Leaves as the thin but growing crowd floods in from the breezy quiet almost dead night of fall. I was mesmerized by how flawless this band played The White Stripes.  Seven Nation Army came next as the house is really packed now at 9pm.  Then my personal favorite Fell in Love with A Girl  and I said it once before but it needs repeating that this band is ridiculously accurate, loud, and fun. If you love music from the old The White Stripes I would recommend  you go see The White Strips (without the e). I never realized how much fun and sexy a night of Stripes' music could be.

After the show we were all instructed to walk over to Big Top where one of my old local favorites: Limb was performing. I was very shocked to know before hand that they were doing a complete set of Kate Bush covers. My reasoning for coming out had a lot to do with this as she is one of my favorite musicians and I have never heard any mentions of Kate Bush from this new generation of music-heads let alone a small indie rock band interested in covering her music. I love this spooky time of year around Halloween; It particularly suits my witch-y pagan self and nothing could be so perfect as to hear Kate Bush music live with some drinks in a dim lighted bar in a somewhat desolate area of downtown Houston.

Nonetheless, I popped on over next door to The Big Top to see Limb play. I picked a spot right in front of the band. Limb was placed in the back corner of the bar which meant that once it got crowded having a sit down would put me behind a sea of standing people, so you see my logic. I was pleasantly surprised to see a new addition to  the band:  a young attractive lady with a blonde pixie cut and I wondered the band's decision to cover Kate's Bush had anything to do with her muse. Cloudbusting is the song I remembered them starting first and is a good choice because of its slow build up. I was unsurprised by some of the comments from the crowd who didn't even know who Kate Bush even was. She was mainly popular in the 80's and early 90's to green artsy librarian types. And who to show up and sing most of the lyrics with me? I was surrounded by these girls :). Sometimes it doesn't matter if you go to a show alone because you are surrounded by like minds gathered for a common interest in the music. Limb was brilliant and actually the music of Kate Bush is right up their alley of experimentation with its steady hard Celtic drums layered with violin and keys; They are the masters of recreating different sounds from a keyboard. And I have to take my Brooklyn Nets hat off the the lead singer (I honestly don't know her name but wish I did). She belted out "Look, its in the trees! It's Coming" as Kate Bush famously shouts before Hounds of Love  and the knowing target audience of women surrounding the band start to sing the song with her. They ended the night with her most famous hit Running up that Hill and by now I think the crowd starts to get who Kate Bush is. I had such a great time that the set seemed so short when it ended.


Back-story: My first encounter with Limb was not so pleasant when I first moved here to Houston in 2008.  I was an outsider from a small town in Georgia and virgin to the Houston Noise so I was just eager to know some new DIY music. Sadly, they were too exhausted from playing shows in SXSW in Austin to entertain my questions about where to get the music or website url. I don't know if it was my excited hurried approach or the fact that I clearly look like an outsider but it was hard to get this band to talk to me.  But seriously, I am over it now. I've seen this band plenty of times since then and they are still one of my first and favorite independent bands from Houston and is responsible for my continued interest in local live music. I hope they gain enough public attention to play on national television one day. They are truly an innovative band of three members. The lead singer or quite possibly lyricist is always revolving but it will always be: guy on drums, guy on computer/keys and mystery guest singer. I really appreciated their appreciation for Kate Bush, and is probably the only time I would be able to hear Cloudbusting live in my lifetime. One day I would like to interview Limb to see which direction their band is going to take next if they would allow me to...you never know. 

"...just saying it could even make it happen." 

                                                           Cloudbusting, Kate Bush.