Rhinoceros, xTyrantx, Venia, Birth Of A Hero - St. Paul, MN

I hit up Station 4 in St. Paul for a sweet hardcore show on the 31st. Since I’m a bonehead, I completely forgot about the Republican National Convention, and the fact that the entire downtown area of St. Paul was under military protection. I got completely lost due to them re-routing all the roads. I ended up having to circle around the east side of St. Paul and sneaking in one of the side streets. It was worth it. I blame myself.

Birth of a Hero, local Courage Crew act, started it off. It was my first time seeing them, but I knew the signer through one of my previous bands, so I needed to check them out. Most of them had good energy and good sound. One of the guitarists broke a string in the first song (good for him for rockin it out), and took forever to change strings. Someone yelled, “Buy a backup guitar!” I second that. It’s just professional and courteous not to make your audience stand around for what seems like ages. The other guitarist seemed like he was trying hard to play the right notes, which as we all know is not the point of hardcore music. I think Brett, the singer, is a good front man. He’s got a ways to go, but he’s got a great start. I like his style.

Venia played next. I don’t know much about them, but the singer blew his voice out early. They weren’t bad. The singer had on a “god filled” somethingorother shirt and talked about abortion, but he wasn’t preachy about it, so it was fine. He sang as long as he could and tried to get the crowd to sing some to relieve him. They didn’t play anything that really stuck with me and didn’t have a ton of energy, but they were listenable. But I will give these kids credit for dancing for every band. I love to see that, even if I’m too fat and old to do it myself. These kids have fun

xTyrantx played next – that’s who I came to see. John, the singer of this tough guy Courage Crew band, has come a long way from his early days of hardcore. His pipes have gotten better. His stage presence has gotten better. He’s become an amazing shirt designer. We talked about when played in King of Clubz back in the day – it was nice to see him grown up musically and personally. His band has a bunch of good guys in it as well. These guys are pretty tough. I was disappointed because their second vocalist Dave wasn’t there, but John pulled it off really well. These guys are tough. Go check them out. They’ve got a new cd coming out. Can’t wait.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get to see the headliner, Rhinoceros, due to the fact that I had to make a quick trip to the emergency room – see previous post. I’m sure they were good, though.

My favorite local hardcore (kind of) guy was there also. He looks like a slimmer version of Kevin James from King of Queens. He thinks he’s way bigger than he is. He walks with his arms out as if he were too huge to put them at his sides. He wears too small polo shirts and occasionally takes it off. He doesn’t dance all that well, but he protects his face at all costs, to the point of comedy. Classic. I look forward to that guy at every show.

And as usual, Station 4 has great sound. It tends to be a big venue for all ages hardcore shows, but it’s still a good venue.

Top 5 things
1. xTyrantx is tough
2. Birth of a Hero – glad I got to see them finally
3. The Kevin James guy
4. The venue has fans blowing everywhere, so it’s bearable – only venue EVER to do that
5. Sound quality of the venue

Bottom 5 things
1. Venue is too big for hardcore
2. Couldn’t get to the venue due to the RNC
3. Got lost trying to find Jimmy Johns with Tyrant
4. I missed Rhinoceros
5. Waiting for the guitarist to change strings


www.myspace.com/BIRTHOFAHEROMPLS
www.myspace.com/veniamusic
www.myspace.com/xtyrantx
www.myspace.com/rhinoceros716