No Grave Like The Sea - Cave System - The Gamma Foundation @ The Old Miami, Detroit, Michigan - 03-06-10

By Krazy K
Motor City Blogger


The Venue:

The Old Miami is situated on Cass Avenue, just south of Wayne State University. It is the classic "dive bar" venue but with lots of knick-knacks on the wall. Probably the main thing that keeps this establishment alive is Wayne State being nearby, giving them a constant flow of fresh, young bands which brings them customers. Also, every Monday, they have DJ Chinese Spareribs. Sounds too good to be true.

I did see a prostitute get picked up in the church parking lot across the street from The Old Maimi. That was a heart-warming moment...amen.

The Old Miami is touted as being Missing In Action MIchigan (MIAMI), a veterans bar, but I'm not sure how many veterans actually go there. I saw two guys there on Saturday that were over 50. I'll assume that they were veterans. There is cluttered but cool decor all over the place, from a stuffed raccoon to a giant missle. There is limited seating, mostly which consists of tattered, hand-me-down couches.

The bartender was really nice. She did let me in for free, but she had no idea what MotorCityBlog was...so it took some convincing. I bought a beer, a Madhatter IPA, which was $4.50, which is a little pricey for a dive bar. Maybe that's why everyone was drinking Fosters, "Australian For Beer". (They don't have Fosters in Australia by the way...or Aussie shampoo's).

Since I've been there last, they've made some improvements, but not exactly the ones I would have expected. They've laid concrete embossed with their venue name where there used to be a plywood ramp, and installed a modern glass door that leads to the backyard (which I assure you will be smashed in the near future by some drunkard).

Where they need to improve, and have not, is the bathrooms. Like most dive-bar venues it's probably a waste of money to improve Men's rooms. But the Women's room, which has it's door nailed wide open for all to see, is downright scary for any girls who have never painted their nails black.

The stage is actually smaller than the speakers they use for the sound system. It is super overkill for the size of the venue. So, unless you really don't care about hearing in the future, or have already abused your eardrums to oblivion, bring earplugs. Did I mention bring earplugs? Call me lame, but I've already lost enough hearing from cymbals and feedback over the years, and even being half-deaf, it still hurts at the Old Miami. That is partially the responsibility of the sound-man, but as is often the case, they might have lost their hearing too...so they overcompensate the high-end frequencies because they can't hear them, compounding the damage to everyone's ears.

But hey, they ARE booking original bands, and have stayed open for a long time. They also have advertising for the bands in one of the lesser known free newspapers around here. Thanks for being here in good ole' Detroit, The Old Miami!

The Performance:

Well, where do I start. I'll try to be nice about this.

The poster for the event says 8pm. I thought 8pm was unusual, but maybe they are young kids and need to get home early. I got there "late" around 8:50pm. (I know there's usually a 30 minute cushion for the stated start time.) But when I walked in there was no band playing...I guess I must have missed the first band. Wrong. They hadn't started yet. Instead, I waited an additional 45 minutes, around 9:35pm for the first band, The Gamma Foundation, to start playing.

Now, I've been in bands and I've played many bars including The Old Miami, but I've never seen a show advertised as starting ONE AND A HALF HOURS before the music starts. Thanks for pulling a fast one on us guys!

Okay...maybe the first band was late, and held up the show. Let's blame it on them for now. The second band, Cave System, set up pretty quickly and didn't waste much time. They ended their set around 11:40pm...no time problems there...thanks guys for keeping the show rolling.

But then the last band, No Grave Like The Sea, hadn't even completed their soundcheck until 12:40am. And after soundcheck, they needed five more minutes for drinks. So, it took them over ONE HOUR to set up their band. At that point I had lost my patience, took pics of them during soundcheck and left.

Sorry guys, but only music festivals should last for over 5 hours. You tried my patience, and you lost a good review. Next time, please tell us exactly when the show starts, and try to keep the whole show (as advertised) well under 4 hours. Maybe someone else would have covered just the headliner, but there are three bands on the flier, show starts at 8pm. Perhaps the Old Miami pressured you to start later, but don't do it at the expense of the flow of a show. An hour between bands is unacceptable in my book.

The crowd was good...they all seemed to show up later than I did. Hopefully the bands all got some pocket cash. If they didn't get paid then let me know, and I'll change my review of the Old Miami.


The Fluff:

The Gamma Foundation - Head jerking modern rock, 89x radio worthy. Unique and stylistic rhythm changes. Chorused, flanged, and delayed vocals reminded me of 311. Nothing too revolutionary, but well-rehearsed and energetic.

Cave System - Imagine if Mahivishnu Orchestra styled jammers turned to modern rock music, and mixed in some Incubus funk. Sparse, if almost non-existent vocals, but pretty cool melodic guitar tapping techniques. Variety and originality, but a little more vocals could go a long way.

No Grave Like The Sea - An instrumental band. The band members seem really nice. We had some good conversations. Check them out on myspace.com/nogravelikethesea