Bits of Sound is an ongoing music review column
written by alternating local musicians from the Motor City.
This week is Jeff Howitt of DUENDE!
covering the band The Shivas live at Jumbo's Detroit.
I've known quite a few people who have lived in both Oregon and Michigan and climate wise felt pretty natural between the two. If you come to the Mitten or more specifically Detroit or it's Metro areas you probably have the Stooges on your mind at least or want to drive by the Motown Museum or if you saw the new Jarmusch film ONLY LOVERS LEFT ALIVE want to drive by the boyhood home of Jack White. Hipper people might track down the Myth of The Stooges Wax Museum or go to the corner of 12th (now Rosa Parks) and Clairmount where the Blind Pig raid was that started the '67 Riots or Or OR…
If
you were visiting the Northwest and all it's traversable cultural isolation
that brought you The Sonics, The Wailers and the Barefoot Bandit himself,
Colton Harris-Moore, you may have slightly more macabre and moody stops beyond
muddy banks, Space Needles and the near Ghost Town that holds the set of
Northern Exposure. I know I'd have to go to Olympia's K RECORDS and buy
everybody lunch. If you have been listening to INDIE ROCK inside the last
twenty years you may have heard of Beat Happening, The Make Up, Calvin
himself and all his sonic exaggerations
and now The Shivas who hail from Portland, Oregon. They have plenty of Psyche
bombast and driving melodic chaos as much as they draw from early 50's Rock 'n'
Roll and with beautiful minimalism abandon cakewalk into town/onto the stage.
Definitely check out The Shivas wherever you
may find them. As tonight proved, it may not seem like the right place or time
but that is when the shit really starts happening so GET WITH IT.