D.I. / Cherry 2000 / N.E. Last Words / Roid Rage @ the LVCS

by Dean Pascucci for Blue Tile Lounge Presents.

Roid Rage - Sorry guys I missed your set arguing over a parking space and being sweated by a bouncer - twice.

N.E. Last Words - Seen it before, it's done to death, nothing original here or particularly engaging. Having said that, excellent musicianship was displayed by N.E. Last Words. Just not my cup of tea or what I was expecting to see opening for D.I.

Cherry 2000 - The singer/lead guitar guy said on the mic “I am a Father of two and that's the most Punk Rock thing you will hear tonight.” Ladies and Gentlemen I liked them. I thought they were good and to my Punk Rock ears I found them appealing. Great musicianship shown here and good songs, bravo Cherry 2000. And when I say great musicianship you have to take that with a grain of salt because I'm impressed with anyone that can play guitar or bass without looking down at it while they play - says the one finger, top stringer bass player.

D.I. - What can I say? They stepped up and blew doors. I had lost a lot of confidence in them earlier in the day when I heard they did not bring their own back line, i.e. gear like amps and a drum kit. I thought, how good could they sound if they just arrive and say "OK, can we borrow extremely sensitive equipment tuned to the sensibilities of some OTHER random musician?" I was wrong. They jumped on stage, made some tweaks to the borrowed equipment and blew my mind, they sounded great. Everyone was singing along to many of the songs including Rusty Hung Himself. If I heard what went down correctly a T.S.O.L. drummer stepped in and played one song. Man he was throwing down. I thought, he's a hundred times better than the D.I. drummer, but then I realized up unto that point in the show I'd been mesmerized by Casey, the bass player Eddie (who ruled) and guitar player. So when the original D.I. drummer went back to his kit (actually someone else's kit ) I watched only him and thought, yep D.I.'s current lineup is the whole package. I don't recommend ever missing this band when they come to Vegas.

---