Roky Erickson and the Black Angels- El Ray Theater, Los Angeles 10-31-08 TWO HEADED DOG!

Roky Erickson and the Black Angels, tearing the joint apart in Hollywood on Halloween night!

Roky Erickson and the Black Angels- El Ray Theater, Los Angeles 10-31-08 VIDEO

This is the first song of the set by Roky Erickson and the Black Angels at the El Rey Theater in LA on Halloween! My brother's friend shot it in HD vid! More vid is coming! We got Two Headed Dog and Night of the Vampire! Two Headed Dog is sick!

I wuz there too! I met Roky after the gig!

Roky Erickson Videos

Here are some cool Roky Erickson videos! The first one is Roky Erickson and the Black Angels at the El Rey Theater, LA, 10/31/08. The second is the Great American Music Hall 11/1/08. The third is Roky Erickson and Billy Gibbons performing The Beast at Threadgill's in Austin Texas on 03/13/08.

Roky Erickson and the Black Angels - Great American Music Hall

Posted over on the Golden Dawn group:
wayne hawes dhawes2...@yahoo.com:

Roky show at Great American Music Hall....

So Brian Vaughan and I caught the Roky Erickson and the Black Angels show at the Great American Music Hall last night. The place holds 470 people, and at 9:10 the guy at the entrance said the place was very close to reaching capacity.

Great show. I will give a review of sorts later, but I am being slammed currently by work and a big paralegal class assignment.

The Great American Music Hall is a former light opera hall - - either pre or post SF earthquake of 1906. They don't make buildings like this anymore - - with ornate decorative art, in the art nouveau style. Great place to see a gig. A mini Fillmore.

It was stunning to see how young the crowd was. Grey hairs left over from the hippie heyday were a very small minority.

I didn't know that Roky Erickson was so big among the younger artist/ alternative rock crowd, but it was like the cognoscenti of San Francisco's young art students showed up for the gig.

You go to a Moby Grape gig - - you all know that I am a huge Moby Grape fan and former associate of Skip Spence (in his later years) - - and you see lots of old grey hairs that after the gig come up to band members like lead guitarist Jerry Miller, and go, "hey Jerry, great to see you! It's been years!" Moby Grape was THE biggest band in San Francisco in the summer of 1967, the talk of the town. But a Grape show today doesn't draw the younger crowd in large numbers.

But for Roky Erickson? It was hundreds of young twenty somethings - - including a generous dose of young hotties.

Roky was great. Kiloh is right. The Dark Angels provide the psychedelic atmosphere of the authentic Elevators. I never have seen Roky before, so I can't speak regarding the Explosives. But if Kiloh's description about The Explosives is correct, they would be too polished and clean to provide the proper atmosphere for the Elevator material.

Although their sound would perhaps be appropriate for Roky's later work. Anyone who has listened to TEO or "The Evil One" knows how clean and polished (and unpsychedelic) those studio recordings were. Really new wave in feel.

Last night I really felt like I went back in time to Austin in 1966. Especially in the pocket opera hall atmosphere of the Great American Music Hall.

Great show. And Roky is in premiere shape! Sang very well, had his stage presence and band timing down - - and even did a searing blues solo on this one blues number.

Roky seems to have gotten religion of late too - - perhaps one of the reasons for his remarkable recovery. One of the two blues numbers had lines about "Jesus is Coming to Earth Soon," and "Because the Bible says so..."

Brian and I got to talk at some length after the show with one of the guitarists in the Dark Angels, by the name of Christian. Great guy.

The lead singer of the Black Angels had that jug sound down too. Great work!

So Roky was especially good on "You're Gonna Miss Me" and "Splash 1" from the first Elevators album. I fell in (unrequited) love in the spring of 1979 to the soundtrack of this song, so it was very evocative for me.

Roky had a tougher time with the very demanding high range of the vocal for the opening song "Two Headed Dog." That is a very difficult song to sing, with its high range, and so Roky had to drop to a lower range, which lost a little of the song's power.

Anyway, I did a review of sorts after all.

Douglas Hawes San Jose, CA

Roky Erickson and the Black Angels- El Ray Theater, Los Angeles 10-31-08

I saw Roky Erickson and the Black Angels at the El Ray Theater in Los Angeles on Halloween. My business partner and I drove from Phoenix and met my brother (from Las Vegas) in LA. We checked into the Dunes Hotel and then went to eat at the famous Canter's Deli. This is the very same deli that groups like the Byrds and Mothers used to frequent. The Jewish food was to die for and brought me right back to New York. See a picture of Canter's to the left of this text.

After dinner, we went to the El Ray Theater. I brought along two Avalon Ballroom "Spaceman" posters for Roky to sign. One is an actual "Bindweed Press" version that was used to promote the gig back in 1966. Both of these posters were signed by EVERYBODY (alive) in the 13th Floor Elevators including Powell St. John and Danny Thomas. So to get Roky's signature with all the others was essential.

We went into the El Ray Theater and it was really decked out for a party. This was LA on Halloween night and this WAS a Roky Erickson show. People were dressed up as cops, tigers, mummy's, zombies, everything... The theater was a big room with a stage at one end and a small balcony. There was a huge dance floor.

The Black Angels came on first and they were great. I don't know who is talking sheeeeeeit about this band but they were really good. They reminded me of early Mothers of Invention, or Velvet Underground, bootlegs. It was heavy rythym and percussion (hypnotic) and then they would get some cool fuzz-tone jamming going. The singer needs to express himself more clearly as he tended to mumble the words but that's a quibble.

The Black Angels also would exchange instruments between songs. This was cool and reminded me of seeing The Band numerous times years ago. Danko, Helm, Hudson and the rest would trade off instruments to get a "different" sound for certain songs.

The Black Angel's Drummer was a delight. She, literally, pounded the crap out of her kit. She is a real power drummer and I enjoyed watching her perform. At times, the Bassist would also hit an upright snare.

This band also played the vintage instruments. It was great to see that. It gave this music a real authentic feel. It was very organic sounding. See a picture of the Black Angels to the left of this text. The Black Angels eventually went off stage and there was a 45 minute break.

Around 11:00 pm, the band came back on and began playing Bo Diddley's a Headhunter. They got that cool riff going and then Roky walked out. The crowd went wild! Then THAT voice started singing! It was pandimonium! This crowd was lit up on every drug imaginable, lots of alcohol and completely into it. This was followed by Two Headed Dog! The crowd went wild! They were singing and swaying, drunkenly, on the dance floor.

Everything became a blur; I was having a good time. I stood there with my brother and business partner and just soaked it in. They did I Walked with a Zombie, Night of the Vampire, all that! The guy next to me was taping the show so....

Then, the singer of the Black Angels broke out the jug! They did Splash 1 and You're Gonna Miss Me! It was amazing! Later on, the band broke out more 13th Floor Elevators material. When they did Roller Coaster the crowd surged forward flipping out. They were screaming the lyrics and swaying around. It was something else.

Finally, the show ended and the singer from the Black Angels came down. I met him and we spoke. I told him that his band was waaaaaaay better than the Explosives! The Explosives are too polished. They sound like what they are: an Eighties new wave band. The Black Angels are perfect for Roky. They have that organic, fuzzed out, garage sound. The singer looked relieved and thankful. He acknowledged the mediocore reviews and said that they bothered him because Roky is such and influence on him. I told him to forget about the reviews. He then took my posters backstage for Roky to sign. He's such a cool guy.

We went back to the Dunes and then to Canter's for a nightcap. Guess WHO we ran into there? ROKY ERICKSON & HIS WIFE DANA! We spoke for about ten minutes. Roky was really cool. He was alert, happy and engaged in the conversation. I told him about preferring the Black Angels to the Explosives and Dana said that *they* liked the Black Angels a lot too. Here's a picture of Roky and I below:

It was the PERFECT ending to a fantastic evening.

The next morning we met, former Roky Erickson Guitarist and Producer, Mike Alvarez at Canter's for breakfast. Mike was just back from surfing. It must be nice. I've known Mike for 10+ years through the Internet but this was the first time that we met. He's really cool! See a picture of Mike Alvarez and I below here:

After hanging out with Mike, we went to Venice Beach. That was cool to see all the artists and surfers. It's a long boardwalk that's lined with artists and surfers. Check it out:

This was a truely great weekend. Go see this band! BTW, Roky DIGS the Roky Erickson CD Club!