Pierced Arrows @ Green Room

My walk to "Le Salon Vert” was an interesting one.

Walking on upper St. Laurent, being distracted by all the really cheap Indian restaurants, my senses were cut off by a mass group of interesting people gathered outside a gallery exploding with indie music and laser lights. For a brief moment I thought to myself that this concert might actually be pretty exciting, with all the glimmer and interesting-looking people.  

Unfortunately, this awesome venue was not the Green Room. I continued walking down the street and then I recognized a tiny group of smokers, clad with punk attire that always reminds me of Middle Ages garb. The Green Room is a grungy bar with a tiny platform for performers. The place wasn’t even filled and it reeked of body odor, I badly wanted to unleashed an Axe-spray bomb into the crowd.  

The two opening bands, Unfun and another whose name I couldn’t wrap my ears around, because the music, if you can call it that, blockaded my eardrums and prevented any sound from entering. A slight exaggeration yes, but these two opening bands were unbearable. I have no clue how anyone around me could even make out the lyrics, if they even had any, or could relate to the angry smashing and ghoulish screams they were making.  

What was nice about the Green Room was that they close doors at midnight, the opening bands started at 9:30, I couldn’t wait for Pierced Arrows to finally get on that stage, so I could get the hell out of there.  

Finally Pierced Arrows on the stage. Pierced Arrows was originally a band in the '80s that combined garage rock, punk and country and originally called themselves Dead Moon. The original Dead Mooners, singers/guitarists/songwriters Fred Cole and Toody Cole, which have reached a prime age of retirement, still kick it in Pierced Arrows with Kelly Halliburton on drums. These veteran artists know how to excite the crowd. I found it interesting that there would be a rock/punk band, in which the lead singer is married to one of the members. It totally goes against the image of the life of a rock-star who sleeps with all his groupies.

As happy as the crowd was to hear this veteran band, I couldn’t decide what was worse, their terrible combination of genres that came out sounding like garbage or their saggy skin flowing back and forth on stage. I do give them credit for fighting the years to stay young, but their uncouth appearances just gave me the feeling that I was watching a group of junkies ranting on and making a racket.

After a few songs, I could not take this genre of music anymore. I decided that I would sacrifice the chance of seeing them eating a vampire bat or resurrecting the dead, I quickly ran to the door and went to Reggie’s bar, anticipating the cheap beer and slightly quieter music.

-David A.