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BY JOHN GRAHAM |
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Fireballs of Freedom, Weird Lovemakers, Shoegazer EJ's, 2140 NE Sandy Blvd., 234-3535 10 pm Friday, Jan. 22 Cover It's not exactly the standard plan for rock stardom. If you're seeking fame, you generally hit the glamour towns, like New York, Chicago or L.A. What you don't do is start in sleepy Fargo, N.D., move to only slightly-less-sleepy Missoula, Mont., return to Fargo for a spell, go back to Missoula, then finally set up camp in Portland. (Despite the success of what could be known as the Alexakis Procedure, most people who move here do not find wealth overnight; this is a great town for getting on your feet, not running with the big boys.) But if you're the Fireballs of Freedom, you don't base your career on demographics and the potential for national press exposure. You think about more important issues--where you can pay low rent and find lots of beer (Portland). You seek a central location from which you can launch lightning-quick rock'n'roll blitzkrieg tours into as many cities as possible (Portland). You find a town where they allow you to dance on the bar and smash glasses with your boots and where you won't get tossed for stagediving to karaoke renditions of "Light My Fire." Well, two out of three ain't bad. "I'd never seen anyone get 86ed from a bar until I moved to Portland," says FOF guitarist Kelly "Gator" Gately. "The OLCC is completely Nazi compared to the Midwest, where they'll serve you until you fall off the bar--and then they'll give you another shot. It's total lawless drinking. Like there's fucking dogs running the bar." Despite the legal obstacles preventing anarchic, all-night booze marathons, the Fireballs have found a way to party in public and not only get away with it, but get paid: They play some of the sweatiest, swankiest, full-on sweetest r'n'r music this town has seen. Punk-blues echoes of the MC5 (without the hair), Nation of Ulysses (without the politics) and Jon Spencer (without the ego) erupt from the overdriven amps. Gately and second guitarist Von Venner take turns unfurling ropy guitar solos and shrieking madly into the mike; Sammy "L.L. Cool" James flails at his drum kit so mightily he can't stay seated; bassist Troy Warling grounds the three with bounding bass lines; and Isaac K. "The Snake Handler" joins the team on organ and flaming maracas. There's only one problem. "People don't know how to dance to us," Gately laughs. Warling adds: "Yeah, it's like an epileptic fit," as they shimmy in violent imitation of a typical fan's movements. The solution? Drink a Schlitz and let the spasms happen. As James says, reversing the famous George Clinton motto: "Free your mind and your ass will follow." This is something they know a lot about. Tales of drunken insanity (and insane drinking) are a popular topic among the Fireballs. Like the story about playing teeball with beer bottles instead of the standard spheroid target. Or the one about how an old landlord used to sneak through their window just to see how trashed the place had become. And how James got evicted this past Christmas because he'd used up the landlord's seasonal cheer. These are seriously nice guys, though. Despite the fact they've been playing roughhousin' music together for ten years--under such monikers as the Smegma Clowns, Buttchuck and Phil Must Die (referring to Phil Collins)--and James' insistence that they're "a step away from being vandals," they care about you, the listener. They're here for your pleasure. "We're just playing for us and everybody else who loves music and ass-shakin', voodoo, raw expression," says Gator. The band's even gone so far as to cover their speakers with starry blankets, which he joshingly explains are really asbestos curtains "to keep the fire from blowing out of our amps and melting people's faces like at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark." You may laugh, but sometimes it seems the only reason these Fireballs don't explode is because of the perspiration flowing out their pores. Not only are the live shows intense, their eMpTy Records release The New Professionals is so immensely packed with pure, unrefined rock that its brief 28 minutes nearly wear the listener out with exhaustion. Now, everyone loves a Dionysian aural orgy, but is it like the old MTV slogan--"too much is never enough"? Or can it be overwhelming? Sometimes people just can't take so many groovin' and rump-movin' blasts being hurled at 'em--and the FOF can play for hours without having their thirst for rock'n'roll slaked--so will they ever let up? Nope. They grew up in North Dakota, where there was nothing for bored, freezing kids to do but "drink yourself into oblivion" and jam for five hours straight. So if they limit themselves to 45 minutes of ear-piercing pandemonium, count yourself lucky. They let you off easy, bud. They could've actually lived up to Kiss' exhortation to "rock'n'roll all night and party every day." Besides, true believers, the kind of endlessly revelling scamps the Fireballs like to hang out with will return again and again for a taste of the holy stuff. "People go to church every week and don't get sick of God," jokes Sammy James. To which Gately adds more seriously: "Of course, we don't want to be called gods, but if you're willing to testify, come on down." Let this be the first Portland testimonial. Can I get a witness?
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