2019: STATISTICS AND ANALYSIS

So here it is! Another year, another set of meticulously tracked statistics of my activities! Who needs rampant corporate cloud surveillance? I'm doing a fine job keeping track of my damn self. Every year, I think maybe I won't write anything, and I'll just dump the raw information on you, and leave it that. But, oh, I suppose I should write a "little something." Anyone with their head outside of their ass should already be fully aware of the problems affecting our planet, our country, our state, and our city, so I'll leave that analysis for the others, and focus on the live performances that defined 2019!

To the best of my ability to keep track, I witnessed 55 shows as an audience member, 20 less than last year, and an all time low, one less than the previous worst year, 2017!  That's a pretty bad slip, but I have excuses, as always! I worked a lot, and had a lot of band practices, which prevented me from going out many nights that I would have liked to. With Deathgrave practices happening in San Jose on Thursday nights now, it caused me to miss A LOT of shows that I would have gone to in Oakland and San Francisco. Plus, let's face it, I'm old and jaded now. A lot of times I feel like I can get more enjoyment out of a nice hike in the mountains than going to see ANOTHER metal show at a bar in Oakland, where I will drink 3-6 beers, buy an obligatory LP to support the touring band, and stagger home to attempt five hours of sleep. I had to pad my list of shows attended this year with some SERIOUSLY QUESTIONABLE performances I saw while at work, just to make this NOT the lowest year ever for nights spent out!

So as the world crumbles around us, let's have a look at some of the highlights of the year! I got to see Japan's Kikagaku Moyo, one of the best and tightest psychedelic bands going right now, two nights in a row in a tiny bar out in the Big Sur redwoods! Entrancing and intimate. The best bands I saw in 2019 were mostly from Japan, of course, and the biggest winner was Green Milk From The Planet Orange, who I saw at The Knockout in San Francisco. Best live band of the year! (Also, their new record III, which I believe they played in it's entirety that night, note for note, is my favorite album of the year.) Other great Japanese bands I crossed paths with included Boris, Church of Misery and Radioactive. Classic metal bands made a fine showing in 2019! Iron Maiden owned Oakland Arena with an excellent performance and unbelievable stage production.  Judas Priest delivered the goods at The Warfield. Obituary slaughtered the UC theater. OK, here's a cool one: I had never seen Metallica live until September of this year, when I was called by work to be a camera assistant at their "Symphony and Metallica" (S&M) 20th anniversary shows at the new Warriors Arena in San Francisco. For two nights, I was beyond front row, as the ageing thrashers played alongside the orchestra. Witnessing the frustration on the faces of the classically trained percussionists as they had to share a stage with Lars Ulrich was priceless! Another highly notable performance of a totally different sort was seeing the Pharaoh Sanders Quartet at Yoshi's. I decided it was more important to see one of the few living jazzmen who had actually played with John Coltrane, than to see King Diamond again. Bay Area choices! Pharaoh Sanders was great, still honking and squawking his sax like a champ at age 79, but he was almost overshadowed by his band, especially the drummer, who was simply jaw dropping in his skill and dexterity. Turned out it was Marvin "Smitty" Smith from The Tonight Show with Jay Leno! Of course, most of the shows I went to were to see the numerous talented, and more often than not, extremely malevolent, local bands. Check the full list for details!

As a drummer, I played 68 shows with five different bands, up slightly from last year, and not bad considering I didn't do any extremely long tours. My amalgamation into Deathgrave certainly boosted my statistics, as the band toured and gigged regularly throughout the year, re-estabishing themselves after six months without a drummer. Half of the sixty eight shows I played were with Deathgrave. My other old bands limped along in various states of disrepair, disagreement or apathy. (To be fair, Hazzard's Cure was actually focusing very hard on writing a completely new album, which will be sure to blow your ear holes in 2020).
Here's the breakdown:
Deathgrave: 34
Owl: 14
Isotope: 9
Cronander: 6
Hazzard's Cure: 5

Accounting for nights when I played or attended more than one show in the same night, that adds up to 121 nights spent out at a show of some kind, or 33.1% of all nights spent out. Barely scraping by as the second lowest year on record, and below the average of 39%. I wish I could do some kind of "decade retrospective" like a lot of people are doing this time of year, it being the end of the "2010s," but my meticulous record keeping only goes back to 2011, and therefore you are spared such heavy analysis. Now, let's have a look a the numbers:

Percentage of total nights spent out:
2019: 33%
2018: 35%
2017: 32%
2016: 39%
2015: 37%
2014: 38%
2013: 48.5%
2012: 46%
2011: 43%

FULL LIST OF SHOWS ATTENDED AND PERFORMED AFTER THE JUMP

2018: STATISTICS AND ANALYSIS

Time marches on. We struggle to quantify our parade of struggles and small victories in whatever way we can. 365 days. A year. Four seasons. A blink of an eye, or an eternity?

To the best of my ability to keep track, I attended 75 shows in 2018 as an audience member, which is up from 56 last year. I think I actually made a conscious effort to make it to as many live gigs as possible, in spite of my multiple band practices, and (sometimes) insane work schedule. Also, there is a new urgency to see certain legendary performers before they die. Because I work in the entertainment industry, some of these bands I saw while I was at work! As the Bay Area starts to suck in a lot of ways, I decided to just enjoy the hell of what's still around, and there turned out to be quite a lot, even in the face of rampant gentrification, multiple venue closures and the general trend of society to "Netflix and chill" instead of going out at night.

Some highlights included seeing one of the greatest drummers alive, and one of my personal heroes, Billy Cobham playing at Yoshi's. There was also my first trip to Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, and seeing David Byrne from the talking heads doing an extremely avante garde stage show, while I was working at Civic Auditorium. But for the most part, it was business as usual, tons of death metal, hardcore punk, sludge, psychedelic rock and maybe an odd Nintendo band.

As a drummer, I played 63 shows with six different bands, which is down slightly from last year  (when I actually played more shows as a drummer than attending as a punter). Although I played with six different bands, most of them did not play many local shows, and there were only two tours. Here's the breakdown:
Owl: 27
Isaac Rother And The Phantoms: 15  (European tour)
Isotope: 9
Cronander: 6
High By Night: 4
Hazzard's Cure: 2

Accounting for nights when I played or attended more than one show in the same night, that adds up to 128 total nights spent out during the year, or 35.34% of all nights spent out, which although is a slight rebound from last year's dismal tally (the lowest ever), it's still the second worst since I started keeping track, and well below the average of 39.8%.

In some of the early years of this project, I did a list called "venue graveyard," documenting the closures and burnouts of the local scene's live music establishments. Eventually, I stopped doing it, maybe because it was depressing and morbid, maybe because the scene stabilized somewhat in those middle years, or maybe because it was too tedious to document every little fly by night punk venue that came and went. But anyway, 2018 was a humdinger of a year for venue closures, with some real heavy hitters biting the dust; a few words must be spoken for the deceased.

The Elbo Room closed it's doors after 27 years in business as of December 31, 2018. In a rather science fiction type move, it manged to transfer it's soul into another, smaller venue in Oakland, where it lives on. The Hemlock Tavern, the ultimate small bar venue, closed it's doors in October, after 17 years, and will succumb to the wrecking ball sometime in 2019. Gargoyle might have to take the cake for shortest lived new venue. Though it appeared to be a fully functional and legal club, it closed after a few weeks and a few shows, and was revealed to have no permits of any kind. Whoops! Downtown Oakland stalwart Golden Bull, though it didn't shut down, pulled a kind of Pet Semetary move, when it temporarily died as a live music venue, then it came back, but it wasn't the same.

Percentage of total nights spent out:
2018: 35%
2017: 32%
2016: 39%
2015: 37%
2014: 38%
2013: 48.5%
2012: 46%
2011: 43%

FULL LIST OF SHOWS ATTENDED AND PLAYED AFTER THE JUMP

2017: STATISTICS AND ANALYSIS

To the best of my ability to keep track, I attended 56 shows as an audience member, which is WAY DOWN from last year (95, holy shit!), and actually the lowest amount of shows attended in a year since I began keeping track, which was in 2011. This extremely poor showing could stem from a variety of factors: my erratic work schedule never helps, and I was also playing a LOT of local gigs with four different bands, which meant a lot of nightly rehearsals that often went just a little too late to go catch a band I wanted to see at the club. There's also a chance that I'm feeling a little jaded these days. I'm definitely not trying to go see every little punk band that comes through town anymore "just for the hell of it," and for at least half of the year, I had a "serious" girlfriend, which means I had no need to go out to shows to just get drunk and look for chicks! Also, let's face it: the Bay Area scene is dying! The year was marked with a rash of venue closures mostly related to the notorious Ghost Ship fire that occurred at the end of 2016, and pretty much hammered nails into the coffins of DIY venues across the land. So there weren't even as many available shows to go to! I think I went to ONE Oakland punk house show the entire year, and it wasn't for a lack of wanting to.

What surprised me was that in this environment, I actually played 67 shows, only the second time since I started keeping track that I played more shows as a drummer than I attended as an audience member. (The only other time was when I played 103 shows in 2013, an epic Owl touring year). That's 11 gigs with Hazzard's Cure, 19 with Isotope, 12 with Cronander, 22 with Owl, and one each with A.N.S., Hazzard's Crüe (Mötley Crüe Halloween cover band), and High By Night (Rush Halloween cover band).

Accounting for nights when I played or attended more than one show in the same night, that adds up to 118 nights spent out, or 32% of all nights spent out, the lowest percent since I started keeping track. Pretty sad. Mostly, I'm gonna blame the excessive band practices. How Many? Maybe I should count... ah fuck, I'm sick of counting things.

2017: 32%
2016: 39%
2015: 37%
2014: 38%
2013: 48.5%
2012: 46%
2011: 43%

READ THE FULL LIST OF SHOWS AFTER THE JUMP

NEW BOCA DE FUMA FACEBOOK PAGE

LINK HERE

2016: RECAP AND STATISTICS

I almost didn't post my yearly analysis of extreme rock activities for 2016, the least significant reason, of course, being that no one cares about this shit besides me. More importantly, most are keen to forget the past year and it's myriad tragedies, be they those of the city of Oakland, the mortality of Rock's royalty, or the global political climate in general. Many were the tribulations. Few will care to "have a look back" at the past year one more time. Likewise, it feels quite gratuitously masturbatory to spend time aggrandizing my personal achievements of 2016, when so much energy is needed here, now, in the present: Actual threats to free speech, democracy, human dignity, and the environment have never seemed so real in my lifetime as they do at this moment.

But my yearly analysis and number crunching is a tradition, and I feel that I cannot move forward without doing it, so here it is: To the best of my ability to keep track, (which apparently is not that great, because even as I type this up, I am finding other shows I forgot to catalog) in 2016 I attended 95 shows as an audience member, 25 more than last year! The result surprised me, because I also put in more hours at my job than ever. This can mostly be explained by my lackluster performance in the touring department. None of my bands wanted to go on tour, so I was in town a lot. I worked a lot, and missed some cool bands because of that, but not as many as I would if I had been out in full Road Warrior mode. (Full disclosure: I did fudge the numbers slightly, as some of the shows I "attended," I was actually at work at the same time, seeing as I am employed within the entertainment industry. This will explain some of the "questionable" items, if you actually read through the list.) 95 shows attended is NOT far off from my all time high record of 118 in 2011! *Pats self on the back*

I only played 58 gigs with my various bands (four real ones, and two offshoot projects of Owl), which is down from 70 in 2015. That's 28 shows with Isotope, 12 shows with Owl, 8 shows with Cronander, 8 shows with Hazzard's Cure, and one gig each with the Owl spins offs "Bowl" and "High By Night." Isotope was the only band that even did anything close to what you would call a tour!

Accounting for nights when I did more than one thing (attended / played more than one show, or both), I spent 142 nights of the year playing or attending gigs, which edges me back up to 38.9% of all nights spent out, slightly bucking (much to my delight!) the downward trend of the past few years. I may not be touring as much as I used to, and I may be working a helluva lot, but I'm still not some beaten down, Netflix addicted homebody!

2016: 39%
2015: 37%
2014: 38%
2013: 48.5%
2012: 46%
2011: 43%

READ THE  FULL LIST OF SHOWS AFTER THE JUMP!

BEST OF 2016

TOP TEN BAY AREA ALBUMS OF 2016
In no particular alphabetical order

Black Cobra: Imperium Simulacra 
February 26, Season Of Mist
Possibly the most brutal and relentless album yet! It seems like Black Cobra are almost a victim of their own success at this point, they are so productive, putting out solid album after solid album, that this one went well under my radar until the last minute! Also, they're so busy touring the Euro festival circuit that they barely seem like a local band, only rarely playing at home.


Body Void: Ruins
June 16, Transylvanian Tapes / Dry Couch / Crown And Throne
Muscularly heavy. At times, almost elegant in it's single purpose mission: to smother you with the unyielding weight of it's Earhammer / Greg Wilkinson production. Crushing. 


Cardinal Wyrm: Castaway Souls
October 14, Svart
"Interesting doom," finally! Diverse, musical, magical, mysterious.


CCR Headcleaner: Tear Down The Wall
June 20, In The Red
Noisy blown alterna-grunge, butt-hole fuzz. The old Bay Area spirit that I miss: Offensively slovenly dirty, torn, shredded, rolling in beer mud, stained flannel, unapologetic. 

Eerie: s/t
July 29, TeePee
Pretty good for hipster tattoo artist black metal! An all star cast of at least half Bay Area musicians, so I'll count it. I don't think they've ever played live?
https://soundcloud.com/actionmedia/sets/eerie-eerie

Glitter Wizard: Hollow Earth Tour
October 21, Heavy Psych Sounds
Their third and best album yet! Bay area mainstays of gay wizard heavy glam rock for ten years now! The songwriting overshadows the spectacle of this time, which is good.


Hammers Of Misfortune: Dead Revolution
July 22, Metal Blade 
Hammers veered off an a twisted course over the last few albums that I could not quite follow, too operatic, too pop maybe. This year they came back out of the woods with something I can not only listen to, but can really enjoy! Heavier, faster, thrashier than anything they've done in awhile! Reminds me of why I used to like this band! 


Negative Standards: Fetters
June 16, Vendetta / Negative Standards
More black metal, more interludes, but still the same old Nega-stan! Biting, totured vocals about what I can only assume is something very intense and politcal. I think this might have supposed to been a 2015 release, but there were crazy-ass delays at the pressing plant?



Pins Of Light: Home
January 16, Sound And Pressure 
Motorhead meets Hawkwind may sound like an over simplification, and it is. Because you forgot that 90's post punk skate hardcore influence with the dual slashing guitars! 


Void Omnia: Dying Light
June 20, Vendetta
Cool death / black metal, some really good riffs in there, pretty epic. Great debut from a new band. 


Click down below for much more on Bay Area releases that came out in 2016! 

UPCOMING GIGS!

2015: THE RECAP

2015 was a little different from the past three years in that I did not do a huge month long tour in November, and to the delight of my mother, I was home for Thanksgiving! In fact, I did not do any long tours at all, though I was away for the entire month of August, which included two separate, smaller jaunts with two different bands. Even though I cut back on touring, I managed to hold the line pretty well on my "nights out" ratio with a hefty load of local shows and short mini tours.

To the best of my ability to keep track, and I must admit that my record keeping was exceptionally good this year, I attended 70 live shows in 2015 as an audience member, ten less than last year, and slipping further from my all time recorded high of 118 shows attended in 2011! I blame this decline in attendance to a more vigorous work schedule, a jaded perspective that comes from seeing almost every band I've ever wanted to see already, and not caring about going to see every little punk band that comes through, whether they're any good or not. (Most not.)



In a strange, first time coincidence, the amount of shows I performed was equal to the amount that I attended: 70! I did 70 gigs in 2015 behind the drums for four different bands, which is a slight step up from last year (62), but still down from the 103 gigs I performed in 2013, which is the highest on record. I have a feeling that 2006 was higher than that, but I'll have to do some research to prove it.

Accounting for nights when I attended two different shows in one night, or played two different gigs in one night/day, or played a show and then went to a different one after... that's 135 nights spent out at a gig, or about 37% of all nights spent in shitty rock venues. As you can see here, there's a continuation of the declining trend. Am I losing my vigor, or is there just nothing worth going out for? We'll see if the trend continues in 2016.

2015: 37%
2014: 38%
2013: 48.5%
2012: 46%
2011: 43%

THE FULL LIST OF GIGS ATTENDED AND PLAYED AFTER THE JUMP

2014: THE RECAP

Oh, 2014! Surely the beginning of the end! The beginning of a profound slide into complacency that will lead me to my grave! I feel the gears of a once mighty show attending / gig playing machine grinding to a halt! Oh, why has Lemmy forsaken me?

To the best of my ability to keep track, which may have been not so good last year, thanks to being apathetic and not giving a fuck (during certain phases), I attended 80 lives shows in 2014 as an audience member, the exact same amount as 2013, but still down from 99 in 2012, and the highest on record, 118 in 2011.

I only played 62 shows with four different bands in 2014, which is down from 103 shows with 3 different bands in 2013, and 80 shows with 5 different bands in 2012, but I am still up from 2011, when I played only 56 shows with five different bands.









Accounting for the nights when I attended or performed more than one show in the same day, that makes for a total of 139 nights out, or about 38% of all nights of the year out attending or performing live gigs, which makes for the lowest overall percentage since I started keeping statistics, in 2011:

2014: 38%
2013: 48.5%
2012: 46%
2011: 43%

This evidence can only lead me to the conclusion that I am now actually declining into OLD MAN status, preferring my armchair by the fire, my pipe, and my history books to the mosh pits and broken glass strewn nights or yore. 2014 was also an uncharacteristically weak touring year for me, and if I hadn't ended up filling in on the Wild Eyes European tour, road dates would have been almost non existent. 2014 was also my first year in quite awhile that I began the year with no steady job, and I know I spent many nights home and broke, scanning the internet for real estate upon which I would establish my alpaca farm. Researching last year's calendar to compile the list of shows I attended, I came across a startling amount that I MISSED.

CLICK BELOW TO SEE THE FULL LIST OF SHOWS FROM 2014:

BEST OF 2014

1. OWL: Screech


2. HAZZARD'S CURE: The Ugly EP


3. ISOTOPE: Final Wind Of Mercy Demo


HONORABLE MENTION: WILD EYES: Above Becomes Below
(I didn't play on it, but I toured Europe on it) 


FUCK YOU ALL

UPCOMING PERFORMANCES

2013: THE RECAP

So here I am at the beginning of 2014, doing my annual analysis of shows attended and played. If I can't quantify it, it's not real! The numbers don't lie folks!

As I looked back over the past year, going through my archives and adding up the gigs, I remembered how optimistic, how enthusiastic I felt at the beginning of 2013. "Lucky '13!" was my rallying cry! And for awhile, I felt pretty lucky!  Shit was going good... but something somewhere must have changed, for I sit here at the dawn of 2014 feeling tired, defeated, disgusted, and like I've finally reached that age where I realize that I've been throwing my whole life away for some stupid bullshit that doesn't matter! I guess it's time to retire from rock and roll and become a file clerk!  This could possibly be the last year end recap that you'll have to suffer through. Cheers!





To the best of my ability to keep track...

In 2013 I attended 80 shows as an audience member. Down from 99 in 2012 and 118 in 2011. 

In 2013 I performed 103 shows with three different bands. Up from 2012 when I performed 80 shows with five different bands and 2011 when I performed 56 shows with five different bands. 

Accounting for a few nights when I played or attended more than one show in one night, that's 177 nights out in 2013, or almost 48.5% of all nights, which beats last year's percentage: 46!

Venue Graveyard 2013:
Pink String: Oakland (???)
Metro Small Room: Oakland
Rio Grande: San Francisco
The Swamp: Oakland
Sugar Mountain: Oakland
And like ten different ones in San Jose that lasted only for one show...


FULL LIST AFTER THE JUMP

UPCOMING SHOWS

2012: THE RECAP

Photo: Marissa Gräz

Posts have been pretty sparse around here at the famous Boca de Fuma blog, mainly due to an insane amount of business in other activities, many which will become clear as you read through this post. I know that my loyal readers wouldn't let me slip by without another epic end of year recap of my activities: specifically my activities of performing and attending a wide variety of extreme rock and roll gigs. As of now, a live gig experience is something you still can't download, and I'm going to take this opportunity to says "CHEERS" to all those who braved crowds of drunken idiots, harsh urban environments, transportation problems galore, as well and flying glass, spit, beer, blood and human bodies to make all this stuff happen. Here's hoping that 2013 is just as packed.

To the best of my ability to keep track...

I attended 99 shows as an audience member.
Down from 118 in 2011.

I performed 80 shows with five different bands.
Up from 56 shows with five different bands in 2011.

On eleven nights, I went to two shows in one night, which means a grand total of 168 nights spent at some kind of rock gig last year, or about 46% of all nights spent out.

VENUE GRAVEYARD 2012:
105 Pioneer: Santa Cruz 
BMC (Bobby Hill's House): Oakland
Five Points Art Space: San Francisco
Fuzzplex: Oakland
Kitty Castle: San Jose
Mama Buzz: Oakland   
Rec Center: Oakland


CLICK "READ MORE" TO SEE THE COMPLETE LIST OF SHOWS ATTENDED AND PERFORMED IN 2012

Fuck 2011: The Recap

I attended 118 shows in 2011.

In addition, I performed 56 shows with five different bands.

Accounting for the nights when I went to more than one show, that's a total of 158 nights I spent out at a show or playing one, about 43% of all nights. Not bad considering I didn't even do any big tours this year.

Venue Graveyard 2011: These ones didn't live to see 2012
The Hazmat: Love it or hate it, it was an Oakland institution.

Ghost Town Gallery: Although usually full of h****** garage rock trash, that's one less venue on a street corner that at one magical point in 2010 had FOUR rock and roll warehouses doing shows simultaneously. 

Kimo's: Bands hated it because of the stairs, fans hated because, well, I dunno, they'd rather be at the Hemlock? One less rock venue in San Francisco. You didn't love it enough, I hope you're happy fuckers! 

Victory Warehouse: What a cool spot! But those nice Wisconsin kids were sick of all the neighborhood violence creeping into the shows. Another one of the four warehouses that made up the one time 25th and San Pablo rock mecca. 

First Church Of The Buzzard: The stars that burn the fastest burn the brightest, and The Buzzard went pretty quick, but not before hosting some of the most incredible metal shows of 2011. Did that East Bay Express article have anything to do with it's untimely demise? 

Oh yeah... and The Eagle Tavern: A great loss to San Francisco's live music scene as well as gay community. Who really runs this town? Real estate! Fuck off! 

Why fuck 2011? I don't know, i just wanted to use that funny picture of myself flipping you off. 2011 was a year like any other, it had it's ups and downs. So what.

I'm getting ready to really kill it in 2012. Just you wait. Here's to many more shows, tours and hopefully some new venues in the Bay Area! Happy New Year!

Click "Read More" to see the lists of every show I played and performed, like you care...

A Funny Review

Acts Of Sedition/A.N.S. Benefit

Featuring the sexy sounds of:

LECHEROUS GAZE (straight outta yer dad's bar)
PIGS (heavy Oakland shit)
HIGHTOWER (SF Skate Thrashers 'n' Bashers)
OWL (Clint and his little brothers rock out like 1971)
THEA (new Oakland rock and roll)

This is a benefit show to generate money for the equipment that A.N.S. was borrowing from Acts of Sedition to play the Tankcrimes Brainsqueeze. For those who don't know, an unknown (and still uncaught) individual(s) broke into the van, which was parked right around the corner from the venue and left unattended for only 15-20 minutes, stole two guitar heads, a box full of pedals and cables, and a cymbal case. None of it has been recovered.

Neither A.N.S. or Acts Of Sedition has been in any financial position to re-buy the gear, so we've been scraping along with borrowing stuff for the past few months (btw thanks Dave Witte/Municipal Waste/Paiste for loaning the cymbals to use on the A.N.S. tour).

Please hang out with us!

DUE TO POPULAR DEMAND: Here is a Paypal donation button for those who wish to contribute to the equipment recovery, but cannot make it to any of the shows. Even if it's a couple of bucks, we know you guys are broke too!

Happy Fucking New Year

Got all kinds of cool shit for no one to read in 2011! Lots more show reviews, a paper version of Boca de Fuma (featuring the complete flier archive from 2002-2006) and fully a functional Stop Go Destroy Tapes/Records Of The Mountain/Hazzard's Cure store! Stay tuned.

Acts Of Sedition Plays In San Francisco!

A rare San Francisco show. Come kick it with us and Sub-mit.