3RA1N1AC, Come On Down
Why didn’t no one tell me that Brainiac were touring again? Oh, because I only know one other person who listens to them, and I’m really not on social media anymore.
To be honest, this was probably more improbable than Unwound reforming last year since Brainiac’s lead singer Tim Taylor died in a car crash in 1997. When I saw they were coming to the Regent back over the holidays, I knew I had to go.
Brainiac were so great because the songs were heavy and manic forcing you to dance like a rhythmless refugee from the 80s. After their first album Smack Bunny Baby, they rarely relied on power cords and distortion instead using dueling jangly guitars that seemingly weren’t playing anything complementary or anything that could be understood as helping along a melody. And the vocals were so processed you couldn’t decipher the lyrics. So you just had to focus on the music. As solid as their final album Hissing Prigs in Static Couture was, Bonzai Superstar always fucking hit me. As “Hot Metal Doberman’s” gently brings you into their world, the sounds and noises on there are transfixing and hypnotizing. It climaxes with “Status: Choke” (which I knew they were not going to play) and drones out with “Collide”, fading out into the ether.
Here they were opening the gig with “Indian Poker Pt. 3”. You can get a sense of what I’m saying here.
Since they reformed when the Brainiac doc Transmissions After Zero screened and played after screenings in New York, LA and Dayton, they saw there was a hunger to seem the live again. John Schmersal now taking the lead role with Juan Monasterio on bass and Tyler Trent on drums, they added Tim Krug to round out the lineup. Even though I never saw them live back in the day, you get a sense of what they were and what they could have been. You hear their influence on almost all music in the 2000s from Nine Inch Nails to the Faint, Blood Brothers, At the Drive-In.
I know I say this just about every time I go to a show here in DTLA, but it really is wonderful to just walk to these venues from my apartment. Walking into the Regent there was the army of old folks like me with a smattering of young kids — you could tell them from their big unruly permed hairdos and shitty facial hair. It really was adorable and touching that they even cared to study up on old music — a lot of kids don’t do that even though it’s available at their fingertips.
I made the mistake of buying a drink at the Regent– a Hendricks and soda with tip was $22. Since I don’t go out, I don’t know how that falls in line with other venues. I knew that prices were going to be inflated, but that was bit too much.
As they got into their set, it was everything I was expecting. Manic dancing, chanting when I actually knew the lyrics (as nonsensical as they may be.) I was in my 20s again, not caring what a fat doofus I looked like up in the front and center. There really is a catharsis in screaming “2, 4, 6, 8, TELL ME WHO I’M S’POSED TO HATE/ CAN’T QUIT THE GOOSE STEP / TELL ME IT’S A TWO-STEP PROCESS” at the end of “Vincent Come On Down.” As outrageous and manic as the show was, it did get a bit wistful when John mentioned being shocked at the demand to see the band live again and honoring Tim with these shows. What could have been.
It was a tight hour-long set that ended with what is perhaps their swan song, “I Am a Cracked Machine.” And like that it was over. I was 45 again. At least this time, I only had to walk five minutes to get to my apartment, pet my cats and listen to Brainiac until I fell asleep.