alt title: i hate myself for using the word "blistering"

Well, I lasted this gig better than the previous Hot Grits party, although that one started at midnight and went for two hours, I was knackered and I kept getting hit on by offensive drunken louts. This time I napped, guzzled V, and it helped that the gig was on familiar turf. For some reason the higher proportion of reticent indie kids in attendance makes a difference. But I'm waffling.

Unfortunately the nap (and a brief encounter with a distressed girl on my dash down Queen St) cut into support act time, and I'd GROSSLY UNDERESTIMATED THE INEXPLICABLE GENIUS THAT IS THE BENKA BORADOVSKY BORDELLO BAND. They played a couple of cossack numbers after I got there (I suspect it's all russian-flavoured), but oh, how I wish I'd caught the rest of the set. There were a lot of people bouncing up the front, and from my view-from-the-back, the band looked like the entire cast of an episode of America's Got Talent all shoved on a stage the size of a pool table. I couldn't quite tell if the front-man (Benka Boradovsky, I assume) was naked or just topless. I don't remember who it was I mentioned this to, but I was assured he wasn't completely naked, and warned that he wouldn't need much encouragement. Anyway, Bx4 were the perfect warmup for the Hot Grits, who didn't really need it on the night, but, well, bonus for them. Everyone was in a good mood by the time I got there.

Now that I think about it, the BBBordello Band were most likely the cause of the the high incidence of indie kids. Definitely one of their head band-aids is Ash Kilmartin - the consummate Fangirl (by her own admission, and the title of her set at the last comedy festival) and nzmusic.com old skool. We caught up on our respective groupie action "my boyfriend's in the band" "oh! my boyfriend's in the other band!" "squee! go us!", and towards the end of the gig a not-inconsequential number of previously-bouncing indie peeps filed past and informed her that they were going back to her place. She said she'd catch them up.

Anyway, The Hot Grits: rather than just blast into their first number, the funky backing music playing on the PA was overwritten by drums, then guitar, then horns, until eventually the whole band was playing. It's a cool way to start a set, I reckon. People stand around drinking and conversing, until a gradual dawning of "oh! they're playing" sets in.

I'm not actually sure how they fit twelve (12) band members on a stage the size of a pool table, although when Glen the tenor sax player was hailed and farewelled, all I could see was half an arm waving out from behind a speaker. There was a veritable scrum across the front of the stage, and there were a couple of moments when Barney's gospel-preacher wailing and flailing threatened to displace the baritone sax that Ben was balancing on his shoulder. The whole sports-team front-line motif was emphasised further by Ben's gesticulations to the rest of the horn section, informing them what kind of punctuation to play next.

Conclusion: the band & the crowd was bouncy and happy, and so was I. I have now established that funk is all about thinking up a killer riff, then repeating it over and over and over again, and very occasionally changing something just when the people are off their guard. This results in the worlds longest intros, a couple of more leisurely tracks for which I completely zoned out, and the rest of a blistering set being head-boppy and foot-tappy as hell. And we all headed up to Cartel and got drunk.

The Hot Grits and The Benka Boradovsky Bordello Band
July 15th, 2007
The Schooner Tavern

Earworm: Say I Love It.
Rating: a 12 out of 10 band members able to fit on one stage.