Last Friday (May 14th to be exact) I did something that I haven’t done in four or five years and went to a concert (or shows as we call them in the punk rock world). What made this show so special that it was one of only two performances that would occur in support of the new Stephen Egerton album The Seven Degrees of Stephen Egerton, on one Friday at the Conservatory and one on Saturday in Tulsa. The show included Euclid Crash, Slorder (Stephen’s instrumental band), Drag the River, Scott Reynolds & the Steaming Beast, and Stephen & friends.
The show opened with Euclid Crash taking the stage for six songs (originally it was going to be seven but one of the guitar players had some issues with a broken string). During EC’s set I was impressed with the band (this is the first time that I had gotten to see them play) and especially impressed with their drummer. It wasn’t until after their set when I was introduced to EC’s lead singer Tory Gonzales (thanks to her cousin and my good friend Ross) that she pointed out that their drummer was none other than Jesse Smith (Roustabouts, The Condition, The Flood). I hadn’t seen Jesse in years so it was great getting to chat with him in person.
Up next was Stephen’s band Slorder. If you are at all familiar with the instrumental work of ALL/Descendents, then you’ve got a pretty good idea on what Slorder sounds like.
Next Jon Snodgrass and Chad Price took the stage for a duo version of Drag the River. I’d only heard a few DTR songs prior to this show, but I am now a huge fan! What a set these two put together. They got on the stage with their guitars and simply asked the crowd what they should play. Both Jon and Chad have powerful and haunting vocals and the mixture of the two over the alt country music was amazing.
Scott Reynolds & the Steaming Beast took the stage next. Now for fans of Scott, Steaming Beast is a bit of a departure from his work with ALL, Goodbye Harry, and The Pavers. He is still playing pop songs but they have a lounge feel to them. In the set they played a couple of Goodbye Harry and Pavers’ tunes but the highlight for me was their version of ALL’s “Dot.”
Finally the moment we were all waiting for, Stephen Egerton took the stage. First up on vocals was Jon Snodgrass who performed “Fire’s On” (his song on the record) and “Abundance of Fluff” (John Moreland’s song from the record). Next was Chris Demakes who performed three songs, then members of Le Fang joined Stephen to do fours songs, including one of theirs. Sadly I’ve forgotten who sang next. Then Scott Reynolds joined Stephen for the songs “Sunny Disposition” and “She’s Got Everything” (which is sung by Milo Aukerman on the album). Now it is in-between these two songs that something truly special took place. My good friend Steve, who joined me for the show, has been talking with Stephen back and forth online for a while and had made an off handed comment that it would be awesome to get married at the show (okay there is a lot more to this but I let Steve explain it all when he is ready but suffice it to say that he had met a wonderful woman upon returning to OK and they had decided to get married). AT the show, Stephen came up to Steve and said, “hey a friend of mine oh is a minister is here tonight and would love to do the ceremony.” Needless to say that set off a chain reaction of many phone calls by Steve and the eventual arrival of Mandy, his girlfriend, at the show. Steve had asked Stephen is they were going to perform “She’s Got Everything” earlier in the night and thus Stephen decided that they would do the marriage on stage right before the song. The marriage went off beautifully (and the cameras were going like crazy) and Stephen dedicated the song to Steve and Mandy. After that ALL/Descendents drummer and general punk rock legend Bill Stevenson joined the band. Scott took a break and some poor guy who apparently doesn’t sing and didn’t know the words to “When They Roam” was brought on stage to what could only be called suffer though the song. Scott then rejoined the band to belt out the ALL classics “Scary Sad,” “Fool,” and “Mary.” Finally Chad Price hit the stage to tackle three songs from the Seven Degrees album, his song “Funny Face,” Tim McIlrath’s “South for the Winter,” and one other that I cannot remember. Then the show ended with the band doing three more ALL classics, “Miranda,” “Refrain,” and “Original Me.”
After the show I talked with Chad, Stephen, and Scott again (I spoke with Scott and Stephen before the show as well) and was blow away at how amazingly cool these guys were. They had no attitude and spoke to everyone like they were friends. To me that was amazing. The other thing that I found amazing about the show was that as I looked around at the people in attendance I realized that these were my people. There was nothing but true, honest to goodness fans of Stephen’s work; there were no hipsters, trendy kids, jocks, or a-holes. Instead there was an atmosphere of friendship and a connection that felt very real. In a way I felt like I was home. And we all knew that we were there for something special that some people traveled hundreds of miles to see and that doesn’t happen very often in Oklahoma (neither does an on stage marriage for that matter).
Stephen and company I cannot thank you enough for a tremendous night that will live in my memories forever.
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