Fucked Up - Mississippi Studios, Portland OR - December 10, 2018

[from Toronto, Ontario, Canada] Everytime I hear this band, my finger lifts to skip because I hate screamo … but then they catch me and entrance me. There’s some deep musicality and groove to their hardcore. Again and again and again, I was amazed at how Fucked Up fucked up my perception of screamo. So I became their dedicated fan and started tracking their tour dates and all sorts of madness I don’t usually engage in. And suddenly they were touring in Portland …. They were as confusing live as as they are recorded. Although my notes suggest I was also a hot mess. I Do Know they started out all paisley and whimsical and jangly (Madchester?) and I literally started googling to see if I was the one who’d fucked up and bought tickets to the wrong show. Then the beast rose. But I still felt confused because there was some truth in the hardcore to where they’d started. Rolling drums. Who are these weird Canadians? The lead singer’s a showman with crazy stares, a total lack of concern for rockstar image, and regular evocations of radical liberal sentiment. When he yelled “fuck fascism,” I literally heard the thundering patter of a hundred middle class White men from across Portland storming the stage. My nonsense notes (“tracers,” “swimm dancer”) reference Daniel Romano, whom I’m going to go ahead and irrelevantly take a listen to since I’m obsessed with “Time Forgot to Change My Heart.” Not irrelevant! He’s Canadian too. Coincidentally, I was in Toronto right after this wondering what bands are from Toronto. I don’t know how those happy well-social-serviced Canadian fools produce such excellent tormented music.