17 years ago or so, I was in the middle of a crush of teenagers at Bayfront Park, in the middle of a Nirvana concert when Kurt Cobain took the time to plug: "There's a band called Harry Pu--y playing Churchill's tonight." The audience screamed in delight, and a few alt rockers behind me started discussing the merits of Rat Bastard's favorite noise band.
A few months earlier Rat had passed an untitled single to Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth favorite band -who in turn had hipped Cobain, as he was his A&R guy. The next thing you knew, Lou Barlow and every other indie rocker worth their weight in limburger was singing the praises of a miami noise rock trio fronted by Alliance theater founder Bill Orcutt who played a 4-string guitar, and his wife Adrias Hoyas - who never bothered keeping a beat on her drums, preferring to attack them like Miss Piggy.
Orcutt and Hoyas were very prolific in their 5 year career, and managing a dozen or so releases and several US tours despite their local fan base being restricted to Rat and his 40 or so friends that habituated Churchill's on "Beautiful Noise" Thursdays.
When HP broke up in 1997, Orcutt soon cut his ties to the Alliance and bailed to the west coast, working as a consultant to Ebay and not giving his music career much thought. But if there's one thing that middle aged artistes won't let go, it's the need to have the kids think you're important - and after a decade-plus of hipsters name checking HP like evangelicals - Orcutt picked up an atonal 4-string guitar, tuned it low so he wouldn't snap the neck and began recording frantic, noisy, bizarre, alleged acoustic "blues" numbers that sound all the world like Bob Log III minus the motorcycle helmet microphone, kick drums and boob scotches.
The art music world has scooped it up with both hands. The internet is littered with huzzahs from Pitchfork, WFMU and their ilk. Tuesday night at Sweat Records, you can see what all the fuss is about for free. Rat bastard and his cast of minions open the show.
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