the MINDY SET vs the CHINESE LOVE BEADS

The Mindy Set reunion & CD release

of god and science

Sin Serenade

Jumpsuit

Friday December 28

Low Spirits Bar & Stage

2823 2nd Street NW

Albuquerque, NM

8pm doors

$7

Chinese Love Beads reunion

Sicteens

The Pantease

Black Wolf Howl

Friday December 28

Tricky Falls

209 S. El Paso St.

El Paso, TX

doors 8pm

$5

Two of my favorite bands reunite on the same night and I’m out of town with the fam. What did I do to deserve such a lump of coal in my musical stocking?!

Tonight will be six years (and twenty days but who’s counting) since The Mindy Set played their final show at Burt’s Tiki Lounge. There was barely a dry eye in the house that night, off or on stage. It was truly the most emotional farewell show most of us Mindy fans had ever witnessed. Me, I’m still pissed off that the Mindy Set was never showered with lucrative recording contracts. Was it better after all to leave with quiet dignity rather than as the next big thing hyped on the cover of Magnet? I don’t know but I’d like to have seen it nonetheless because the band deserved much more than it got.

Call them neo-psych or American Britpop, whatever, but there was no mistaking the influence of UK bands like Ride or The Charlatans (or if you’ were really deep into the pudding, Coast or Mantaray). Joshua Williams laid out the prettiest basslines you could ever hope to hear. If  you weren’t  paying  attention, it would’ve  been easy to overlook the gorgeous subtlety of his work that perfectly complemented Matt Dickens’ elegant guitars. And I say “guitars” rather than “guitar” because Matt’s style and echo/fx settings made him sound as if duet-ing with himself, like playing in a room full of audible mirrors.

Sadly two key members will not be present. Master stickman Noelan Ramirez will sit in for drummer Jill McArthur and although she’s irreplaceable you couldn’t find anyone better suited than he. Michael Tinley played some of the loveliest and most unobtrusive guitar I’ve ever heard, both lead and melody at the same time. From what I understand, no one will be playing in his stead tonight and that’s as it should be.

One of the fiercest punkrock n’ roll outfits of the late ‘90s Southwest was The Chinese Love Beads. Based here for a short time, their real tierra was El Paso and Ciudad Juarez. Fast, furious and grimy, the ‘Beads rocked like chinga and are expected to pull out the stops tonight at their first show in over a decade. Singer/bassist Ernesto Ybarra is better known today as DJ Rootzrocka and guitarist Pauli B. is Pablo Novelas who fronted Albuquerque’s The Dirty Novels until a few years ago. I’m betting few ‘burqueños will be cruising down to Chuco for the unexpected reunion but I hope at least some of you will represent.