Sonic Youth and the Feelies vs. A Giant Hole of Suck

Photo of Theater District tagged “Bostonist” by Antydiluvian . Boston’s worst live music venue, the Wilbur Theatre, on the left. Is there a shittier live music venue in Boston than the Wilbur Theatre? We hope not. Let’s just say that it takes an advanced level of suck to cancel out the awesomeness that is a Sonic Youth-Feelies concert and that the Wilbur Theatre managed to conjure it. We watched the show last night while standing in a god-foresaken zone of the dimly appointed venue called “Floor 6.” “Floor 6″ is less a floor than a pen, a space about 5 by 20 feet fenced off from the rest of the general admission area by wrought iron and patrolled by zealous security people with bright flashlights and black baseball caps. We were two years old the last time somebody wanted to keep us in a pen for three straight hours, but this is how the Wilbur treats adults. “Floor 6″ has the misfortune of being directly below the venue’s crumbling mezzanine, which hovered two feet above our heads. Not only did the mezzanine keep us from seeing the entire stage, the overhang offered enough baffling that we only heard the high notes by chance. It was a problem that got worse when the Feelies were on the stage. The Feelies play music that’s as harmonically rewarding as anything in rock. Unfortunately, those harmonies call for high notes as well as low ones. The Wilbur’s sound guy, for his part, has never met a low tone he hasn’t plugged into an

amplifier, cranked to a bowel-trembling volume, and ridden into the red. Watching the band from “Floor 6″ was like standing on a corner of Washington Street and hearing the Feelies rumble from the Alpine speakers of a fleet of El Dorados. When Bill Million Glenn Mercer, sunglassed, shredded through his solos, the resulting muddle was a crime against the guitarist as well as his fans. Sonic Youth, despite a noticeably more competent sound person, fared little better. The cavernous Wilbur swallows sound and regurgitates it in a shadow form—music sounds to a Wilbur concertgoer how images looked to the man in Plato’s cave. Guitars that we should be describing as “searing” sounded instead like the tinny racket from a Fisher Price My First Detuned Electric Guitar. The highlight of the whole experience was Kim Gordon’s dress, which looked, from afar, as if it were attached to her body with electrical tape. Sonic Youth plays the Wilbur again tonight with the Meat Puppets, but here’s how you can save your $30 and still feel like you got the experience. Put your Meat Puppets and Sonic Youth records on your stereo, turn the bass all the way up, and then go stand in your closet. To make it more realistic, call up your simian-jawed landlord, give him a flashlight, a black baseball hat, and the instructions not to let you leave your closet until the music is done. Press play and enjoy.

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Sonic Youth and the Feelies vs. A Giant Hole of Suck