Sound check — Geoff Carter: Promoting dialogue on the question of arena concerts

Friday, July 23, 1999 | 9:13 a.m.

Geoff Carter's music column appears Fridays. Reach him at carter@ vegas.com

Earnest Concertgoer (gesturing at the writer's notebook): Hey, are you reviewing the show tonight?

Writer: Yeah.

EC: Should be a good one.

W: Perhaps. It's already got a strike against it.

EC: How's that?

W: It's an arena show. Arena shows are awful. No band should play them.

EC: How do you figure?

W: Look around you. This place was built for boxing matches, hockey games. Nobody cares what those sound like. You ever see a hockey team playing a 1,200-seat club?

EC: Aw, you're being negative.

W: As a matter of fact, I am. It's all mathematics. Where are you parked tonight?

EC: I'm parked in the garage.

W: This venue's garage, or next door? I'm parked next door. They made me park next door and walk over.

EC: Really?

W: Really. Then there was the wait at Will Call ...

EC: Tell me about it. I waited in that damn line for 45 minutes!

W: Uh-huh. So subtract the amount of time you waited for tickets you already bought, the distance you walked to get in here, your total distance in yards from the stage and your ticket price from the intrinsic value of barely seeing and hearing a band with exactly two songs that you kind of like. What's your total there, junior?

EC: Um ... I have no idea.

W: Neither do I. It ain't much.

EC: You know, arena shows do kind of suck.

W: They certainly do. And they can be avoided.

EC: How's that?

W: Well, both the bands on tonight's bill played club shows this past year. You could have gone to one of them. The age of the super-stadium bands with a fleet of tour trucks is gone. With the exception of Metallica (which is too loud for human-scale joints), there's no reason to see a band in a venue with more than 5,000 seats, and even that's pushing it.

EC: Isn't that about the size of the Aladdin Performing Arts Theatre? When are they supposed to re-open that place?

W: You're gonna make me cry.

EC: I like club shows, too. I like the intimacy. They feel more ...

W: Civilized.

EC: Yeah. Like you're out for the evening, you know? Like what you're doing is a big deal. And they're easier to get out of after the encore. Always takes me an hour to leave this place after the show. And lemme tell ya, I want a cigarette in the worst way.

W: No fume en esta arena, por favor.

EC: Yeah, what's up with that? I gotta go out to the casino to smoke, sitting in a place that's bigger than any casino? It doesn't add up.

W: Sure it does! Forty bucks a ticket, multiplied by 12,000 seats, divided by the 25 percent of us that are actually gonna make out the facial features of the band tonight equals no cigarettes for you, but plenty of nice, fatty cigars for the promoters.

EC: I hate arena shows.

W: Me too.

(A band takes the stage; the crowd cheers.)

EC (squinting): Which group is that?

W: No idea. I think it's the Red Wings.

Stereo Dynamics

The Backsliders, "Southern Lines," Mammoth Records; Meat Purveyors, "More Songs About Buildings and Cows," Bloodshot Records

One of the best nights of my life: I drove the length of Nevada in one straight shot, while helping a friend move to Seattle. We left Vegas at 10 p.m. and drove through Alamo, Ely, Wells, Jackpot ... I made us stop for breakfast in Twin Falls, Idaho (she had insisted on taking the long way around). I didn't sleep a wink that night, energized by my own tenacity and the promise of breakfast in Idaho.

That's why I love alternative country music so much. It's the sound of American highways, of solace, of friendships tangible and remembered, of early-morning coffee in unfamiliar surroundings. That's the sound of the Backsliders, a roots-rock band cut from the same cloth as Festus, Missouri's Bottle Rockets and wild young things Whiskeytown, and the Meat Purveyors, a more traditional-sounding country outfit with two female vocalists and mandolins a-plenty. I can't decide which one I like better because I received both at once and they complement each other beautifully, rolling over each other in shuffle mode like speeding wheels over moonlit asphalt.

Their narrative voices blend perfectly. Listening to the groups in tandem, it's easy to visualize a smoky truck-stop bar in which Chip Robinson, the Backsliders' earnest and eternally cool traveler, tries out lines ("I coulda been Abe Lincoln sportin' $50 glasses") on the Purveyors' wickedly sarcastic Jo Stanli Watson, who's heard it all before ("I'm more man than you'll ever be, and more woman than you'll ever get."). It's a real dialogue, if an unintentional one. This is the sound of the forgotten America, and the miles of interstate highway holding them together.

You can buy these records individually, of course -- they're both excellent -- but I tell you: if I'd had these when I made that all-night run, I might have kept right on going. Looking for Kerouac, Guthrie, Ochs -- or a good cup of coffee, at least.

Get Out, Act Up

Space is tight and gigs are plentiful this weekend so let's get cracking: House of Blues welcomes alt. country group The Mavericks tonight. Saturday brings the genre-busting Latin beats of Cubanismo to the same venue. Call 632-7600 for more information.

On Saturday night Legends Lounge hosts the Worldfolk Flood Benefit, a multiband showcase that will hopefully raise whatever FEMA and local government won't cover. Mark Huff, the Melancholics, Warsaw and many others will perform. Call 437-9674.

The unstoppable B-52's play the Hard Rock Joint Saturday night followed Sunday by loopy-rock trio Primus, the masterminds behind the "South Park" theme. Call 226-4650.

The MGM Grand Garden welcomes hip-hop goddess Lauryn Hill Saturday night with The Roots opening and perhaps backing the diva on a number or two. Call 891-7777.