The Schizophonics
4th March 2020
Neck Of The Woods, Auckland, New Zealand.
Review by Ali Nicholls. Photography by Connor Crawford.
Just shy of a year since their last roady touring Aotearoa, raucous San Diego-based duo The Schizophonics returned with a vengeance last night to Tāmaki Makaurau’s Neck of the Woods. Joined by kiwi bassist Takumi McIntyre (formerly of The Cavemen), Pat and Lety Beers brought the whare down with their turbulent and unrelenting rock n roll/blues/punk bangers.
Last night’s show saw a line-up of local music legends take the stage, with Thee Golden Geese opening the gig with a set-list of short and sweet crackers that had the modest but enthusiastic crowd thrashing about. Matthew Crawley on the mic fed us witty, confronting, side-splittingly funny lyrics to classic hardcore rock and roll licks. Their latest single ’22/39’ hit number 20 on the NZ Music Charts ‘Hot 20’ at the end of January and pops off to open the night to a world of carnage ahead.
Next up is Dick Move, another Tāmaki-based set-up with members from Na Noise and Dateline making up the ripping five-piece punk act. Lucy on the vocals dishes out lyrics about sexual liberation, seedy blokes, repressive norms, and of course, dick. Their self-titled single has the crowd bopping, with the riff ‘Dick! Move! I wanna make your dick move!’ being thrown back by a crowd fronted by wahine having a reckless boogie to the feminist punk hits.
Each of the bands’ songs are short and spicy, no more than three minutes a piece and some just making it over the thirty second mark, and each more satisfying than the last. By the closing of the opening acts, the crowd has at least doubled in size and is now home to some of Auckland’s more seasoned old-school punks who have come out of the woodwork to catch a glimpse of one of the most lively acts to hit our shores.
During their last tour in May of 2019, The Schizophonics caused a splash with Lety’s kicking fast-paced drums and Pat’s possessed gat slinging. Taking K Road back to the days of rockabilly blues with the influences of hardcore and punk amping up the pace and pressure, they made a name for themselves as THE band to see to let it loose and shake it out. It’s no surprise then that they’ve attracted a hefty crowd, and one that’s led by a haunt of regular K road punk aficionados. Nobody wants to miss this.
Pat and Lety take to the stage with Takumi and with very little pretence, rip open their set without hesitation. It’s instantly obvious why The Schizophonics have a reputation as being one of the most raucous live acts out. Pat is an unstoppable force of clanging guitar riffs, shredding chords, and vocals delivered with a desperate and unleashed enthusiasm that elevates their rock n roll roots to euphoric heights. Contorting himself with his guitar like he’s wrestling a cobra, Beers writhes his way around the sparse stage as if under the control of some manic jangling punk spirit. At first, I think he’s managed to perfectly line up a backing track and is using the guitar as a prop. Even if this were the case, it would be impressive. His joints all seem to be on castors, and his weightless hurling and thrashing is hard to comprehend on its own.
In reality he is actually playing. Using a small selection of delay and distortion pedals he serves up riffs with barely a glance at his guitar, usually smacking the strings rather than strumming or picking them. It gives the sound a serrated edge that brings the rock n roll influences more firmly into punk territory, and also gives Beers the ability to sustain his sound long enough to wrangle out some cutting licks without having to be glued to his guitar.
Halfway through the set, Beers’ enthusiasm bites back and his guitar strap breaks mid-song. But it takes me a while to pick up on what’s going on since he never actually seems to be holding it anyway, and its only when the end of the strap becomes a whip for his strings do I realize that he’s broken it. Slinging the guitar by its neck around the stage, crawling and rolling around, even leaping into the audience track after track with the frenzied squinting gyrations of a man consumed by sound, I get a sense that The Schizophonics are not just about making a chaotic scene.
The origin of their sound is deeply engrained in the birth of rock and roll. Punk influences keep the pace, but at its heart is the music that was once thought to be dragged up from the depths of hell to possess and degrade the minds of innocent American youth.
I think about teens crawling over one another at a Chuck Berry concert, women shredding their clothes off at the sheer sight of Elvis on stage, the cultural hysteria of the shuffle groove. The Schizophonics are out here reminding us that this music was considered radical for a reason. It’s frenetic, unrelenting, crazed, empowering, tantalizing, and taps into something right at the core of our heads that says ‘you’ve got to get in there, you’ve got to move, you’d got to let it rip!’ And boy, did they open those flood gates.
In the hour and a half that they spend carving up the stage, they play tracks from across their discography, focusing on their 2019 release ‘People in the Sky’. ‘Something’s Gotta Give’, ‘Streets of Heaven and Hell’, and ‘Steely Eyed Lady’ are highlights of the night, really pulling the whole band together in a calamitous celebration, but it’s their cover of ‘Whole Lotta Shakin’ Going On’ to close the main set that brings it all together. Beers takes to the crowd and brings everyone to the floor, only to unleash one last chorus to a rapturous, writhing mass of overjoyed punks.
The Schizophonics are a one of a kind, no holds barred rampage of chaos and celebration. Here’s to hoping they make their way back before long to give us another hit of that sweet soul medicine.
Were you there at Neck Of The Woods for this energetic rock n roll gig? Or have you seen The Schizophonics perform live somewhere else before? Tell us about it in the comments below!
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