The Jesus Lizard Returns To Chicago For Warm Love and Cool Dreams

Sep 30, 2024 admin_bitlc Features, Music News, Reviews 0

By Kyle Decker

The Jesus Lizard has always been an important band to me. Mind you, I was two when they formed in Austin, Texas, four when they relocated to Chicago (before my family did), and fourteen when they broke up, and I wasn’t the kind of kid who was super into music. Yet. I found them when I found most bands. College. And every so often I’d find a band who made me go, “You can do that!?!” With a reaction like that it makes sense that they were a seminal force in a genre that would come to be known as “noise-rock.” A post-punk/pre-grunge hard rock characterized by aggressive guitars, provocative howling vocals, percussion that sounds like a car crash in a metalworking factory, and a whole lot of distortion. The Jesus Lizard influenced major bands from Nirvana to recent acts like Idles and Viagra Boys.

Frontman David Yow has been favorably compared to Iggy Pop throughout his career. He’d stage dive, crowd surf, start mosh pits, and, at their peak, would get naked. He is the perfect example of a madman frontman. Duane Denison can make sounds with a guitar that are both terrifying and alluring in ways that defy traditional hooks and structure. Also, any conversation about the greatest bassists of all time must include David Wm. Sims. Whatever group over at Rolling Stone who put together that top 50 list a few years obviously never listened to “Monkey Trick” from Goat. And drummer Mac McNeilly somehow keeps time with the chaos, turning it into a cohesive whole.

When the band reformed for a reunion tour in 2009 they played four shows in Chicago. I saw three of them. I bought that iconic shirt of theirs with a Mickey-like character wearing a dress and wielding an axe while riding a bomb. “The Jesus Lizard” is prominently displayed arching over the image. I happened to be wearing it on a road trip from Chicago to Aspen and was confronted about it a number of times while stopping in Nebraska.

“What does your shirt mean?”
“Um… it’s a band from Chicago.”

“But what does it mean!?”

I would calmly explain that the band takes its name from the nickname for the basilisk, a reptile native to South America known for its ability to run on the surface of water. This wasn’t the type of conversation I wanted to have with a hostess of an IHOP a hundred miles west of Lincoln. But, I’ll admit to being turned on by how provocative it was for her. The Jesus Lizard, as a name, is iconoclastic but has a benign explanation. I loved that. Still do.

But it’s 2024 now. The Jesus Lizard has dropped their first album in 26 years (The last being 1998’s Blue, from their Capitol Records years). Rack release on September 13, 2024 and continues the band’s long-standing tradition of four letter-words for album names. And it kicks fucking ass. When the first single, “Hide and Seek” dropped it was clear from the start of Sims’s chugging bassline that the band was back in fine form.

It also gave them the perfect excuse to headline Chicago’s Salt Shed for the first day of the Warm Love, Cool Dreams Festival (which comes from a line in Nelson Algren’s Chicago-set novel The Man with the Golden Arm) on September 28th. It was my first time at the venue, so I arrived early to get a lay of the land. The website had said the show was originally going to be in the outdoor “fairgrounds” section, but it was wisely moved indoors. The six-band lineup was, admittedly, a bit overwhelming. But doors were at 2:30, The first band I saw play started at 4:00.

The bill mixed up the genres, which I loved. Aitis Band is hard to define, but they make heavy use of synths and pedal manipulation to create an experimental avant-pop of sorts. Stress Positions is a hardcore punk band, with elements of thrash and fastcore. I was reminded of Sugar Pie Koko and a South Korean band called Dead Gakkahs. Provoker is a fairly straightforward gothy post-punk band from San Francisco. King Woman, a project of Iranian-American musician Kris Esfandiari, has a shoegaze/doom-metal thing going on. Then there was Sextile, a three-piece dance-punk/EDM outfit whose stage show felt like something from a nightclub. They cite Christian Death as an influence but seem equally inspired by house music and 90s big-beat techno acts like The Prodigy. It was a delightfully eclectic evening of music. I truly wish more promoters would do mixed-genre gigs.

Generally, I worry about seeing older bands. It’s one of those things where you have to reconcile the fact you might not have many more chances to see them with the fact that they were in their prime while you were still loosing baby teeth. I mean, their first reunion tour was fifteen years ago. David Yow is 64 now. Would his iconic stage diving even be advisable?

The fact that Rack might be The Jesus Lizard’s best album since Liar gave reason for hope. And, I gotta say, despite their sexagenarian status, the band brought the energy needed to satisfy.

Naturally, they opened with “Puss” and Yow was immediately in the crowd. A recent Rolling Stone interview with him mentioned he has to train more now to perform. Sadly I can’t speak to specifics because most of the article was hidden behind a paywall. But whatever effort he’s putting into it shows. He howled and paced and spit. He engaged in wild-eyed audience baiting, stole someone’s straw cowboy hat while crowd surfing, and wore it on stage for a song before tossing it back. All the while he pounded beers from his row of a half-dozen bottles of Stella Artois lined up on the drum riser. That’s about a beer every ten minutes during the hour-long set if my math is reliable. Yow did become a bit distracted at one point and acknowledged that he was concerned that he had injured someone during one of his crowd-surfing excursions.

It’s worth noting again that the band spent a long time being based in Chicago. Yow acknowledged that for all intents and purposes, “We are a Chicago band. And it’s good to be back.” In a bittersweet moment, Yow said, “This one’s for Steve.” Referencing, of course, the band’s longtime collaborator a creative soulmate, Steve Albini, who was their recording engineer (if I said “producer” his ghost would come for me) during their Touch ‘n’ Go years. They played “Mouth Breather,” a song about someone who leaves their house “in the care of a friend” and returns home to find the friend deceased. It was a fitting tribute.

I happened to run into a friend of mine who is, himself, a bass player. So it was cool to enjoy the show with him, as we were standing up front and pretty close to David Wm. Sims, who skipped no beats holding up the low end with his abrasive riffs. I love watching people be in awe. The band as a whole was in fine form. They in no way sounded out of practice or as though they’d lost a step. This music is in them. Sure, the stage antics have been toned down (Yow keeps his clothes on), but the musicianship is as tight as ever.

The show consisted of a healthy mix of the Touch n Go classics, a couple of songs from the Capitol years, and singles from the brand-new Rack. They came back for an encore that ended with their cover of “Wheelchair Epidemic” by fellow Austin natives The Dicks. Based on the set list I saw, a few more songs had been set aside for a three-song second encore, but the event as a whole got started late (I think). I was a little disappointed they didn’t do “Rope”, which is a personal favorite. But thought the set was a good cross-section of their career.

The audience, especially for The Jesus Lizard, was older. No surprises there. But a pit still got going. Though it was far from vicious. Most of the audience ranged from 40s-60s. I didn’t see too many people that looked under 30. Except for the kid who let me photograph the set list they managed to get a hold of. They asked what I thought of the show. And I mentioned it was great and that I had seen them during the first reunion in 2009. They said that’s when they were born. I told them to go Hell. They laughed and their mom laughed. And we said it was too bad younger crowds weren’t picking up this particular torch.

My concerns were alleviated. Between the energy they brought and the quality of their new material, The Jesus Lizard manages to transcend the usual stereotypes of what might be called a “legacy act.” Before going into King Woman’s last song, Esfandiari referred to The Jesus Lizard as “legends.” Which they absolutely are. And so shall they remain.

Setlist:

“Puss” (Liar, 1992)

“Gladiator” (Liar, 1992)

“Seasick” (Goat, 1991)

“Glamourous” (Lash (EP), 1993)

“Mouth Breather” (Goat, 1991)

“Destroy Before Reading” (Down, 1994)

“Hide & Seek” (Rack, 2024)

“Nub” (Goat, 1991)

“Alexis Feels Sick” (Rack, 2024)

“Boilermaker” (Liar, 1992)

“Then Comes Dudley” (Goat, 1991)