Grit Scott
Sunbloc at O'Brien's PubSunbloc warms up for a spring tour at O’Brien’s Pub on Friday, 24 March 2023.
Locals Gollylagging and Crescent Ridge sandwich the bill in support.
What’s going on with Great Scott? The much beloved dive for new music and cheap booze at 1222 Commonwealth Ave. shuttered during the pandemic in 2020.
It took a national health crisis to halt its 44-year run, during which it gained a ferociously loyal following. And, unlike most dive bars, subject to decline in their dotage, Great Scott possessed an eerie kind of artistic vitality into its third and fourth decades.
Relationships with landlords can be messy, though, and the ownership was not able to find agreeable terms under which to resume business after the worst of the pandemic passed.
For a large swath of the local music scene, the closure of Great Scott will make their shortlist for the worst of what changed for the worst in Boston thanks to Covid-19. But with all the goodwill accrued by the dank, dark drinking spot, surely a committed ownership could find a suitable location to reopen and restart the party? After all, 44-year history aside, the formula that made the venue a success at 1222 Commonwealth Ave. could be repeated elsewhere…
Framed Great Scott Photo at O’Brien’s PubFor a hot minute it looked like the former Regine Pizzeria at 353 Cambridge St. might be the new home, but the deal fell through in 2022. Since then it’s been awfully quiet on the Great Scott comms. Quiet at the website, quiet on the Instagram, quiet on the Facebook, quiet on the Twitter. No news is likely bad news at this stage of the game.
Are we entering the quiet goodbye moment? We’ve had our loud mourning and public lamentation of what was lost. Momentum for rebirth may be falling below the critical threshold. True enough, the venue remains a ghost ship floating through the minds and hearts of a certain subset of elderly millennials who discovered the club scene with bands like Caspian, Krill, Hooray For Earth, Speedy Ortiz, and Pile. Not to mention club nights, like the pill and more.
But that crowd doesn’t see as much live music as it once did. Life rolls on with new bands at new venues. The Great Scott ownership also owns O’Brien’s Pub, which maintains a little shrine (OK, just one framed photo) to the bygone bar behind the counter and employs some of the same workers that worked at the other location.
The pub has picked up some of the show calendar that Great Scott would have offered. If you thought 1222 Commonwealth Ave. was a gritty experience, wait until you see O’Brien’s Pub. Bright lights, big shitty. A little lacking in ambiance, even for a dive bar. No complaints about drink prices, though, and the pub punches way above its weight in terms of the quality of acts that come to play.
The loss of Great Scott is a bummer, no doubt. Who knows? It may rise from the ashes one day without warning like Man Ray. Or it may remain a fond memory. Either way music is happening elsewhere in Boston and beyond. Check out the Listings, and shout out to the dives that provide stages to new music every day of the week. Shout out to Midway Cafe, The Jungle, Silhouette Lounge, Lilypad, Cantab Lounge, Crystal Ballroom, The Rockwell, Notch Brewery, Wally’s Jazz Cafe, Charlie’s Kitchen, ONCE at Boynton Yards and elsewhere around town, and more.
Grit Scott.
Grate Scott.
Grave Scott.
Great Stop. Let’s go see Sunbloc at O’Brien’s Pub.
Crescent Ridge
Crescent RidgePride of Stoughton Crescent Ridge opened the three-stack bill with a razor-sharp grunge attack, pulling material from their 2022 full-length Garden of Fools.
The four-piece mixes heavy layers of guitar into a thick stew to inch into psych jam or shoegaze territory.
The approach, though, avoids noodling and aims for the sweet, swift catharsis of a good riff, albeit under a dark storm of FX pedals.
The band tried out a new song, possibly titled “To Run” or something in that general polysyllabic neighborhood.
Sunbloc
SunblocAlbany’s Sunbloc has a tour coming up in May. Is it the same tour they’re on right now? What counts as a tour and what counts as a string of dates?
Whatever’s the case, they’re on the road and ready to roll. The five-piece guitar-led alt punk blunderbuss included a dedicated vocalist, which seems like a luxury in these days of maxed out economy.
No denying though that having a musician with nothing to do except rock the mic creates a kind of energy and mood you don’t get otherwise.
Gollylagging
GollylaggingBoston’s Gollylagging formed its signature hermetic triangle of rock on the low stage at the close of show.
The band assembled itself like a three-piece Voltron, kicking out postpunk thrashers in tight lockstep.
There’s something about their music that makes a big sound out of a band with just three members. It’s not just volume. Credit good writing, the right effects, and a percussive attack that fills the room.
Shout out to the recent three-way split EP Fauna, co-released with Dino Gala and Going222Jail.
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