She Don’t Use Jelly
BurpBURP fever takes over the back room at Silhouette Lounge on Monday, 6 March 2023.
Degenerates of Punk and Key of Caustic open a loud and live bill.
On this episode of As The Sil Turns, Bill the Bartender gets an order for a PB&J. It’s a drink, not a bizarre sex act. What kind of drink?
Bill’s not at a loss, but there’s always a need to clarify. You don’t want to mix something up then have to dump it (or more likely, slide it down the counter to the Silhouette Lounge old timers).
The patron clarified: a PB&J is a beer-and-shot combo, consisting of a Pabst Blue Ribbon tallboy and shot of Jaegermeister. A nice pick me up on a Monday night, but definitely not what Bill had in mind.
The more typical PB&J you’ll find around town is a drink that pulls together a combo of nut- and jam-flavored liquor. Midway Cafe has a version authored by Lenny.
Nut-flavored booze. Your taste buds are already watering! We’re talking liquids like peanut-flavored whiskey (Skrewball gets mentioned a lot), hazelnut-flavored liqueur (say, Frangelico), almond-flavored liqueur (some sort of amaretto), or even Irish Cream in a pinch.
Now for the jelly. You can use a raspberry liqueur, like Chambord or some sort of berry schnapps. There’s also such a thing as grape vodka, which has virtually no uses, so you might as well get it involved when you can.
Some recipes call for the jelly shot to follow the peanut butter shot. Other recipes find ways to mix the opposing elements into a single drink. Either way, it’s not that tasty. A shot of Jaeger and a PBR sound more convivial, but points deducted for no thematic connection to the titular sandwich.
Degenerates of Punk
Degenerates of PunkThe Degenerates of Punk are a Bay State three-piece that have been gigging around town lately. Not to be confused with the late 70s punk outfit Degenerates. The 2023 variant offered a bouncy 90s punk sound with some Operation Ivy vibes, minus the ska edge.
The guitarist rocked an old school mic, like the kind you’d expect Elvis Presley to be crooning into. Was that just lying around in the Silhouette Lounge junk drawer, or is it a regular piece of DOP hardware?
Find out at their next show on March 19th at Midway Cafe.
Key of Caustic
Key of CausticBoston’s Key of Caustic performed as a four-piece, kicking out pop punk rhythms.
You might expect a more abrasive sound, given their name. But the band channeled easy-on-the-ears punk like Ramones.
The songs poured out at a medium- to quick-tempo and relished good licks and hummable progressions. The songs chewed like four-chord bubblegum in your ear, spilling out of the rock n roll radio.
Burp
BurpPride of Lowell Burp might be one of the exciting small venue giggers in the Boston area right now.
The four-piece can be a bit manic, like a Golden Retriever on rollerblades thrown down a staircase. But the band has hard rock chops and a kind of spontaneity that makes live shows fun.
Not sure if burping into the microphone is a regular part of their brand-building or just a Monday night one-off. Shout out to the cover of Nirvana’s “Breed.”
You can catch Burp Thursday (3/16) at Middle East, playing a four-stack bill upstairs.
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Mars Red Sky reps Bordeaux at Middle East.