Let's Roque!

Last night was a school night and yet, I had to make a pilgrimage to my old stomping grounds in Somerville. The Upper Crust were playing Precinct and if you know The Upper Crust, you know they don't play out all that often. I'll spare you too much hyperbole except to say that if 18th century aristocrats playing Bon Scott era AC/DC style tunes(Lord Bendover sounds a lot like Scott)is your thing, then you owe it to yourself to check them out.

For the record...they killed and are also funny as hell.

Tales of infrequent sessions and new tunes.

There are supposed to be waves tomorrow. Please let there be waves tomorrow.

My last decent session was a couple of weeks ago at the local. The forecast looked promising. I got there to find Tony and another dude, Carl standing there not looking happy. A few minutes later a couple of other cars pulled up and everyone had this, "Damn." look on their faces. It was small. Ideas about heading to NH were tossed around and then a collective "Fuck it." was thrown out there and we all went in. At first, it was as advertised. Not much power, micronic stuff. Suddenly it got better. Not "all time" better but knee to thigh, long clean rides better. I rode the Sam for the second time and at first was cursing the fact that I didn't have the pig with me. When it got better, though, I found out what the Sam can do on a clean wave and it was awesome. Really fun climbs and drops. High line trim to bottom turn to cut back and back again. I can't wait to run it back out there again.

Tunes.

You like power pop? I like power pop. I've liked it ever since I discovered Cheap Trick in my elementary school friend Danny's, older sister Paulie's album collection.

I saw Gentleman Jesse and his Men a few years back when they opened for King Khan and the Shrines. I hadn't heard them before and they were really good. I was outside along with one of the guitar players and was complimenting him on the set. I believe I dropped the "Power Pop" thing on him and he cringed a little. My response? "Hey man, there's nothing wrong with that."

In the midst of all my music purchases, Gentleman Jesse kept getting missed and then I bought an iphone recently and was looking to add to the tunes on it. What had I been neglecting that wasn't easy to find on cd? That's right, Gentleman Jesse's first album. Think The Nerves, Nick Lowe, Paul Collins Beat, Elvis Costello, hell a bit of the late great Exploding Hearts. They're not re-inventing the wheel here but it's good rock and roll. Now I'm going to have to pick up the second album.

Dig it.

A respite amidst the flatlands.

I don't remember last summer being this flat. I know it had its spells, summer around here always does but there were enough knee high pulses to keep me sated. July has been bad.

I did score a bit on Sunday. I went down to RI for the dawn patrol and there was some decent enough short period wind swell to play on. It was around waist high with occasional chest(every 20 minutes or so) and I jumped at the opportunity to both christen the Andreini Magic Sam and also get some additional time on the Hot Generation.

Hour 1 - Andreini Magic Sam

It's a 9-4 but don't call it a "log". If you know the history, then you know that this is the type of board the Australians were on while the Americans were still on barges with trash can noses and doing the Quasimodo(not that there's anything wrong with that)and what Nat Young won in '66 on. The board is for hot dogging, carving, front third speed runs and even some nose time in the pocket. My first impressions? It's a decent paddler and cruises into waves smoothly. Aggressive bottom turns work. Flying in at an angle works. It's speedy, it's nimble and it likes a little bit of a push. I did a couple of pretty good cutbacks on it with ease. A bit of aggressiveness is rewarded. In short, I dug it, seriously dug it. I can't wait to run it up to a certain NH spot.

Hour 2 - Hot Generation

Fun, fun, fun. A perfect compliment to the Sam. As the waves started to wall up a bit, I decided I wanted to get a bit more maneuverability happening. Admittedly, I biffed a couple of waves settling in but once I got my timing going...it was off to the races. That thing is slicker'n grease.

Summation? Good day, although a bit more of a face on the waves would have been welcome. Again, I'm looking forward to seeing what these sleds can do with a bit more cleanliness.

What's in the box?!

A "Magic Sam" has been on my wish list ever since I got hip to the type of boards being ridden in "The Hot Generation". This mildly used Andreini turned up in LA and I made arrangements with the former owner, a very righteous guy, to get the board to Thing 1's godfather, Tom. Going above and beyond, Tom had the board packaged up at Aqua Tech in Marina Del Rey and then dropped it with the freight company I went with(Alliance) to get it to me. It wasn't easy getting it back here but it showed up unscathed and I can't wait to slide it.

More Please

I took this one at the end of a great session almost two weeks ago after Andrea had passed through. The forecast for The Local was not favorable(swellinfo's batting average is way down)and yet it was glassy, knee to occasional waist high perfection. It was also my first day in a 3/2. The water is taking its sweet time warming up. Hopefully all this rain bs is mostly behind us because I can use some more days like this one.

Love this era.