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It was the first official Particle gig in San Francisco, but judging by the packed, pumped crowd at the Boom Boom Room last Saturday night, you might've thought it was a local favorite playing to a hometown crowd. Several factors added to the party-with-your-pants-down vibe that ignited the room:
1) Yes, we're talking the Boom Boom Room, John Lee Hooker's infamous, intimate red velvet den of blues and booze, and man you could smell the legacy of the joint, a heady mixture of bourbon, sweat and soul.
2) The hype leading up to the show was intense. For months I had been hearing from friends about the booty-aching sets of raunchy funk the band had been throwing down in LA--opening for STS9; at a post-SCI party at the Atlas Club. Particle updates were landing in my email inbox every week or so, funny and energetic and thrilled to be instigating a scene all their own.
3) It was the band's maiden voyage in their new incarnation in Baghdad by the Bay, and plenty of friends and family had escaped from LA to follow their boys up north. And being a Saturday night more than a few folks had come in off the street after hearing some of the thump escape from the bar's front door.
4) This band was crazy funky and the music they made had more bounce than a carnival Moonwalk.
Comprised of Charlie Hitchcock on guitar, Eric Gould on bass, Steve Molitz on Rhodes and a collection of analog synths, and Darren Pujalet on skins, Particle is at their best as a unified foursome, red-hot and melted into one gooey mass of elastic instrumental groove. Darren's drumming had me entranced; his small kit sizzled with crisp, clear beats, unflourished and perfectly synched like an 808. Understated and hypnotic, his razor sharp rhythms drove the band, and his interplay with Eric's warm, hefty bass lines laid a powerful, low-key foundation for melodic improvisation. Steve's Rhodes added a jazzy, lounge-like vibe, a red velvet sound perfect for a red velvet room. From time to time things got way spacey as he stepped up to the analogs and smeared a fat, phase-shifting buzz back and forth across the groove. Although Charlie's rambunctious lead solos at times overthrew the liquid balance of the band, his impassioned lyricism came close to giving the music a voice without words. As a main dish his playing was sometimes too much to swallow, but blended in as another tasty ingredient of the stew, his rhythmic and percussive touches added just the right amount of spice.
Particle makes great music to roller skate to. After three sets of slippery funk, if your hips weren't unhinged and the smile on your face wasn't stretched out like a rubber band, your body must've been hit by a rolling blackout. Particle brought the room from a light speed full-body amphetamine rush, to a bluesy soul-stirring strut, to a complex, twisted trance dance that eventually cleared out the displaced black leather jackets and left only a sweaty horde of grinning diehards totally turned on to this young, talented band. Particle is busting at the seams with the stinky funky stuff, and we were happy to wallow in it like pigs in poop all night long.
Particle returns to the Boom Boom Room on May 4, so get your moon boots polished soon...
Jonathan Zwickel
JamBase San Francisco Correspondent
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