Weekend Warrior Rock’n'Rollers: The 2008 RFT Music Showcase Recapped
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
It’s Tuesday, two days after the 2008 Riverfront Times Music Showcase, and I’m just starting to recover. It wasn’t so much hangover symptoms as it was an overall body ache, like I had been run through the clothes dryer a few times and then kicked down three flights of stairs. Ugh. Twelve hours of shuttling back and forth between music venues under the unforgiving Missouri sun isn’t something you just jump into unprepared. No, you need proper training, like a marathon runner: practice zig-zagging through the city’s bars and nightspots (preferably with runner’s weights on your ankles for strength); staying up progressively later in the nights leading up to the big event (or foregoing sleep altogether in favor of power naps); warm-up stretches of your required clapping muscles and devil fingers; maybe even a trip to a tanning bed if you burn easily. (If interested, Camp Prockist is accepting applications now for Summer 2009!)

Proper attire for RFT Showcase attendees: Hat to block out the sun, spectacles to witness acts of awesomeness, camera to prove you were there, bag for refreshments and CDs, comfortable shoes, and shorts that breathe.
Or… not. Your call. You can always just do what I did, which is show up with barely enough cash for the $5 all-access wristband and only the faintest idea of what bands you’d like to see and where all the venues are located.

The Livers
I arrived just after 1:00 in time to watch The Livers kick things off. I was already starting to sweat so I was relieved that they were playing in the dark confines of the Duck Room under Blueberry Hill, where Scot Freeman and Luke Roulston, the band’s guitarists and vocalists, had set up their video screen to project Scot Freeman and Luke Roulston, the band’s bassist and drummer. After watching their two-part promotional mockumentary, as well as an excellent Lo-Fi St. Louis episode featuring the Livers, I knew I would be a complete and total putz if I missed this show. They didn’t disappoint. The show was genius to an almost absurd degree, as if they were rock’n'roll idiot savants stuck in 1996 with 21st century A/V skills. They chatted with their pre-recorded counterparts, changed costumes in time, found a spare arm to lean on, and, when they remembered the right cue, took four shots of whiskey amongst themselves. The crowd was eating it up, and it didn’t hurt that the songs were killer too: “She-Wolf,” “Autistic Girlfriend,” and “Humble Pie” are three of the most memorable, ridiculous, straight-up rock songs I’ve heard all year. They closed their set with “2 Legs 2 Dance” and invited the audience to shake their money makers. As far as I could tell, only one lady in mom jeans took them up on the offer. (Continued)


