All Purpose Voltage Heroes… June 15

All Purpose Voltage Heroes
with TAXES and Schuul
at the McCallum Activity Centre, June 15, 2007
Reviewed by Stephen Jersak‘

Eighteen bands couldn’t play this show, and there were at least half a dozen shows happening in the Fraser Valley that night, including two in Chilliwack. Attendance was unsurprisingly pathetic.

Schuul set up in front of half a dozen people, and played for nearly twice that. Their alter-egos had to decline the invitation to play, but the elementary punk trio managed to stumble through their first non-house show, only significantly mangling Library.

TAXES assaulted the tiny audience with 120 dB of noise, challenging the stiffening hair cells within the cochleae of every kid without a ride out of town to compose a swansong that would ring through the night and into Saturday. The daring volumes where complimented by TAXES’ adventurous and occasionally arrhythmic art-punk, with Sean Orr’s reference heavy vocals surfing atop the wave of noise. The set culminated with the former Green Party candidate lying on the floor, singing into a mic suspended inches above his face by a tangle of mic stands and cables hastily assembled moments earlier.

On their last stop before getting the sleep they need to battle their flu, the All Purpose Voltage Heroes played for upwards of twenty people. The fun and silly synthpunk didn’t suffer from the empty room, although illness was hinted at by their [only slightly] less exciting than usual set.