[oh shit] Bad Brains, April 16 @ Paradise

You know a live performance warrants your attention when you immediately think the show flyer is fake. But apparently it's true -- DC hardcore punk legends BAD BRAINS will be in Boston on Monday, April 16, and they're bringing with them NYC aggro dudes H20. We couldb't get no love from the GZA? What the eff. 

The Brains are playing Bonnaroo in June, and working on a new record due out later this year, so these look like warm-up gigs to stretch out some new tunes. Last March the Phoenix caught the reunited rasta crew at SXSW, and if there were some new songs played, we didn't notice. The room fucking exploded right off the bat and pretty much didn't let down until after they were done. One of the many highlights of SXSW 2011, and we taped some of it and wrote some words, re-posted after the video jump. 

Let's open up this pit. 

Here's our recap of Bad Brains' SXSW gig in Austin...

This is how it gets done, kids. By fourth song “Salin’ On,” Emo’s had exploded, arms and legs flying through the air, a whirlwind of skin and aggression tucked carefully under the praying hands of H.R., clearly in control of the room with a disaffected cool most musicians down here would kill for. Just a few feet from this powderkeg, my exit way blocked behind me by a hipster grid of outstretched arms holding iPhones and other gadgets, I realized I wasn’t going to make it down the block to Stubb’s to catch DURAN DURAN.

Now, SXSW is great in many different ways, but perhaps none more greater than causing the internal conflict of "Should I ghost this Bad Brains show to go catch Duran Duran?" I did not, as it were.

Here's some more video we took...