NightRev @ The Galaxy in Santa Ana
Posted Oct 25, 2007, by Josh Snider.
My girlfriend and I arrive at the Galaxy in Santa Ana just before the show started. We hung out and saw some of the cars come in that were showing off their stuff for the car show they were doing out front. A lot of cars showed up that were cool, but they didn't seem like they had all them much too them. I was stoked to see the Lamborghini that made it.
The first three bands, the stage was setup outside so everyone who came for the car show could listen to some music. The first band was Los Mysteriosos and I was surprised to hear them singing in spanish. They reminded me of The Red Hot Chili Peppers. They seemed a little old, and (although not surprised) was disappointed to see how small of a fan base they had. I am pretty sure we missed the second band. The third band was 88 Octane, they were not what I was expecting. They were pretty old, and even though old guys can rock the stage sometimes, these guys didn't. Children were running around in front of the stage during their set. The other eight people watching were standing no closer than 20 feet away from the stage. The band was unoriginal with an emo sounding whine. Most songs sounded the same even one or two cover songs they played. They sounded a little bit like Blink 182 and Lit.
Now we moved inside the venue, took a seat, and got a drink. Pistol Pistol took the stage, and I was eager to see them since my brother did an interview with them a while back. P!stol P!stol had a great stage presence and really knew how to keep everyone entertained. You can listen for them on Los Angeles' KROQ (Locals Only), and on the Fox Sports channel. The lead singer Ash had a nice and raspy but melodic voice. The kind of reminded me of Hot Hot Heat or an american version of The Fertellies. I liked the song "Build me up to break me down." I only have positive things to say about this band, accept that they smoked what I believe was marijuana on stage (from what I could see, I think everyone in the band did accept for the bassist). I don't believe that any drugs should be part of a bands stage performance, and it reflects badly on the venue since the ratio of security to guests was about 1:1. I was very surprised to see the management do nothing about a band using drugs on stage, in their venue.
Ponyboy Curtis (who I heard is the manager of Pistol Pistol) was up next, and to give you an idea of what he sounded like... it reminded me a lot of Mickey Avalon. He had a keyboardists and drummer that were both super awesome. The beats were good, and his voice sounded good too. However, his rhymes didn't flow well, he was kind of slow, pretty repetitive, and the lyrics didn't hold any meaning to me. Durring the second song, a guy came on stage (I think it was the lead singer of Pistol Pistol) and tried to sing with them on an extra microphone, that (thank God) was not turned on. As if that was not enough about half way thru the third song, me came out on stage again with a plugged in guitar and tried to play with the band. At first I was not sure if this was part of the act, but once I heard it and saw he knew nothing about the music the rest of the band was playing, it all came together. I think I saw him (among others) at the side of the stage, and I think he may have been pretty high. The last song was the best I heard from him. The keyboardist played this off-beat that mixed with the song, and sounded amazing.
DJ Bitwise came on at midnight and was going to be spinning until 2 AM. It started out cool because he had this video he made that went with all of his music, on beat and everything. It looked sweet! Just a moment into his set all the power on the stage went out, but his video kept going. My girlfriend and I tried to stay for the "club" part of the night, but just weren't feeling it.
