Show Update #20 - Balcony Presents at the Trocadero
The onset of ska being played all night long had me quite excited. After sitting outside for about an hour freezing our asses off we made our entrance and too our surprise we were led upstairs...to the bar.

About 150-200 people were all crammed in this small little area when Dirty Larry came on. With Yapes (Yapes look alike) on guitar and some horns to back him up the band was pretty hard. Yapes did the screaming and crazy gestures while the other guy sang. Local to NJ this band presented a pretty good combination of hard drums and bass with ska licks and horns. If there is such a genre as skacore, I'm sure Dirty Larry would be a good example of it.
Suprisingly some of the show goers were able to force open a small circle so they could do some skanking in the small space provided. As I was in the back I had a pretty good view of all occurances and wasn't shocked when I was knocked around as the crowd swayed back and forth. One great thing about the band's set was that everyone was having fun, including the band. They had a good selection of songs and I was upset when they were done.

As people moved to the back or found their friends, we took to moving to the front. Soon to be found as a big mistake when No Regrets entered, we made it to the front center of the stage. The first thing I noticed about the band was what looked like a mini mellophone and turned out to be a baby trumpet. A neat instrument, the guy playing it looked drunk. When the music started the next thing to notice was how fake the band was. It was hardly "ska". It was best explained, by Nate Gates, as "Punk with horns". Not a very good sound at all. I'm sure people were skanking all over in the back, but frankly I don't know how anyone could do more than just nod their head to this trash. Maybe people like this band, we're all entitled to our opinions.
The overwhelming enthusiasm of the jock cock groupies didn't help with my already biased examination of the band. These Abercrombie dressed dicks were all jumping on my back singing some retarded lyrics. Then since I only accomplished nodding my head I was pushed out of the way, after 20 minutes of not moving. Finally I was tapped on the shoulder and blown kisses by some ugly fuck who probably thinks he's indie. The sound, the people....drove me mad, I just wanted I Voted For Kodos to get on already.

So finally the jock cocks left to go give their band some head or whatever and I was left back to my original spot in the front center. When a guy wearing a I Voted For Kodos shirt stepped on stage and sat behind the drum set my anticipation was daunting. The lead singer took the mic and announced to the crowd "Hey we're I Voted For Kodos from Wisconsin". The crowd went fucking crazy. Favorite songs such as "Todd", "Wish I Was Aaron", and even "She Hates Ska" were jubiantly echoed through out the bar. My appreciation of ska has never amounted to much, but when iv4k plays everything just fits in. It's real ska, not this fake punk shit that we heard before. Not ska punk gone pop. Just genuine good stuff.
The horns were blasting, the pits were circling, the crowd was swaying, and mellophonist was skanking (since he left his horn in the airport in Virginia, I think they said). With back up vocals given by the mellophonist and guitarist, the lead singer would sing and then run back to pick up his trusty trombone and sound out some nifty tunes. The whole flow and energy of the band was fucking awesome. I mean you listen to the lyrics of iv4k and then you listen to the lead singer talk or the other band members talk. One in the same, both are funny as hell. You find yourself dancing, skanking, or whatever, and laughing all the while. Also the band-crowd interaction was really awesome. Between requests on the crowd to sing key phrases, at given points pointed out by the lead singer and the lead singer picking out different people (a kid with a minor threat shirt/a girl with a brat...blah blah slogan shirt) to the rest of us and talking about them...you could tell the band loves their fans. I mean they were far from local and yet they treated us all as buds with good times to reminisce about.
I knew some lyrics to sing while Joey knew mostly all of them. He was given the mic by the lead singer, but I think the guy was suprised to find someone who knew his songs.
Anyway, I wasted no time after the set was done to shake hands with the band. Then I rushed to where they were selling some stuff and bought what I could afford. I Voted For Kodos plays such good ska. If you can't sway your shoulders to a song its not good ska. Unlike to No Regrets, I could sway my shoulders to I Voted For Kodos and wouldn't want to stop not even when my body ran out of energy.

The band Ruder Than You was up next. Recently returning to the Philly local scene from a break up a while back, the band featured more of a horn-powered reggae sound. With strange sounding vocals from the lead singer and short Rap-like rhymes given by the back up vocalist, the band mastered a jazzy, upbeat sound that flowed through the bar. The band appeared to be older than the rest of the bands with guitarist and drummer having grays appearing in their hair. This hindered them in no way since the funk was the same as it probably always was. The lead singer's voice reminded me of an announcer's voice. Three skank circles formed as the band played on and time passed. As my back began to tire, I became more and more restless.
We left before the set was over, but only because the music had gotten old. Songs began to blend together as one, without notice of the break in between. Also, after about half an hour I began expecting the band to say that they had only two songs left or something to that respect, but my expectations were unfufilled.