For a while, the Matachine were Costa Mesa's onliest punk band (since Sarah Abrams Attack Tank broke up), more likely to set up in someone's living room than on someone's stage, and more likely to finish a set with everybody screaming at once instead of mumbling something about CDs and shirts in the back. They were a jittery little band, and while they still finish screaming (like on their signature “Knock and You Shall Enter the Kingdom of Heaven Is Within You,” sort of a Swans take on “Auld Lang Syne”: “You go/I'll stay/Heaven's not so far away . . .”), there's a starker, simpler sense of space on these new Matachine recordings: a salute to the other (better) part of Wire that usually gets skipped for 30-second verse-chorus-stop! cops. As Pink Flag Wire turned into 154—creepier, heavier, more curious about certain buttons on the keyboard—the old Matachine demos turn into tracks for a new Matachine album that sounds to be as bitter as the Fall (“Eat your heart out!/Rip your guts out!”) and as harsh as early Killing Joke or Big Black (and with the exact same snaky hiss on the word “SUCCESS!” as the old Boston band Proletariat). It'd be a strange spot for a band from OC to plant a flag except for that lost strain of local post-punk (back to the Crowd going after Joy Division and Middle Class going after Gang of Four) as precedent. You always hear about the mean streets but didn't ever figure they meant Victoria and Adams, huh?
THE REVOLVER PROJECT PRESENTS THE MATACHINE AND THE ROLLING BLACKOUTS WITH DJS TRASH ROCKET, NANOBOT, ROB AND KRISTINA B. AT LA CAVE, 1695 IRVINE AVE., COSTA MESA, (949) 646-7944. SAT., 10 P.M. FREE. 21+.
