If dirty, filthy rock and roll is what you’re all about, last night’s show at Spanish Moon was the place to be.  Thursday has never looked so fine.  Louisiana-based group out of Lake Charles, Rootbeer and Mermentau, kicked things off with high-powered, in-your-face blast rock.  For only two guys, they sure produce a lot of noise which is greatly due to frontman Nick’s (a.k.a. Rootbeer) impressive rig that gives him the ability to produce the sound of eight men.  Pair that with eye-rattling drum beats, and you’ve got yourself a recipe for disaster.  Their recently-released album is available here.  (The Revelator rocks hard.)
Next to take the stage was local four-piece, White Heat.  Though it took the group a minute to get their set rolling due to technical inevitabilities, they did not allow the momentum that Rootbeer built to fade.  The group started heavy and finished in the same fashion, resulting in a blood-covered guitar sported by lead singer and frontman, Andy Gremilion.  If Ty Segall and Axl Rose had a band baby, these guys would be the result, and I mean that in the best way possible.  White Heat produces sweet melodies that lure you in, but don’t get too close because they could rip out your throat at any moment with brain-twisting guitar solos and monstrous drum fills.
By the time Bass Drum of Death took the stage, the crowd’s shoe soles were wearing thin from dancing, but that didn’t stop them from fully worshiping the newly three-piece group out of Oxford, Mississippi.  Magically gorgeous vocal melodies on top of gruesome, fuzzy guitar riffs and raging drum beats leaves spectators no other option but to willingly be thrown into the fray of moshers present at the front of the stage.  Though the house wasn’t fully packed, this didn’t stop stage-divers from taking full advantage of the hands in front of them.  It would be strange to call it crowd surfing, however.  It was more like the same small group of guys carrying the stage-divers around for a minute, and safely plopping them back to Mother Earth.  Bass Drum of Death’s new album, Rip This, comes out October 7.  Singles from this forthcoming album can be heard here and here.