Simply put, Heavy Times are a very good band. Sure, they’re not exactly reinventing the wheel, but they’ve got all of the ingredients for a fun show. They’ve got the riffs, they’ve got the hooks, they’ve got the melodies. It’s pretty much perfect.
The Chicago band’s latest, Fix It Alone (out on Hozac Records), is a solid garage punk album that ranges from more melodic numbers to noisier fare and while their official bio refers to them as “Chicago’s most hated band on the world’s most hated record label,” I find it hard to believe that anyone could hate a band with a song entitled “Denim Girls.” And while the album is enjoyable, with a band like Heavy Times, the live show is where it really all comes together. And on this night, it definitely all came together.
While Obits were the headliner and obviously the main draw for most in attendance, for me they just weren’t quite as compelling as Heavy Times. They still put on a great show, mind you, and frontman Rick Froberg’s got one of the great rock n’ roll voices, all rasp and attitude, but there was something more immediate for me about Heavy Times. Maybe it was the fact that I more or less knew what to expect from Obits, whereas Heavy Times was a bit of a ‘eureka’ moment. Or it could have been the 30 minute-plus wait between sets. Still, when Obits launched into “Widow Of My Dreams” at the beginning of their encore, it was a highlight of the night and moments like that when they really kicked it up a notch during their set showed that, for Obits, everything also came together on this night.