8/18/00 - Electron - The Trocadero, Philadelphia, PA

https://archive.org/details/etron2000-08-18.shnf/

Image: The Chemical Warfare Brigade (Source: Custom Smiles)

The first Electron show is a watershed moment in Biscuits history for a number of reasons. The Electron project has been an important outlet for Brownie’s creativity since its inception, and the Biscuits have debuted songs that Brownie originally played with Electron as recently as 2017’s Miracles. This was the beginning of a fruitful professional relationship between Tom Hamilton and Joe Russo, which would take many forms and lead to many interesting projects over the years. And, most pertinent to this show, Marc Brownstein debuted the finished Chemical Warfare Brigade rock opera, in the works since late 1998, with Electron at the Trocadero.

While Barber’s Hot Air Balloon was written quickly and steadily, the development of the Chemical Warfare Brigade was extremely halting. Three Wishes and Plan B debuted at the end of 1998, Little Lai debuted in April 1999, and the eponymous Chemical Warfare Brigade debuted in August 1999. This show featured the first performances of Floodlights, Ladies, Shelby Rose and Confrontation, all of which were then introduced gradually into the Biscuits repertoire over the fall tour and New Year’s run. The songs, especially the new ones, are all varying degrees of different from how the Biscuits play them, and the order of the opera is completely different.

Electron’s original lineup consisted of Marc Brownstein and Aron Magner, Tom Hamilton of Brothers Past on guitar, Joe Russo (by today’s standards the superstar of the group, but then only really known for the band Fat Mama, who had played at the first Camp Bisco) on drums, and Paul Herron and DJ Stitch, who had performed with Brownie in the Maui Project, on percussion and turntables respectively.

The show opens with Plan B, the oldest song in the opera by debut date (10/16/98 at the 8x10). Magner and Brownie were already quite comfortable playing this song, and it’s not terribly different from the Biscuits versions, except maybe for a little extra flavor from Paulie and Stitch. Hamilton steps up to the guitar solo with an almost audible hesitancy. This was quite possibly the biggest room the 21 year old guitarist had played at that point, and his tone in the beginning of the solo sounds very thin and unconfident. His undeniable talent wins out, and you can hear his playing become more self-assured through the solo, which lands spectacularly. The debut of Floodlights follows, preceded by a playful bass riff and an almost M.E.M.P.H.I.S.-esque instrumental intro. Brownie’s bass riff is familiar to us and distinguishes this as Floodlights, but the distinctive guitar riff is absent (as are many others, added later by Barber). The structure of the verses and chorus are nearly identical to the later Biscuits versions, and the jam segments start out similarly enough: there is a short mid-verse jam, but the short guitar solo preceding the main jam section is absent. Things diverge even more significantly in the main jam. The jam is the spacey psychedelic electronic style typical of a lot of Biscuits jams in 2000, but the song as of now is unfinished: there is no destination for the jam and it peters out rather than reaching a peak or segueing into the next song. I have nothing against peter out jams from the Biscuits; I actually wish they would do them more. This one is particularly solid, building up to an almost crescendo around 9:30, then breaking down, building up to a second, mellow groove and breaking down again. Another debut, Ladies, follows. Here, the composition is considerably different from modern versions. Cries of “give it up! give it up!” punctuate the intro and the repeated first lines of the first verse. Lyrically, the rest of verse one is identical to Biscuits versions. However, in place of the first chorus, there is a short keyboard jam, which is followed by the second verse (also lyrically identical). The second verse is followed by a reprise of the intro and the chorus. The Ladies jam is another psychedelic rock groove like the Floodlights jam. It’s considerably more mellow in pace than the Ladies jams of 01 and 02, and builds to a tense crescendo rather than the triumphant peak typical of Biscuits versions. Instead, the band returns directly to the chorus for the ending. Lai closes out the first act of the opera, and like Plan B, had already been debuted by the Biscuits over a year ago. This version is not an orthodox interpretation as the Plan B was. Immediately, the band locks into a tense full-band groove, whereas a Biscuits version would usually begin with a poppy Magner solo. This jam manages to be both haunting and infectiously catchy at the same time. Joe Russo gets to show off his impressive drumming chops here, both guiding the band through tempo changes and playing off the rest of the band excellently. After a breakdown around the nine minute mark, the jam begins to return to familiar territory, and builds to a strong peak. An excellent and enjoyable jam with a solidly type two segment that remains fun and interesting throughout. After Lai there is an intermission, accompanied by sirens and helicopter sounds, fitting for the tone of the story.

The intermission is followed by another debut, Shelby Rose. Strangely, this version has something more in common with Biscuits versions from 2001 and on than it does with the other Biscuits versions from that year: the distinctive first verse pre-chorus is completely absent, with the band playing the chorus twice as with all versions after 2000. The jam is absolutely fantastic, a thrilling piece of experimental jungle music that would very much set the tone for how the Biscuits played the song. Around 11:45, the band jams back into the distinctive riffs that punctuate the beginning of the jam section, and from here the tone of the jam becomes decidedly more blissful. Hamilton brings the jam to a gorgeous conclusion, although notably absent is the distinctive Shelby Rose peak that Barber added to the song (beginning in 2001). The final CWB debut of the night follows. Confrontation is easily the most similar of the new debuts to its later Biscuits versions. The verse and chorus structure is about identical, and the jam even sounds like a Biscuits version. The jam is a straightforward tension and release exercise, but fleshed out, and the peak is strong. Two older Biscuits songs follow, rounding out the original iteration of the opera: Three Wishes, debuted in December 1998, and Chemical Warfare Brigade, debuted in August 1999. The Biscuits wisely moved the powerhouse Confrontation to the end of the opera; following it up with the rather mellow Three Wishes is something of a jarring transition here. Three Wishes is performed jamless as always, and the closing Chemical Warfare Brigade is a fairly standard version.

The second set opens with a cover of Generals, a Tom Hamilton original performed in Brothers Past. I’m not very familiar with the BP versions, but the jam seems fairly straightforward, beginning with a slow groove and building to a powerful ending. Of interest is that this jam makes use of vocal samples (I have to assume it is Stitch doing this) which would become a staple of BP’s play style in later years. Next is the Triumph > Home combo; both songs debuted in this same combination with the Maui Project back in April. Triumph is played with the same aggressively fast-paced verses, and is in other ways very similar to the 4/8 version. The Triumph jam is short and completely type one (Brownie doesn’t leave the Triumph bass line the entire time), but it’s dark and cerebral. The jam segues into Home, which has an uplifting type one jam with a big crescendo. The pairing is solid but short, and I think I prefer the 4/8 version overall. After Home, the band leaves the stage as Brownie says he’s going to do something he’s never done before: play guitar. He endeavors to play and sing M.E.M.P.H.I.S. on his own. At the Maui Project show, M.E.M.P.H.I.S. was the song in which Brownie played with another member of the Disco Biscuits for the first time since 1999, and here it is used for a theme of reconciliation as well. After Brownie makes it through the first two verses of the song (very competently I might add), the rest of the Disco Biscuits join him at the “it’s good to have you in the band” line. The jam that emerges begins as a somber and melancholy theme. Sammy holds the theme down with some vaguely jungle-style beats, with excellent atmosphere especially from Magner. The tone of the jam begins to shift around the 6-7 minute mark, and builds to a kind of blissful crescendo around 10. The jam breaks down and Sammy shifts to a more standard M.E.M.P.H.I.S. hip-hop beat. From here, a conventional, Barber-led M.E.M.P.H.I.S. theme develops, though it is uncharacteristically light on electronic elements (Magner stays on the piano for the rest of the jam) and is more of a straight up rocker. In the M.E.M.P.H.I.S. “outro” (which doesn’t outro to anything) Brownie invites Stitch and Paulie back up to jam. The second jam is very exploratory; although the first eight minutes are all pretty tightly centered on a rigid theme, at around the 25 minute mark the jam breaks down into alternatingly ambient and cacophonous weirdness that continues for nearly ten minutes, until the jam, and the show, suddenly ends.

Like the Maui Project show four months earlier, the first Electron show was an important creative outlet for Brownie, and featured numerous debuts of future Biscuits staples. However, the music is much tighter and more polished, and there are considerably more musical highlights, which are laid out below:

Highlights:

Shelby Rose

Absolutely spectacular jungle, and the strongest debut of the night. This jam, more than any other in the show, sounds like it could be a fall 2000 Biscuits jam.

Little Lai

The jam drops into a type two groove, almost immediately upon leaving the song, that is simultaneously haunting and humorously playful. Brownie and Russo have countless moments where they link up in meaningful ways to shift the direction of the jam, and in general the interplay between all the band members is truly stunning here.

M.E.M.P.H.I.S.
While the second set is fairly pedestrian up until this point, the 35 minute M.E.M.P.H.I.S. more than makes up for it. The last ten minutes don’t really do it for me, but they are undeniably experimental. The first jam is my easy highlight of the whole song, and features two fully formed themes.

Floodlights

Without a net jamming. The first theme has Tom Hamilton using some of the effects that would become commonplace in his playing in BP, and builds to an uncomposed crescendo before breaking down and riding a mellow wave to its natural conclusion.

Stray Observations:
Prior to set two, Brownie introduces the band, and plugs Brothers Past’s upcoming show in Williamsport the day before Camp Bisco. He mentions they took a “long hiatus.” In fact, the last Brothers Past show was 4/29/00 at the Trocadero, opening for the Biscuits. The band was on hiatus as they were finalizing their new lineup with Rick Lowenberg and Clay Parnell. He introduces the next song, Generals by Brothers Past, as “by one of the guys on this stage.”

Brownie introduces Triumph as “a rap-rock tune,” and explains that he wrote the song hoping to cash in on the rap-rock/nu-metal gravy train.

—Mr. Zan