Blank Dogs

[Joey Deadcat]

BLANK DOGS with WETDOG, THE BAPTIST CHURCH and DJ Deadbeat

Thursday, April 8, 2010 at 8:00pm

The Pike Room (inside the Crofoot)

1 South Saginaw

Pontiac

Lo-fi, new wave, death pop, synth, minimal punk. To say that BLANK DOGS transcend such labels is not so much false as it is pointless. The band’s DIY aesthetic and recording style might easily be misunderstood as an ethos or an aesthetic choice--at worst, a conceit. Hardly. Listening to Blank Dogs, one gets the sense that the man behind the music is sitting in a windowless room somewhere puzzling over his back catalogue. Not because he’s disappointed and not because it’s bad—it isn’t—but because he failed as only an accidental genius can fail: with surprising beauty. It’s as if Mr. Blank Dog himself (Ok, we can call him Mike now….) thought he wrote the perfect power-pop song but when he played back his ELO rip-off, the orchestra pit was filled with broken robots and illuminated with matches that burned into darkness as fast as he could light them.

Each Blank Dogs song is like its own planet with a distinct internal logic, landscape, and atmosphere. With their prolific output--17 records in 2 1/2 years, Blank Dogs are creating a universe, not a discography—and that universe is expanding

Complementing the fevered trail of records Blank Dogs have left on a variety of obscure labels—some small, some smaller, most destined for seminal status—the band has garnered attention from bigger indies as well. Troubleman Unlimited, known for working with bands that resist easy classification (Black Dice, Glass Candy) released a Blank Dogs LP in early ’08 and last fall, Woodsist Records—home to Blank Dogs’ cohorts Crystal Stilts, Vivian Girls, Woods, and Wavves—put out a mini-LP/CD called “The Fields”. A double LP, "Under and Under", is forthcoming from indie giant In The Red. The most recent Blank Dogs record came out last month on Captured Tracks—a brand new label that rivals Mike’s creative output. (Captured Tracks was started in 2008 by some guy in Brooklyn. Few people know who he is, but his friends call him Blank Dogs.)

[DJ Nocker]

Me and my room mate might go depending on if we work and how late.

[Joey Deadcat]

Not likely I'll be able to make this - still out of work and have to remain frugal. =(

[DJ Nocker]

Not likely I'll be able to make this - still out of work and have to remain frugal. =(

What happened to working as a bartender?

[Joey Deadcat]

What happened to working as a bartender?

Got canned awhile back.