Saturday night on a warm spring evening in January I made the long pilgrimage out to the boondocks that is Arlington, WA. There I discovered a lovely little club called Mirkwood where I would see my beloved Skablins play. I haven’t seen them in over a year, but also on the bill were It Gets Worse whom I’d seen at the end of December and had been very impressed with.
The Skablins had the dance floor filled in no time and one of the first songs they played was their ska over of the (godly) Kinks’ “Come Dancing.” That in and of itself is beyond cool, but front man Gordy Whyte is such a natural performer I swear he must have been born with a stage floor glued to his feet. He emoted, cracked corny jokes and barely stopped strutting about the stage.
Meanwhile trombonist Buster Larsh almost stole the show with his dancing and oozing of charisma. If charisma were molasses we all would have drowned. Meanwhile, sax player Heather was no slouch when it came to moves and charisma. This is such a fun band. Toward the end they invited some of the members of It Gets Worse for the Specials’ “(A Message To You) Rudy,” followed by a finale of “Hell” (more commonly known as “The After Life”).
Besides the aforementioned, the rest of the Skablins are, Anton Beck – Bass Guitar, Jake Beck – Drums, Ben Curley – keyboard, Jacob Wikan – Guitar & Vocals, Michael Turner Anderson – Tenor Saxaphone, Chris Neumann – Trumpet.
Prior to The Skablins wonderful performance was It Gets Worse. This time they added a new vocalist, Daniel Corby, who fit right in with his complete ska attire and ska moves. Combine this with the corny jokes and anecdotes of bass player James Sweazea, who’s also a dead ringer for Dennis Weaver. Eric Stallard, lead guitar, bears an uncanny resemblance to Keith Moon. Every time the band performed a cover, James would ask the audience if they’d heard of the particular band. Then he always claimed that it was good no one heard of them because “we wrote this song.” This included covers from Reel Big Fish, Streetlight Manifesto and Five Iron Frenzy to name a few.
Early on, I knew this would be a fun band when two of the horn players grabbed toy light sabers and dashed onto the dance floor to battle it out, before returning to the stage as if nothing happened. The remainder of It Gets Worse are as follows: JR Sorrells- Drums, Ben Molina- Rhythm Guitar, Andrew Adams- Trombone, Frank Smith- Tenor Sax and Peter Fink – Trombone. It Gets Worse has not lived up to their name because compared to when I last saw them, I have to say It Gets Worse has only gotten better.
Starting off the whole evening was Seattle’s own The Good Wives. The Good Wives are a young four-piece outfit that played catchy, melodic pop tunes with lots of guitar hooks. Lots of good positive energy in this band and I hope to be seeing more of them in the future. They’re worth checking out.
