On the hunt to spike a crashing nightlife? Burnt out on a scene that decodes instead of dances? Is that jones you're feeling for a basic, primal blast of rough-cut rhythm and blues? Then haunt the bus mall no longer, friend. The
Real Pills have got your prescription filled.
As pushermen of some of Portland's most spirited rock and roll, the Real Pills couldn't be a nicer set of young fellows. To a man, the band is polite, mild-mannered, slightly awkward and sincere. If you sat down with the Real Pills without knowing of their volatile brand of high-grade shimmy, you'd be hard-pressed to accept them as the overheated performers they are.
They typically move in a pack and amuse themselves with quotations from 30-year-old Small Faces interviews. Though making music and collecting records are frequent topics among this somewhat insular group, camping and fly-fishing can be discussed just as passionately as the British Invasion scene. This chumminess is exceptional, given that, save for David Whitehead, all share the same house, making scenes from Help hard to stave off and some easy description like "odd mods" fast to hit the page.
On that note--despite the fact that their ultra-fast and adrenal take on rhythm and blues might recall the milieu of scooters, speed and serious James Brown worship, the band is not entirely comfortable with being seen as "mod." As guitarist Sean Burke likes to say of the contemporary revival of that '60s movement: "Good clothes. Good music. Bad scene."
Likewise, many descriptors the local press has fobbed off on the band over the past three years ("PBR-swilling garage rockers," "go-go creeps") seem a little inappropriate for such circumspect young men. Given that this town harbors many glam poseurs who strut like the Stones while vainly claiming to be "just trying to save rock 'n' roll," the Real Pills' lack of pretension is heartening, to say the least.
Fortunately, though, this modesty doesn't hamper the stage show. Live, the band's punk-furious dance party grooves take off like an Apollo rocket. Shrill vocals and stomp-crazy rhythms cinch tight against a flammable guitar spread of high-end sizzle and fuzz-monster roar. For less than three minutes a go, it's all tightly controlled mayhem, speeding along with brief flourishes of self-effacing stage play.
Adam Burke dips into his mic with his guitar pressed high on his chest. His brother Sean throws out the odd punctuating kick. Finally, Ben Spencer crashes on the downbeat and it's over. A press of sweaty stage-front dancers break from spastic shim-shimmies and pause for a breath. The guitarists stagger a moment to regain their footing. In a moment, everyone is back on the launch pad.
"We try to be very self-critical," explains Adam Burke. "It's all about making the song really grab someone's attention. We try to make every song that way. I hope we never lose the punk energy and rawness. There are very few good rock 'n' roll bands who are really, really polished. I think we're a pretty tight and together band, but I hope it never comes out as--"
"Pro," adds Spencer.
"Yeah, as pro and slick," continues Adam.
"That kind of thing just isn't rock 'n' roll," says Whitehead.
"We're all about a really raved-up groove," continues Adam. "We want impact, and we want to get people agitated."
Spencer and Adam Burke started the band with a few other people back in 1996 in the chilly collegiate environs of Moscow, Idaho, where a brief flirtation with the moniker the Chromies gave way to the medicinal and somewhat blasé handle of the Pills. At the time, the band aped the brutish interpretations of American teen-band sounds of the '60s popularized by groups like the Makers and Supercharger.
After moving to Portland in the summer of 1998 and filling out the ranks with Sean Burke and lifetime Bridgetown resident Whitehead, the Pills began focusing their songwriting skills. They winnowed their reference material down to forgotten European bands left behind in the wake of the Yardbirds and the Stones. Today, they base much of their sound on a frantic, uptempo '60s dance style known as Big Beat, though the Real Pills can hardly be pigeonholed as simple revivalists.
In what turned out to be a rather fortunate turn of events, the band was eventually forced to ditch the name the Pills. A minor feud incited a few years back by a Boston band also called the Pills eventually convinced the easygoing Portland Pills to change their name to avoid any unnecessary hassles. Resistant to fully abandoning their identity, they hit on a solution smacking of brilliance.
By opting for the qualifying "Real" they could pay
partial homage to the Real Kids, the legendary late '70s Boston band, while delivering a solid jab to the present-day Boston bozos. The name also appeals to the Real Pills' cultured sense of rock history. In the case of the Real Kids (né "The Kids"), the Hub rockers dodged a conflict with a similarly named European band by taking Johnny Thunders at his word when he told them, "Fuck those guys, you're the real Kids."
In a situation of similar but inverted circumstance, the then-Pills found inspiration for their new name when they caught wind of a friend's heated argument with a co-worker. This person was insistent that, no, the Boston Pills were the legit Pills, that the Portland Pills were going to get sued by the Boston Pills because the Portland Pills were not the "real" Pills.
Not the real Pills?
No one will ever make that mistake again.
By:Sam Soule
aacckkkthhhhpphhhfffttaaarrrggghhh...I think I've gone apoplectic with excitement. Can't wait for this show. Been waiting years now. YAAY! ps-need any reunion photos? Lemme know.
okay, so what about a Summer reunion? hey, hey? pretty good idea - that ways Fred and Chad and everyone who would be silly enough to miss the Slabtown show can have another chance.....and pure junkies like me can get their thrills.
