Well, this is certainly not a show I should gloss over. But I'm going to do it anyway.

Bosses is from Chicago. Did I hear that this was the band's first tour? Grunge gaze. There's a gaze for everything nowadays. Big crashing downbeats. Pedals squealing. Co-ed vocals. Most of which were dreamy and elongated and good. Three guitars on the stage and the bass player was still playing chords? Damn straight and he was leaping around too. The drummer hit hard, occasionally finding his way to double bass for more intensity. A new one was a bit more buoyant. It either had backing tracks or one of those guitarists was very tricky. They might have been. I'll want to see the Bosses again (and again) to be sure.

Latter was next. Another Chicago quintet. This one has played the KC DIY circuit a time or two. The bigger stage suited them well. The act played hardcore, often augmented by a utility man offering squonking sax or melodic keys. There was lots of guitar noise too. Sometimes the vocalist picked up a guitar and added even more. But mostly she stomped around the stage in a gauzy white dress, screamed her vocals from the apron, and climbed the mains. That was a better use of her talents. There was a lot of crowd work in a long set. And a lot of catching her breath between songs. Or at least trying to. The band was a lot. I can't imagine listening to Latter's album, but that show might just get me back into the DIYs.

And then there was Faetooth. Second time through in a year. Does the trio have a crush on Kansas City? I hope so. Fairy doom (not my words) from Los Angeles. That's a sort of blackened doom gaze in my book. Two vocalists. The bass player screeched while the guitarist had more rounded vocals. Usually. Occasionally they blended. Can anything this heavy be dreamy? It can. Maybe it was the drums that were never aggressive or extreme. Or maybe it was the guitarist's slowly picked arpeggios. Or the way the bass sort of cradled the big downbeats. She announced, "This one's kind of a slow burner." Most of them were. I slipped to the back of the room for the final few numbers of the long set. A couple of new ones may take some time to grow on me, but encore "Echolalia" had me from the start. When that lead ripped through the fog, boy did it hit the spot. That's the one that has me hoping Faetooth will be back for a third time.