Santos Party House, a backstreet club owned by piano-rocker Andrew WK, is located on the fringe of two Manhattan neighborhoods: Soho, a glitzy strip of designer shops, and Chinatown, a culturally-rich immigrant neighborhood swarmed with knock-off handbag salesmen and soft drug dealers. Last night, the off-the-beaten-path club played host to the reunion of off-the-beaten path hardcore legends, Rorschach.Twenty years ago, Rorschach took traditional American hardcore and injected it with doomy riffs and melodies, chaotic song structures and demonic screams, defining the "metalcore" genre of the '90s--before the make up, major labels and mosh shorts turned it into a dirty word.
I caught a train downtown after work, waded through the swarms of tourists on Canal Street and turned onto the quiet side street where Santos resides. It was just getting dark and a black mass of bodies crowded the club's entrance.
As I approached, the bodies came into focus: crust kids and punk rockers stood beside young and old hardcore kids who were chatting up flanneled hipsters and clad-in-black metal folk. The diversity of the crowd struck me as a testament to the power of Rorschach's influence.
(My crowd, the I've-gotta-leave-the-office-early-to-get-to-the-hardcore-show-but-don't-have-time-to-change-out-of-my-business-casual-button-down-and-slacks also enjoyed heavy representation.)
The stage lights dimmed around 9 o'clock and Rorschach dove right into their set. After the first bout of tunes, singer Charles Maggio introduced the band and received a warm round of applause. He paused, laughed a little, and remarked, "We're not used to hearing that after I say that."
During the band's 4 year existence, they played a total of 247 shows and went out on three tours, while releasing two LPs, a 7", multiple splits and six tracks for compilations. Rorschach threw in the towel in 1993, playing the same small basement shows they started out in.In the course of an hour, Rorschach tore through nearly every single song they knew. "It's so awesome you're doing this!" screamed one of the faces in the crowd.
It was clear throughout the evening what a special occasion this was for a band whose name has been dropped countless times since their breakup but who received little fanfare during their brief existence.
"If I thanked everyone in this room for the support they've given us," said Maggio in a rare break between songs, "we'd have to cut the set off right now."
After a pseudo encore, which Maggio humorously admitted was written into the setlist, they returned to the stage to cover Black Flag's "My War", with Ted Leo lending guest vocals, and play their final song of the night, "Reoccuring Nightmare #105."
The club lights rose. The crowd exited. They boarded trains, hailed taxis and hopped onto fixed-gears.
Some headed off to suburban Jersey homes, urban squats and fancy Uptown lofts--most went straight to The Charleston in Brooklyn's Williamsburg neighborhood where Rorschach would play a late night show for the kids who couldn't get out of weekend waiting shifts, the suits who had to stay late at the office and hundreds of people looking to see their long-lost, favorite band twice in one night.
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