ROCK OF ASIAN: Black Kids in Los Angeles
Last night, we caught the Black Kids show at the El Rey. There were a surprising number of geezers in the audience (we count ourselves among them). Which is funny, because what we love about Black Kids is how young they are–young, fun, and unjaded. They were stoked to be playing a packed house in L.A. They don’t even have their stage banter down yet, unless you count Reggie Youngblood using “fuckin’” and “motherfuckers” a lot. Sometimes Reggie sang off-key. Their set was short, because as Reggie put it, they’ve only got “like, seven songs.” But they’re still fuckin’ entertaining, and when they pulled out the Clash’s “The Magnificent Seven” for their encore, we fell in love with them all over again.
A lot has been made of Reggie, because he’s the lead singer, he’s got that badass Filipifro, and he rocks the skinny jeans. Not enough has been said about his sis Ali, however, who is a stone cold fox. She’s 180 degrees from the pale, wan, depressed-looking, twiggy drip that you always see plaguing the indie rock scene. She’s stacked and she doesn’t hide it. She let her hair down and shook it loose in the middle of the set. When she smiles, she looks like a Blasian Betty Boop. And she smiles a lot. So, yeah, we would totally do her.
Download the Black Kids’ first full-length album Partie Traumatic on iTunes. Then go see them in concert and tell us what you think. In the meantime, enjoy this dramatic reading of the lyrics to “Partie Traumatic”:
Filed under: 80's Throwbacks, Ali Youngblood, Betty Boop, Black Kids, Blasians, Dramatic Readings, Ladies Who Rock, Partie Traumatic, Reggie Youngblood, Stone Cold Foxes, The Clash