Last year's Spring Scream festival in Kenting featured 110 bands on two stages over four days and this year's show promises to be at least of the same scale.
In the run-up to this year's Spring Scream, scheduled for April 5 to April 8, again in Kenting National Park, Taipei Times will profile several of the highlight acts coming from abroad and all over Taiwan to take the stage at this year's event.
We begin in Taiwan with the Taichung band, Milk.
PHOTO COURTESY OF MILK
After two concerts last weekend -- one at the Say Yes to Taiwan Concert (和平演唱會) at the 228 Peace Park and the other at Taipei's Zeitgeist (聖界) club -- the owners of Zeitgeist were so impressed they immediately asked the band to return for another show this weekend. Milk even managed to hog all the air time on TVBS's broadcast of the Peace Park show. So if you missed Milk last weekend, you'll have another chance tomorrow night when they play with three other bands at a thrash rock and hip-hop theme night.
But Milk is neither a thrash nor hip-hop band. The seven-piece chicken fetish ensemble is more what one would call a barnyard funk and groove band, slightly in the tradition of Dribdas, the now defunct group started by Spring Scream organizers Jimmy Moe and Wade Davis.
"We're not really songwriters, we're more like jam adapters," said didgeridoo player Kenton Hermer. "Sometimes we capture something in a jam, and then we're like, `Hey, everybody just remember that.'"
Milk's members are all Taichung-based foreigners, who have been in Taiwan at least three or four years -- long enough to develop a "Taiwan commitment," Hermer said -- and all have taught English at one point or another.
As for the relationship between teaching English and performing music, Hermer commented, "It's not really that big of a leap, is it."
Through both of last week's sets, vocalist Erin King spent about half the time time squawking, strutting and flapping like a chicken. (He can also rap). Other band members contributed other farm animal noises.
Performance notes
What Milk, Chenmo Luohsuan (沉默螺旋), Gangguan Lamei (鋼管辣妹) and Huen Huen Tiao (昏昏跳)
Where Zeitgeist, B1, 122 Chunghsiao E. Rd., Sec. 2, Taipei (台北市忠孝東路2段122號B1)
When 8pm to 12pm
Tickets NT$250
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