Christian Perez's Travel Journal

Middle East Club, Thu Jun 23, 2005

Mass Ave is dotted with little cafes, eateries, and bars all the way up to Harvard Square (and probably beyond.) We've walked past them many times, but have only been to a very few. Minna was bored and asked a local grad student for cool things to do on a Wednesday night. One of the was the Middle East Club, a small restaurant 15 minutes from MIT which doubles as a small bar and venue for local bands. We checked out the website to see what was on the menu and it was funk!!

Funk music is so fun; you don't need to have heard it before to be able to dance and enjoy the show. I was pretty excited about it, so we rounded up some others, and walked down for a quick bite to eat and then a concert. The food is pretty good; I had the grape leaves, which are stuffed with meat and spices. It's not anymore expensive than other places in Boston, and if you don't mind ordering a 1/2 lb cheeseburger and a middle east cafe, you can get it for 6 bucks!

The music was righteous. I was excited, but the show went way beyond my expectations. The first band we saw was The Klapp, a rock/funk band with heavy reggae/calypso influence in it beat. Combined with the chick singer, I was reminded of No Doubt but with less vocal acrobatics and more harmonizing and Carribean groove, and a little bit of rock. There were something like 7 people in the band, so you had a decent wall of sound going.

Then came Greesome, a jazzy funk band complete with trumpet/sax/trombone trio, fat bass player, keyboards, guitar, and a vocalist which really defined their sound. When she sang, I had mental images of some broadway jazz number sung by a 50's chick in a skimpy dress but funkified so you could groove to it. Everyone in the room was hippie dancing their brains out. I swore I even saw Jim, the stiffest one of our troupe who only gets excited about obscure Indie bands, move a little bit to the music. It may have been others jostling him, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. Definately two bands worth checking out.

I was browsing Netscape.net's Top Cities for Singles, and since I'm in Boston, I thought I would check out their blurb on us. Lo and behold, Middle East club was named as the place hipsters go to hear the next big thing. After hearing The Klapp and Greesome, I can see why.