“If your band is called Symptoms of a Wet Guitar, it’s not like you can
show up with one guitar,” says Nathan Benjamin, guitarist and singer
for the rock quartet.
He’s got a point. For a band that sounds something like the aftermath of Springsteen slamming his motorcycle into a Neil Young concert on the outskirts of Savannah, Symptoms lives true to its name. People that go to a show will appreciate the hordes of musical gear they bring along. “We have to fill every space,” bassist Chris Coitus explains. “Every time we play … it’s like we’re playing at the Coliseum.” Benjamin expounds on this design, noting, “It’s completely over the top. I mean, why go out and play, haul all that gear, and stay up late hanging out in a dive bar if you’re not being completely over the top and having overt fun with the whole thing?” But it would be deceiving to say they are all about excessively noisy musical toys. They rarely cover a song and the stories they tell are almost always true. On their first full length CD, BarnBurner, Symptoms inserts random soundscapes. These are often obscure soundbites from newscasters, politicians or whatever else the band stumbles across. “It’s always great when someone comes up and [asks] ‘What was that one song?’ ” Benjamin begins, “and then you turn them on to something they don’t know about.” Symptoms will create a ruckus, and more than once in our conversation they remind me that rock ‘n’ roll comes first; over political vendettas, over fame and fortune, and unquestionably over the day’s trials and tribulations. But even this philosophy appears like it will never drown out their attachment to ballad singing, Southern-serenading, and the overarching style of the folk-rockers who trouped before them.
9 p.m. Friday, Oct. 24. The Windjammer, 1 Rancho Del Mar, Aptos. Free. 685-1587.
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