The long, strange legend of the Sun City Girls (described in last week's story "Praising Arizona" by Devin King) has a special side-story for us Portlanders: the Girls share a fleeting but cherished history with Fire on Fire, the local-scene superstars opening the Girls' June 20 show at SPACE Gallery.
The two remaining members of Sun City Girls, Alan and Richard Bishop, will pay tribute to their recently deceased bandmate, Charles Gocher, at Friday's event, with a screening of Gocher’s video art followed by an acoustic performance by the Bishops.
South Portland’s own avant-folk behemoth, Fire on Fire, play their first gig in about nine months to open the show, continuing the deep but little-known connection between the two bands. Earlier this decade, some members of FoF, then in their previous musical incarnation, Cerberus Shoal, began exchanging mail art and music with the "Gals." Later, the group collaborated with Alan Bishop on a fascinating EP called The Vim and Vigour of Alvarius Band Cerberus Shoal, released on Northeast Indie in 2002 and still available on the label’s Web site (northeastindie.com), which captured the essence of both groups — chaos dancing with reverie, folk and psychedelia strewn with carnivalesque oddities.
Cerberus Shoal went on to open for the Sun City Girls a few times in 2004-2005, and singer/multi-instrumentalist Colleen Kinsella recalls the visceral reaction their performances provoked. “I remember my eyes watering, my eyes burned. I wanted to be everywhere at once. Running through the crowd, pressed up against the stage, wishing I was one of them.”
Bandmate Chriss Sutherland, reflecting on the Girls’ prodigious but quirky legend, calls them heroes. “They have existed for over a quarter century making music, art, video, politics and jokes without borders and without dumbing down or pandering to an audience. They represent an idea of a musician/artist that is almost extinct in our country.”
Fire on Fire and the Bishops play tribute to Gocher at 9:30 pm on Saturday. Tickets are $10, available at SPACE Gallery’s Web site, space538.org.
