There hasn't been a show quite so peculiarly memorable as the Goddamn' Hustle's ...Ruined My Life CD release party in the recent history of the South Florida music scene. Besides dozens of sexy cat (in bread?) costumes, nearly naked men and women, a scooter, there was fan-fucking-tastic live music.
See also
- Q&A: The Goddamn Hustle's Ashley Reda on Growing Up and Apathy Swag
The Goddamn' Hustle, or GDH, certainly hustles a winning sound of modern Southern bluegrass, indie rock, old-timey folk, and instrument-heavy rock and roll that with ...Ruined My Life, a collectively rare style these days. In combination with lead vocalist Ashley Reda's raspy growl -- which sounds like someone who's probably got a 2-pack-a-day habit and drinks a little too much whiskey -- a perfect combo is borne.
The handsome homegrown foursome -- with Ashley Reda on guitar and singing, bassist Adam Guagliardo on bass, guitarist Chris Ament, and drummer Juan Herandez -- crafted their new release to a very high standard. They turned out a record that you can't help but turn up to full volume and sing along to, because each and every song is epic with ironically poetic lyrics.
Fittingly, given that the GDH toured with them this summer, the ...Ruined My Life party kicked off with a Black Locust Society swarm of Gaps, Jabrjaw, and Protoman, whose spitfire rhymes had the entire venue going bananas. Rebel and Civilian followed suit, giving stellar performances before Bleubird took to the stage. Slowly but surely, the crowd grew frantic in anticipation of GDH's set which flawlessly covered old tracks and the majority of their newest album's six songs -- a personal favorite being "Summer's Over Brah" -- and a cover of Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros' "40 Day Dream." They closed out with their hit with corresponding music video, "Dirty Little Pet Names."
GDH put together a ridiculously familiar yet fresh lineup of acts. From the moment the doors of the downtown music venue opened the sounds rivaled the womp-womp-womp of the AP Tour next door at Revolution.
The all out marathon of fast paced, crowd-pleasing, dance inducing jams had even the bro-iest of bros and the hippest of hipsters pouring out onto the dance floor, and while we can neither confirm or deny whether or not lives were actually ruined on Saturday, we can guess that, like us, everyone who was given a (free!) copy of ...Ruined My Life hasn't taken it out of their respective players yet.
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