Grub Lord, Children of the Flaming Wheel, and Choses Sauvages at The Press Room
The drive up to Portsmouth started under a sky that looked like it was still deciding what it wanted to do. It was late afternoon and the light was still hanging on, but you could see the clouds slowly stacking into something heavier as it got later.
I had left early hoping to stay ahead of both traffic and whatever weather was coming. Turns out that part worked. The highway was quiet most of the way north, just long stretches of highway and that slow creeping feeling that the sky might eventually turn into something more serious.
For the moment though it was still holding together.
By the time Portsmouth appeared the streets were just wet instead of stormy. Downtown felt pretty calm when I got there. The rain had left the streets shiny and the brick buildings looked darker than usual under the streetlights. Narrow uneven sidewalks, old storefronts, the kind of place that was around long before anyone thought about live music happening upstairs.
The Press Room sits right in the middle of that block. From the street it just looks like another bar or restaurant with a round sign hanging over the sidewalk. If you didn’t already know there was a music room upstairs you could walk right past it without thinking twice.
Inside, the building stacks itself upward. The first floor is a bar and restaurant space where people eat and talk while the music happens somewhere above them. The second floor is where the stage sits, a compact rectangular room where the audience stands only a few steps away from the band. There’s even a small balcony level looking down onto the floor below but it was unfortunately closed for this show.
When I came upstairs early in the night the lighting was already set the way it would stay all evening. A wash of purple and blue across the stage with dim bar lights here and there. That glow never changed from band to band. Instead, each group stepped into the same atmosphere and had to make it their own.
The room was still half in conversation when Grub Lord started playing. A lot of people were leaning against the bar or finishing drinks, not fully paying attention yet. That didn’t seem to slow the band down much.
The singer/bassist stood out right away. Liliana had bright blue hair under the purple lights and what looked like vampire fangs every time she got close to the mic. The band didn’t bother easing into the set. They jumped straight into it fast and loud, cutting right through the noise in the room. Song after song, quick and sharp, letting the momentum build on its own.
By the time they reached the end of their set the room had started paying more attention. The singer jumped down off the stage during the last song, stepping right into the crowd before the music cut out and the lights settled again.
After that, Children of the Flaming Wheel stepped up.
The shift between the two bands was obvious right away. Where Grub Lord had been all punch and movement, this set moved in a slower, heavier direction. The guitars stretched out more and the songs had a slightly hypnotic feel to them. Instead of hitting the room all at once, their sound seemed to spread gradually through it.
At first the vocals sat a little low in the mix but that corrected itself early in the opening song. Once the sound settled in, the band moved through the rest of their set at a steadier pace. The guitars circled around the rhythm instead of charging straight through it.
The singer stayed mostly planted at the microphone, focused on delivering the songs rather than putting on much of a spectacle. Under the purple and blue lighting the band almost blended into the back wall, the stage washed in color while the rest of the room stayed dim.
From the floor you could see people slowly edging closer to the stage. A few heads nodding, a couple phones lifting for quick photos, the kind of small shifts that happen when a crowd starts settling into a band’s sound.
They finished their set simply, thanking the crowd and giving a quick nod toward the next band before stepping away from the microphones.
By then the room had filled in noticeably.
When Choses Sauvages walked onto the stage they didn’t look much different from the crowd that had been hanging around the bar earlier. They didn’t make a big entrance the way some headliners do. It was modest. Just five musicians stepping into the same purple and blue lighting that had been hanging over the stage all night.
But the sound changed the room almost immediately.
The Montreal group plays a sharp dance punk style built around tight bass grooves and rhythmic synth textures. Their music moved in loops, building grooves that pulled the whole room along with it. The lead singer Felix joked early on that the crowd might have trouble singing along because every song was in French. It didn’t seem to matter much once the rhythm took hold though.
One of the highlights of the set for me was “La valse des trottoirs,” which unfolded into a long, pulsing groove that felt almost tailor made for a packed room. The rhythm held steady while guitars and keyboards layered melodies over the top.
From the back of the room it looked like a small dance floor had suddenly appeared where the standing crowd had been only minutes earlier. The groove pulled people in, but it was how comfortably the band sat inside that rhythm that made the set land. They never rushed the songs or forced the energy higher than it needed to go. They just kept feeding the pulse forward and trusted the room to follow it. By the last stretch of the set, most of the crowd already had.
When the encore wrapped up the room slowly relaxed back into itself. People drifted toward the bar again while the band started breaking down their gear. The staff at The Press Room kept everything moving without ever making it feel rushed, bartenders still pouring and chatting it up while the stage slowly emptied.
Choses Sauvages sounded right at home in that room. Tight enough to dance to and loud enough to fill the space without overwhelming it.
After stepping back out onto Daniel Street I wandered into a bar down the block for one last drink before heading home. It was a packed house of townies spread throughout the whole spot. Whatever awkward feeling out-of-towners sometimes get walking into a packed local bar never really showed up. The people were very welcoming, quick to offer a smoke or friendly conversation. A couple were finishing their night there and before long the usual questions came up. Where are you from, what band did you see, was the show any good. Turns out the answer to that last one was pretty easy. After a while I finished my drink, stepped back out onto the street, and started the drive south again.
Not a bad night to follow the music a little farther from home.
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