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The Vibro Champs
w/The Oblivians, 8 tonight at the Hi-Pointe
It's amazing what a band with limited instrumental skills can do with a pompadour, a sense of humor and a few rockabilly and surf riffs.
The Vibro Champs aren't trying to change the world, and don't want to burden you with tedious tales of angst. They just want your company on a little trip back to rock's primitive beginnings.
The Oblivians open, but they're the bigger deal here. Ga-Rage rock out of Memphis, a town that always keeps a couple of ace hard-core R&B acts up its sleeve no matter what the prevailing mood happens to be around the rest of the country. (Techno on MTV? That's just where most of it belongs.)
The Oblivians are stumblebum instrumentalists shorter on substance than such hometown proto-rock homeboys as Tav Falco's Panther burns, or Mud Boy & the Neutrons. But like the best of their punk/blues soulmates (Ramones, Cramps, Blues Explosion), they offer some scintillating style over substance. The drummer loses...