vBlog: The Atomic Swindlers at the East End Fest

The Atomic Swindlers got the chance to liven up what has been a Rochester tradition for years, and is slowly becoming a Rochester embarrasment: the East End Festival. The East End Festival used to be filled to the brim with interesting people, great food and great original music. Now, they charge two bucks to walk on the street during the festival, which takes up exactly half the East Avenue that it used to and features nothing but cover bands. In fact, I haven’t been to an East End Festival in years, primarily I think because any chance that I might need to endure The Skycoasters is generally too great a risk to my mental well-being.

However, this time it was worth the risk (and even the entirely silly two bucks) to go to the Fest, despite the looming storm clouds. For the first time in years, a band I actually dig was playing: the Atomic Swindlers. And also in spite of a somewhat lame crowd caught completely off guard by original thoughts coming from an East End Fest stage (Dude, where’s Uncle Plum?), the Swindlers put on a killer show.

Rather than do my usual vBlog thing, I decided in this case to let the video speak for itself, though not literally: the sound out of the little condenser mic on the camera was reprehensible. So, I took the liberty of using one of the tunes the Atomic Swindlers have previously offered their fans as a free download as the soundtrack for this video. And so, without further ado: