Karen Ponzio Photo
Ghost Lot.
Two three-piece bands shook up Best Video on Saturday. One was fairly new to the New Haven scene. The other was a couple years in, but with deep roots. Both had enough hard-hitting sound to get the crowd riled up and ready for more.
Executive director Julie Smith welcomed the first band, Ghost Lot, to the stage with Francis Ford Coppola’s Rumble Fish playing on the screen behind them.
“Matt Dillon, look at that guy,” Michael Cooper said. “One second…” as he stopped talking and stared at the screen while the crowd laughed. Prior to that pause, he introduced himself and the band.
“I’m Mike,” he said, “the executive director of Ghost Lot. We’re from Hamden. Hence the name Ghost Lot. If you don’t like us, you can enjoy Rumble Fish behind us.”
Ghost Lot is named after the Ghost Parking Lot, the famed former art installation at the Hamden Plaza, for which 20 cars were embedded in asphalt. Created in 1977, the installation was removed in 2003 and is often lamented by those who grew up with it as a touchstone of their childhood and teenage years.
The band ripped right into its latest single, “Under the Clothes,” released in September. Bassist Cooper shared and traded vocals with guitarist John Meah and, along with drummer Dave Schmidt, set the tone for the rest of the night by creating a big booming melodic sound that felt like an awakening, making heads nod along in the crowd and bringing out smiles aplenty.
The camaraderie was apparent in the trio, who have been friends for many years. Each one has been a member of various bands in the New Haven music scene for over two decades and has been playing together since 2020. Cooper mentioned that the three of them were “all in their 40s and have kids” and “we all live in Hamden” before introducing a new song of theirs called “Ready for Nothing,” which he said was about “my fear of dying.” You could see more than a few empathetic audience members nod along in agreement.
And though the music rocked hard, Cooper kept the mood light and easy throughout, referencing the movie by telling Dillon to “get ‘em!” during a fight scene and joking after having to restart one of their songs. “My lyrics are really great. I’m really proud of them, but I don’t remember them,” he said.
He also made the time to thank Best Video and noted his ties to the legendary institution, also with his signature humor.
“Besides the old Rudy’s, this is where I spent most of my 20s. Now I bring my kids here on Saturday mornings to hear children’s music.”
Ghost Lot’s eight-song set showcased each member’s power and love for the music as well as their collective consciousness that created pulsating, smart, and instantly captivating music that begs to be heard on repeat and sung along to at their live shows (Cooper mentioned before the set that they had been trying to play around once a month, so it should be easy to catch them). The final song of the night, the eponymous “Ghost Lot,” felt epic in its reach and scope, changing tempo and melding the best of power punk and good old fashioned heart-thumping rock with a healthy dose of pop punctuation. At the end of the song, Schmidt jumped up and screamed “yeah!” The crowd responded in kind. More, please.
Cooper had said before the set was over that Qween Kong — a band that has only played a handful of shows, but has amassed a loyal following — was going to “rip this place apart,” and that the group did. After a couple of technical difficulties which they laughed their way through, the band — Cara Delucia on bass and vocals, Gillian Basilicato on guitar and vocals, and Dylan Royka on drums — launched into a sizzling set of five songs that melded dreamy doses of the alt-rock 90s sound (they even covered a 90s classic, L7’s “Pretend We’re Dead”) with a heady amount of modern commentary and mad rock vibes that showcased the band’s wit and wildness.
Songs like “Reverse Cowgirl,” “Lucked Out,” and “Feelings” ran the gamut of what this band could offer, everything from softer licks that built upon one another, eventually offering a bigger bite, to climaxes that almost came out of the blue, sweet and satisfying but yet leaving you wanting more. And the crowd definitely wanted more, begging the band to play one more song after they were done.
“If you wanna see more, we’re playing a show at State House Wednesday,” said Basilicato. Sounds like a plan to me.
