X Live At The Stone Pony 9-25-11: Los Angeles By Way Of Asbury Park, NJ When a band decides they want to tour playing a complete album as an anniversay celebration, one of two things happen: the band blithely grinds through those same old songs they have time and time again, with little or no life to the performance, or the band rocks the veritable shit out of the songs and lay waste to all around them, complete with a half-smile, half-sneer that says "We know this is going to kill you, even more than it did back in the day.". X performing "Los Angeles" at the Stone Pony was definitely the latter. They slayed it (and by proxy, us, the crowd in attendance). It amazes me when a band can play songs for some thirty-odd years, and still play them like they wrote 'em yesterday, and can't wait to shove their rock and roll down your unsuspecting virginal throat. The effortless playing, the enthusiam, the sweat, the almost Skeletor-esque grinning (thank you, Mr. Zoom), X showed once again why this band is legendary. If the performance wasn't enough, the songs speak for themselves. The rockabilly-infused punk never fails to deliver. If you don't own a copy of "Los Angeles" run, do not walk, to wherever you get your music from, and purchase this bad boy. It's a culture you need to experience. My favorite part of the evening? Wasn't even so much the playing of "Los Angeles" in it's entirety. It was seeing the band call out the rest of the set, making it up as they went along ("Devil Doll", "Hungry Wolf", etc). I love seeing a band work on the fly, and killing every impromptu choice. Age is insignificant in rock and roll. Great songs are great songs, and great bands are still great bands. X are proof positive of that. -Jay Mazeffect www.xtheband.com Photos by Lazlo (click on photo see full size)