Review by Val Tapia
Venue: Yucca Tap Room, Tempe, AZ (www.yuccatap.com )
Date: Wednesday June 12th, 2024
It’s been several years since I’ve covered a gig at Yucca Tap Room in Tempe. It’s known as a “dive bar”, however, it looks pretty damn clean to me. Which is a great thing by the way. Cleaner is definitely better!
Honestly, I completely forgot about the arcade there. If you like video games and live music, you’ll definitely want to head to Yucca.
I did exactly that on Wednesday June 12, when self-proclaimed “noisy punk” band CNTS (an acronym for c***s—yes, that word– in case you were wondering) took to the very small stage at Yucca and pretty much burned through a seven song(?), 30-minute set. As the headliner of the night, mind you.
Opening with I Won’t Work With You from their new (and second) album Thoughts and Prayers, the Los Angeles-based quintet kept things fast (and somewhat lighthearted) with lead vocalist Matt Cronk‘s friendly interaction with a few of the 27 people in attendance. Yes, I counted, in case anyone is wondering.
The rest of the band consists of lead guitarist Mike Crain, rhythm guitarist Koko Arabian, bassist Rico Adair and drummer Kevin Avery.
Two other new songs, Smash Mouth and Thoughts and Prayers, went over pretty well. But most of the people there seemed unfamiliar with most of the set— including this reviewer.
They play well, but in my opinion, the songs simply miss the mark.
It turns out that this was the last show of the tour, according to Cronk. He thanked the fans for coming out to the show, and the band immediately removed their pantyhose masks.
I’m guessing it was a bit hot for them wearing the “masks”, given the 110-degree record temperature earlier that day. To that point, I guess I can’t blame them for pulling them off so quickly.
Overall, I’ll give CNTS two out of five stars for effort. I wish them well.
