The Crowd Pleasin’ Kitsch Heavy Glam Rock Of Italian Band Giuda Never Fails To Entertain. Here They Are At A Packed Show I Shot At The Bottom Of The Hill in San Francisco

The main two members of Giuda are the songwriters Lorenzo (guitarist) and Tenda (lead vocalist) who have known each other since they were toddlers and were also in a band called Taxi for ten years in Rome before Giuda put out their first album in 2010. That debut album, “Racy Roller” , was described as “Cock Sparrer twinned with the Equals” and features the studio version of this song in the video I just cobbled together. Giuda music is available as purchasable actual vinyl artifacts or even streamable through all the evil innernetted outlets in the universe.

I first caught a glimpsr of Giuda by chance in a packed Thee Parkside circa summer 2016, when I was there to catch the Briefs.

It was hot and sweaty and equipent wise and position was ill equipped for the frenzy, late to hit the thick sweaty pit and get appropriate images of their act down for posterity. When Giuda came back to the Bottom of the Hill a year later in the fall of 2017, I made sure to spread a few cameras around, and try to trap a little of the glory. Unfortunately batteries started fading during opening sets by Buster Shuffle Official and So What and then Giuda’s road manager ixnayed me placing a camera up on the stage where I could get the prime view…

By the time the mighty power pop professionals of Giuda came downstairs and popped onto the stage to deliver their 70’s style schtick like the equivalent of a Sardinian Slade tribute or a Sweet & Cheap Trick influenced Italian suedehed band, I was down in the pit up front clutching an iPhone 6, a bootleg Go Pro knock-off and a lo-rez outdated Zoom Q3 I had found in the garbage a year earlier. (All 3 devices are since either fried, dead and buried or lost).

Pinched by the front of the stage, behind a floor wedge, whilst getting elbowed by a still photographer with a big pro looking lens and constantly getting banged into by moonstompers from behind, I hoped for the best. I made a go of capturing some shaky lo-fi video shots while trying to avoid concrete poles and flying drinks, and hopefully getting some not altogether too overloaded and muffled audio.

It took about 8+ hours to edit and render this puppy while home sick one day, much of it spent on trying to EQ and balance the audio so you could at least hear a semblance of vocals over the boomin’ bass amp I was right in front of. 

I’ve now watched it at least once and it seems pretty rockin’, capturing the goonish cartoonish style of these swarthy saviours of the lost sounds of the 70’s, that they’ve remade into a catchy 21st century glam punk hybrid. Enjoy