When a band cancels shows because its bass player blew up his teeth in a collision with a flying microphone, you know it's for real. The Riverboat Gamblers bassist Pat Lillard's post-trauma photo (above) is pure T-shirt material. He looks like a younger, gorier Alice Cooper, but the blood is real, and it took more than six hours of surgery to repair his fractured mouth. Not that this band is particularly violent. But with its reckless, raucous breed of Texas garage punk, little things like body parts get smashed up once in a while. (Contrary to rumors, the Gamblers' love song "Catch Your Eye" is not a sly reference to one of the band's other onstage mishaps.) Just don't get too close to the action.
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