If triage, medically, is establishing priorities to maximize survival, then Triage, the rock band, making a third annual appearance at Cherry’s at the Bay, on the steamy afternoon of July 16, knew just what we needed musically: harness the heat and ride it out gloriously! Triage, the trio, consists of Ann Mounty, on vocals, and Tobie Dean Tripodi and Cherry Grove’s own Sue Cialini-King, on guitars and vocals.
“(I’m a) Bitch (I’m a lover),” featuring Ann’s dusky alto, backed up by Sue and Tobie, was Triage’s opening, bold and proud. The trio burned up the stage in “Mystery Achievement” and remembered David Bowie with “Suffragette City,” penetrating and political, with Tobie, on bass, as lead vocalist. Ann, then joined by Tobie, led off in a seductive, then angry “It Makes You Happy.” We knew from Ann’s first sung line that we were in for a fierce “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” the Nancy Sinatra classic, with Tobie and Sue soon lending their voices, and getting people up on the floor dancing and singing the repeated line “[these boots] are gonna walk all over you” back to the stage.
Tobie led off the Kinks’ “You Really Got Me,” with drive. Triage issued a loaded invitation to “Talk Dirty to Me,” taken up with gusto by the audience. “We Got the Beat,” the women sang, in the Go-Go’s song, and a propulsive one it was. They insisted that they, like the Ramones, “(wanna be) Sedated,” Sue and Ann’s vocal duet, Sue and Tobie’s guitar duet, and wild all around. In a fiery “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” and in “Highway to Hell,” their finale, with Sue leading off, the trio worked together magnificently as one, so precise was their blend of voices and instruments.
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