I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: September 8, 2024] Waxahatchee / Snail Mail / Greg Mendez

I would have liked to go to one of these two Waxahatchee shows.  I wouldn’t have gone to both shows, but I had a hard time deciding which one to go to.

It turns out in the end that it didn’t matter, because we wound up going to Pearl Jam shows on the 7th and the 9th.  I joked with my wife that I was going to try to go to this show too, but we had been standing for hours for Pearl Jam and then would be standing for Pearl Jam for hours the following day. So I had to give it a miss–even though I’ve heard the show was outstanding.

I love Gladie and would love to have seen them again, but when I saw this lineup, I had to choose the night with Snail Mail, a band I have wanted to see them since about 2018, but it keeps not happening.  This is now the seventh time I could have seen them but didn’t.

At the end of last year, I had not heard of Greg Mendez until he was the opening act for two different bands a few weeks apart.  I didn’t go to either of those shows, so I still haven’t seen him.   o

Here’s a crazy blurb from the artist

For Greg Mendez, reflection doesn’t mean a static image in a mirror, or even a face he recognizes. It’s more a kaleidoscopic mirage, where paths taken shapeshift with the prospect of paths untread, and the subconscious merges with the intentional. On his self-titled new album, the Philadelphia-based songwriter and multi-instrumentalist investigates the shaky camera of memory, striving to carve out a collage that points to a truth. But there isn’t a regimented actuality here; instead, Mendez highlights the merit in many truths, and many lives, and how even the hardest truths can still contain some humor.

I had written Greg Mendez plays mellow folk music with a gentle voice.  According to Bandcamp Daily, he is

one of the Philly DIY scene’s best-kept-secrets, the soft-spoken songwriter with a preternatural ability to craft brief yet powerful songs is enjoying a raised profile with the release of his self-titled full-length. On the strength of a few early singles, the initial run of vinyl sold out within a month of the album’s announcement, but with releases and demos dating back to 2006, Mendez is hardly an overnight success.