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Archive for June, 2025

Halloween (Warehouse on Watts, Philadelphia, PA, June 16, 2025) [LIP CRITIC]

Posted in Halloween, Hello Mary, Lip Critic, Philadelphia, PA, Warehouse on Watts on June 16, 2025| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: June 16, 2025] Halloween

I first heard about Warehouse on Watts back in 2021, when some kind of Yves Tumor Halloween show was being presented there.  I didn’t understand what was happening that night and really had no idea what to think of this venue.  I’ve only been interested in the venue one other time since then, but I didn’t go to it.  But here at last was someone (Hello Mary) that I really wanted to see and they were playing there.

Imagine my surprise to find out it’s a block away from The Met Philly.  It’s a cool, small club with a short stage and walls that you can lean against if need be.  I really liked it and would happily go back.

So I arrived really early and was able to check out the place a but before Halloween started.  I can’t believe that in 2025 a band can call themselves Halloween and there’s no real conflict.  Has no one ever called their band Halloween before?

Halloween is a Philly based band and they play an interesting mix of sounds.  They are probably based around shoegaze, with fuzzy swirling guitars.  The vocals are quiet ( I often couldn’t hear them, but I could tell there was singing).  Guitarist Sia Dokos (who also sang lead sometimes) played really cool interesting chords and noises and I wished that I was on their side of the stage to really see what was going on). (more…)

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Vampire Weekend (The Met Philadelpia, Philadelphia, PA, May 31, 2025)

Posted in Geese, Philadelphia, PA, The Met Philadelphia, Vampire Weekend on June 1, 2025| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: May 31, 2025] Vampire Weekend

Vampire Weekend’s first two albums are perfect.  They are two of my favorite albums and any time I listen to them, it makes me smile.  I had wanted to see them for a while, but I wasn’t sure if they would be as good as the records live.  And then suddenly they were selling out bigger venues than I wanted go.  I had tickets to see them in 2019 but couldn’t make it.  Somehow I missed when they played The Mann in 2024 (I was too buys that weekend anyhow) and finally I was able to snag tickets for one of the two nights at The Met.

I saw after that they played a different set for each night, so it’s a bummer I couldn’t go to both.  But having finally gotten so see them I can yell at my younger self because they were fantastic live.

After Geese left the stage, a giant Vampire Weekend banner dropped in front of the dark curtain.  A whole bunch of folks in dayglo yellow set up the stage area–bringing out a piano and drums as well as a mic stand.

Having never seen them I honestly wasn’t sure if this was the show–just a trio in front of the band’s name.  And I was fine with it because they sounded great.

It was just the original trio singer/guitarist Ezra Koenig, drummer Chris Tomson, and bassist Chris Baio.  They opened with  the quiet Hold Me Now and then segued into a far more rollicking Oxford Comma (And I was in heaven because they’d already played on of my favorites songs).  And then they played Blake’s Got a New Face, which my wife and I had just been singing.  It was great.

It was sometime during the next song Ice Cream Piano that I realized that there were more sounds coming from the stage than these three guys could possible make.  And soon after, the pulled back the VW curtain to reveal a huge band behind them.  The revelation was quite a delightful surprise and it wasn’t until they started the next song, Classical (which I never no the name of) that I realized how great the whole huge band sounded.  There were two drummers, keys, several guitars and lots of backing singers.  During the instrumental section of the song, one of the guys in the dayglo shirt did a very sexy dance in the spotlight.  It was pretty fun.

And how to describe the backdrop?  It looked like they were in an underground tunnel, like a concrete bunker with multiple ins and outs.  It looked really convincing.

Ezra typically played guitar but for a few songs, like Connect, he put down the guitar and walked the stage while singing. (more…)

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