I Just Read About That…

[DID NOT ATTEND: October 4, 2025] The Sound of Animals Fighting / Soft Blue Shimmer / The Casket Lottery / This Will Destroy You

I hadn’t heard of The Sound of Animals Fighting until I looked further into Anthony Green’s work.  Then I learned of this band and how they were a masked supergroup.  I gather they don’t wear masks anymore, but maybe they do.  The lineup is Rich Balling (Nightingale) Anthony Green (Skunk) Matt Embree (Walrus) Chris Tsagakis (Lynx) Steve Choi (Koala) Matthew Kelly (Wolf) Keith Goodwin (Penguin).  Two of the guys are from RX Bandits.

I was really interested in seeing them and seeing what their live show was like, but I already had events lined up for tonight, so I didn’t bother getting a ticket.  They seem to tour infrequently, so maybe they’ll be back.

I saw Soft Blue Shimmer open for Touche Amore and rally liked them.  I would have been happy to see them again.

I had not heard of The Casket Lottery but they have been around since 1997.  I listened to a couple of songs and liked them.  PunkNews says

Casket Lottery provide a lot of contrast in their music, and each song offers something different at every turn. Equal parts gritty and melodic, straining and beautiful. They’re obviously extremely tight and cohesive musicians, as everything flows very well together, with mathy drum beats, powerful bass, and guitar that can be clean and rhythmic, yet loud and crunching. Either sound can be put into a song without sounding forced or contrived, and it just builds off what came before it.

And they’re right, there’s a lot of stuff going on in these songs and I’m really surprised I hadn’t heard of them before.

This Will Destroy You is from Texas.  They formed in 2004, but I hadn’t heard of them either.  They play cinematic instrumentals not unlike Explosions in the Sky.  They sound great.

This would have been a fun (but long) night.