T. was really into Beach Bunny when we saw her back in November of 2021. I was pretty surprised that she was going to tour again in May of 2022 (in fairness, the 2021 tour had been rescheduled twice and I think she was ready to play new stuff, but she had all the gear from the old tour so….). Plus, this new tour moved her from the 1500 capacity Union Transfer to the 2500 capacity Fillmore.
I had really enjoyed her at Union Transfer and was looking forward to what she’s do at this show.
Last time the stage was filled with old video game cabinets. This time it had old small TV screens.
Lili Trifilio came out with bunny ears on and jumped right in with “Oxygen.” The crowd seemed very young to me (which, I guess to me they were very young, but I believe the Fillmore was designed for a largely under 21 crowd).
My daughter seemed a little overwhelmed by the crowd and the show and decided to hang nearer to the back. She felt like she could see better, which may have been true). But i always feel disconnected from the show when I’m too far back. (more…)
[DID NOT ATTEND: May 19, 2022] Sleaford Mods / Sorry
It’s weird to me when bands that I like feud with each other.
So it was weird to me that Idles and Sleaford Mods would have some kind of shouting match feud with each other, especially since they both advocate for the same thing (it’s not even worth getting into what the feud was about).
I love Idles. I like Sleaford Mods–but I also thought they’d be really cool to see live.
I was pleased to get a ticket for this show, but then The Front Bottoms announced a show at White Eagle Hall and my son was really keen on going to see it. So, I basically blew off this show for The Front Bottoms. Which we wound up not going to anyway. Fortunately, Sleaford Mods seem to come to Philly a bunch, so I think I’ll get to see them next year.
Sorry is a fascinating band from England with kind of spoken/sung deadpan lyrics. But defining their music is really a challenge
Matty Pywell of GigWise stated that “Listening to Sorry’s discography is to hear a safari of different sounds, as eye catching as the next. One area might contain the grumbled discontent of punk and rock, whilst if you look close enough you can catch a flash of hip-hop and jazz. Grouping them into a single genre is a fool’s errand”. Lorenz and O’Bryen have themselves talked about their genre in music, describing it as pop music, while Lorenz has stated that “It’s just a bit annoying to be called post punk or grunge because I don’t think we are that.
I actually think the music is pretty weird and not very poppy at all. They’d have been a great opening act for Sleaford Mods and I hope they come back to the US sometime too.
[ATTENDED: May 18, 2022] Ky Vöss [Wednesday cancelled]
T. was really into Beach Bunny when we saw her back in November of 2021. I was pretty surprised that she was going to tour again in May of 2022 (in fairness, the 2021 tour had been rescheduled twice and I think she was ready to play new stuff, but she had all the gear from the old tour so….). Plus, this new tour moved her from the 1500 capacity Union Transfer to the 2500 capacity Fillmore.
Of course I got her a ticket!
It also happened to be the same night as my rescheduled (three or four times) Deftones show which I was incredibly excited to go to. Which my son really wanted to go to having recently gotten into the Deftones.
I tried so many different ways to make this night happen for all of us.
Perhaps I could get a ticket for him for Deftones and we could go together. Mine was GA, but GA was upselling for like $300 (NO!). I could get him a seat in the balcony–that would suck) and even that was upselling for like $175 (NO!). (more…)
[DID NOT ATTEND: May 18, 2022] Kikagaku Moyo / Nina Ryser
I saw Kikagaku Moyo in 2019 and they were amazing. I’ve wanted to see them again, but they are from Japan, and the Pandemic kept them away.
They finally announced a new show for 2022 and I was psyched. Too bad it aligned with the Deftones show that I’d been waiting to see for a couple of years. Too bad also the Beach Bunny show that I was going to take my daughter to see fell on the same night.
Then Kikagaku Moyo announced that this was going to be their last tour–they were going to break up. So I’ll never see them again.
Alas.
Nina Ryser is one third of Palberta.
I happened to see her later on in the year opening for Tropical Fuck Storm
Nina Ryser is a member of Palberta. .. Like the rest of her Palbertans, Ryser is a prolific songwriter who is classically trained but who likes to push the boundaries of what music should do. … For this little set, she and her husband played keyboards (and all manner of gadgets). The set sounded improvised, but I’m sure it wasn’t. … Most of the songs were built around a beat and a simple chord pattern. There was a droney component to it and Nina’s vocals were kind of deapan. … My favorite parts of the show occurred between songs where Nina would mess around with looping pedals and make these interesting collages out of bits of the song she’d just played. There was definitely some improv in here and I enjoyed watching her manipulate the sounds to create something cool.
[DID NOT ATTEND: May 18, 2022] Deftones / Gojira / VOWWS [rescheduled from August 22, 2020 and August 27, 2021]
I was pretty excited to see this Deftones show. But I was even more excited when my son said he wanted to go to the show with me. Well, it had sold out a long time ago and I couldn’t get a Pit ticket for a reasonable price. I didn’t want my son to be in the balcony while I was in the pit. But I also didn’t want the reverse.
But then, what happened was that I got a ticket to see Beach Bunny across town on the same night. And so, my daughter and I went to the Beach Bunny show and I gave my son the Deftones ticket. Yes, he would be by himself in the pit.
The timing actually worked out just fine, because while Wednesday bailed on our show, VOWWS bailed on their show. This meant I had to do some mathematical time keeping to see if I’d have to leave Beach Bunny early to get him so he wasn’t hanging around on the streets of Philadelphia.
But it turned out that his show ended almost exactly the same time as our show. Since our show was only ten minutes away, there was still plenty of foot traffic when I went to go get him.
He said the show was great. And Markit Aneight kindly recorded the entire Deftones set.
~~~~~~~
I was pretty excited to see this show this summer. It turned out, however, that the show was the night that we returned home from vacation. Ie, it would have been a pretty exhausting day. So, the fact that Deftones decided to postponed until May was fine with me.
I’m bummed that Poppy is no longer part of the tour because I’d really like to see her. But she is now headlining her own tour–which I don’t really want to see. I’m not sure a full show of hers would be that much fun. But hey, maybe she’ll be back on board
~~~
I saw Deftones at a lousy location (Sands Bethlehem hall), but it was one of my favorite shows that year. The crowd was pushy and shovey, but Chino came within five feet of me and the energy was amazing.
Plus at the end of the show, when a roadie threw out a drumstick, I actually got it.
I knew I’d want to see them at least one more time, but wow was I surprised to see that they were going to play The Met in Philly, which I think of as a more “delicate” hall. I’d be slightly afraid for the seats at a Deftones show.
The opening acts were really intriguing as well.
Gojira area French heavy metal band whose 2012 album I loved. Heavy and very technical I’d imagine they put on a great show.
Poppy is an absolute mystery. She’s an internet creation whose every song is is a different genre. Her latest album was really really heavy but with that fake internet sheen on it (in a Babymetal kind of way but less sincere, if that’s possible). I’ve been intrigued by here since I first heard about her, but I wouldn’t want to see her show if she was headlining. This seemed like a great way to experience her weirdness. I hope that she is still on the bill next year and that she is still into metal, otherwise it could be kind of awkward.
I really thought that this show at the end of August might go on but on May 19, they sent this note.
Due to the current regulations, and uncertainty surrounding COVID-19, we must reschedule our North American summer tour dates with special guests, Gojira and Poppy. We’re currently rescheduling the dates for 2021, and you’ll be the first to know once they are confirmed. All tickets will be honored or refunded upon our next announcement regarding the tour.
I’m glad they are promising to come back And by then, their new album (due in September) will be familiar to all of us.
I have complained before about one-named singers. But usually, they have somewhat unique names to trade on. But Dave? Really? Especially since the Dave Matthews people call him just Dave most of the time. How does a British rapper succeed when he is called DAVE?
Pretty well, apparently since he did three nights in New York (the poster is before new dates were added).
He also played TLA. I have never been to an exclusively rap concert. But I thought that I’d like to see DAVE, because I really like his tone (and his accent is neat).
I think the show sold out, but it turned out that I had tickets to see Crash Test Dummies that night, so DAVE was never really on the table.
I don’t know what the opening set was like. According to the Brooklyn Vegan review of one of the New York shows,
The crowd was already hyped up thanks to Hot 97’s DJ Kast One warming things up with a hits-filled DJ set, but when Dave walked out on that stage, the already-packed crowd packed in even tighter, with people storming towards the stage, a sea of phones in the air, and almost the entire crowd rapping along to every word to show-opener “Verdansk” right off the bat. (At one point, Dave stopped the show to ask everyone to move back and check on people in the front row.) For a good chunk of the show, there was nothing on stage except Dave and a hazy light show, and that’s all he needed to keep the energy level at a 10/10 song after song. He’s not only a great storyteller but a great performer, and he won over the entire room off the strengths of his raps alone.
Maybe when he comes back I’ll be able to check him out.
[DID NOT ATTEND: May 14, 2022] Sunflower Bean / Hello Mary
I’ve seen Sunflower bean twice. The first time I was blown away by them. The second time, they had changed their sound a bit and, while I liked them, I didn’t really love the new direction quite as much.
Sunflower Bean had cancelled a few shows earlier this month due to singer Julia Cumming’s injury. This show did happen, but if I was going out this night it was to see The Dead Milkmen.
Although now that I know about Hello Mary, that might have changed.
Hello Mary is a band I hadn’t heard of. Why hadn’t I heard of them? Well, because this article from November 2022 (yes, out of chronology, but it shows just how unknown they were back in May) explains
The New York trio’s self-titled full-length debut, out March 3, isa blast of distorted chords, sunny harmonies, and all-consuming angst that will renew your faith in the hopelessly dated and/or timelessly classic sounds of alternative rock. Hello Mary is an instant contender for 2023’s most bracing entrance to the stage, sharp and self-assured. Oh yeah, and the band’s two founders — singer-guitarist Helena Straight and bass player Mikaela Oppenheimer, both 18 — just graduated from high school this summer.
So at the time of the show they were still in high school. That would have been wild to see them. I have since listened to the album and I love it. I sure hope the tour soon.
[DID NOT ATTEND: May 13, 2022] The Lemon Twigs / Tchotchke [rescheduled from May 16, 2020]
I discovered The Lemon Twigs a few years ago and really enjoyed their glam rock sound and I imagined that they would be a ton of fun live. The band is technically a duo, although I don’t know if they have more people on stage with them.
I really liked The Lemon Twigs’ Do Hollywood album and their follow up EPs showed even more development. Since then they have put out a few albums, and I have enjoyed them.
I have rather wanted to see them–this new tour, which was playing at TWO locations really close to me seemed to be an easy way to catch them.
We had a school day scheduled for this day and it ran much longer than I imagined, so even though I had tickets, there was no way to get to the show.
Tchotchke is a band from New York comprised of Anastasia Sanchez, Eva Chambers and Emily Tooraen. They used to be called Pinky Pinky which I think is a much more apt name for the style of music they play–it’s a kind of an updated doo-wop, pop sheen aesthetic.
Really not my thing, although I heard that if you went to their merch booth after the show they handed out a tchotchke to each person.
[ATTENDED: May 11, 2022] Built to Spill [rescheduled from July 30, 2020]
I feel like I have seen Built to Spill a million times, but this was my fifth show.
The first time I saw him was at Union Transfer back in 2015 and he had a five piece band. That was a couple of iterations ago and now he was back with a new band.
On this newly announced tour, his whole band was going to be different. In fact, I have seen at least three different lineups for the band over the years. This tour was going to feature drummer Teresa Esguerra of Prism Bitch (who opened for Built To Spill last time) and bassist Melanie Radford from openers Blood Lemon.
The last time I promised myself I wouldn’t get too close to the stage, but I did. The problem with being so close is the way Doug Martsch has his guitar set up. His amp is right next to him and it is so loud. From where I was you could barely hear anything else. Of course I’m there to watch Doug play, so it’s not too bad. But I promised myself I would stand back to fully appreciate his band.
I love that Esguerra was on the side of the stage facing the other two (that’s how his band was set up with the previous trio as well). This allowed for Esguerra and Radford to communicate with each other while Doug was jamming. And they had outstanding chemistry. (more…)
[CANCELLED: May 13, 2022] Sinéad O’Connor [rescheduled from April 5, 2020 and September 18, 2021]
Lots has been going on in Sinéad O’Connor’s world in the last, oh, decade or so. It’s no real surprise that this show was postponed or cancelled or whatever it is. In addition to inner turmoil, she also suffered the death of her son. And she announced she will not be performing live in 2022 “due to continuing grief over the tragic loss of her beloved son Shane”
On March 24, City Winery sent out this message:
Dear Ticket Holders,
Due to circumstances beyond our control, City Winery is forced to reschedule SineadO‘Connor‘s performances in NYC, Boston, Philadelphia and Chicago.
Many of you have been holding onto tickets since 2019, and we are grateful for your patience and support. We’ve had to navigate multiple reschedulings due to the pandemic, Sinead‘s personal tragedy, and travel restrictions. We understand the disappointment and don’t want you to wait any longer for a refund.
~~~~~~~~
I have seen Sinéad O’Connor four times. although the last time was in 1998.
T. was really into Beach Bunny when we saw her back in November of 2021. I was pretty surprised that she was going to tour again in May of 2022 (in fairness, the 2021 tour had been rescheduled twice and I think she was ready to play new stuff, but she had all the gear from the old tour so….). Plus, this new tour moved her from the 1500 capacity Union Transfer to the 2500 capacity Fillmore.
I Just Read About That... 