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Archive for the ‘Underground Arts’ Category

Be Your Own Pet / Birthday Girl (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, October 22, 2023) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Be Your Own Pet, Birthday Girl, Philadelphia, PA, Underground Arts on October 22, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: October 22, 2023] Be Your Own Pet / Birthday Girl

I remember when Be Your Own Pet came out in 2006–they were endorsed and supported by members of Sonic Youth.

They played bratty teenage punk and were a ton of fun.  And then they broke up.

They have recently reunited (wikipedia says)

Following a fourteen year hiatus, they reunited in 2021 after being specifically requested by  Jack White to open up on a few dates of his Supply Chain Issues Tour.

Their own blurb says

On the heels of playing to packed rooms and enthusiastic audiences at SXSW, Nashville’s Be Your Own Pet have dropped a new single, “Hand Grenade,” via Third Man Records. The song marks their first new music since the release of their seminal Get Awkward album (XL Recordings) in 2008 and was written and recorded by the three founding members Jemina Pearl Abegg (vocals), Jonas Stein (Guitar), Nathan Vasquez (bass), and longtime drummer John Eatherly. Picking up right where they left off and clocking in at just over 3 minutes, “Hand Grenade” is an exuberant return and leaves no question they are the same band that Pitchfork called “vibrantly charismatic” and Rolling Stone labeled “charmingly raw.”

I had not heard of Birthday Girl which is surprising only because of the band’s lineage.  A Pessimist is Never Disappointed notes:

I think some folks are, rightly, going to check out Birthday Girl because Mabel Canty’s father is Brendan Canty (Rites of Spring, Fugazi, The Messthetics, etc.), or because Isabella MacKaye’s dad is Alec MacKaye (The Faith, Ignition, The Warmers, Hammered Hulls, etc.). But people are going to stay with this band because the music those two make with drummer Tess Kontarinis is sharply realized and emotive. What’s here on the band’s self-titled debut isn’t so much the sound of a new generation of harDCore, as it is that of the heyday of college rock. Less Beefeater and more Bettie Serveert is what I’m saying.

Sounds great.

Unfortunately, I am trying not to go to as many shows in quick succession.  And since I was out last night, I decided to give this one a miss.  I’d like to check out Birthday Girl some time though.

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Algernon Cadwallader / Knifeplay / Church Girls / Huey, the Cosmonaut (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, October 14, 2023) Philly Music Fest Day 6 [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Algernon Cadwallader, Church Girls, Huey the Cosmonaut, Knifeplay, Philadelphia, PA, Underground Arts on October 14, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: October 14, 2023] Algernon Cadwallader / Knifeplay / Church Girls / Huey, the Cosmonaut

Algernon Cadawallader announced two shows at Union Transfer last year.  I bought tickets to one and then couldn’t go.   I hadn’t even heard of them before the show, but I had since listened to them and thought they sounded pretty great.  My show sold out and the second night did so eventually as well, I believe.

When this night of Philly Music Fest was announced, I immediately grabbed a ticket assuming this would easily sell out.  But as of the night of the show there were still tickets left.  That seems very weird to me.

I was pretty psyched for this show mostly for the opening acts, but then my son came home from college and I stayed home to hang out with him and the fam.

Of course this means I didn’t go to any Philly Music Fest shows this year.

Knifeplay plays a kind of moody acoustic music.  The guitars feel acoustic but the songs are layered in washes of synths and feedback. There’s a  cool shoegaze feel and the vocals sound almost like he’s singing made up words (ala the Cocteau Twins) although he isn’t.

Knifeplay is a band that eludes definition, existing somewhere between the nihilistic detachment of shoegaze and the emotional honesty of folk songwriting. Originally a solo bedroom recording project of Tj Strohmer’s.

The whole vibe of the album is great.  I’d have liked to see them.

Church Girls play indie punk right in my sweet spot.

Church Girls write propulsive melodies and achingly vulnerable lyrics wrapped in the throbbing anxiety of post-punk and joyous aggression of pop-punk. Formed in 2014 by Mariel Beaumont.

The record sounds big and full with too many guitars and too many big vocals and it is glorious.  I absolutely wanted to see them.

Huey, the Cosmonaut plays in a variety of genres.  The first song of his that I heard I didn’t like. But the others I did.

I’d like to think that my music exists in the space between emo, R&B, bedroom pop, lofi hip hop and jazz. Some of the themes in my music include a focus on loneliness, traveling, nostalgia, melancholy, everyday sensations, black history, renewal, growth, cartoons, comic books, the cosmos and imaginary worlds. I feel that I’m constantly caught between different worlds in my personal life and musical aspirations.​ Through my music, I seek to unite some of those things. All of my music is produced from the bedroom. I’ve been playing with a band recently though.

Knowing that he plays with a band makes me want to see him more than if he was by himself.

Bummer that I missed the show but it was great seeing the college kid.

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Everything Everything / Pierre Kwenders (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, October 5, 2023) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Everything Everything, Philadelphia, PA, Pierre Kwenders, Underground Arts on October 5, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: October 5, 2023] Everything Everything / Pierre Kwenders

I recently heard of Everything Everything in glowing terms and when I saw that they were playing locally I made a note of it.  They are an

English art rock band from Manchester that formed in late 2007. Noted for their eclectic sound and complex, sociopolitical lyrics.

Their music is interesting and they remind me of a few bands that I like, but I wasn’t blown away enough to want to check them out.

Pierre Kwenders is the stage name of José Louis Modabi, a Congolese-Canadian musician. His 2014 album Le Dernier empereur bantou was a shortlisted nominee for the Juno Award for World Music Album of the Year at the Juno Awards of 2015, and a longlisted nominee for the 2015 Polaris Music Prize.

he has a good vibe and nice flow, but I’m not sad to not see him.

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Margaret Glaspy (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, September 29, 2023)

Posted in Margaret Glaspy, Philadelphia, PA, Tasha, Underground Arts on September 30, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: September 29, 2023] Tasha

I had been wanting to see Margaret Glaspy for a pretty long time.  She last played Philadelphia in 2016, about two months before I heard her album.  She was supposed to headline a tour back in 2020, but that show was postponed, so it’s not all her fault that it took me so long to see her.

And now, I’ve seen her three times in a year and a half.

Tonight I had tickets to see Explosions in the Sky, a band I loved seeing live and who I’ve wanted to see again (and again).  But when Margaret Glaspy announced her show for tonight, after careful consideration, I decided to see Margaret. The first time I had seen her was as an opener.  The second time was for a short free at noon.  So I had never seen her as a headliner, and that won out.

She was terrific. (more…)

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Tasha (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, September 29, 2023) [MARGARET GLASPY]

Posted in Margaret Glaspy, Philadelphia, PA, Tasha, Underground Arts on September 29, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: September 29, 2023] Tasha

Tasha is a Chicago based singer songwriter.  I hadn’t really heard her, but she opened for Nilufur Yanya on a night that I, coincidentally, went to see Spoon’s rescheduled show (for whom Margaret Glaspy opened(!)).

About her then I wrote: She has a lovely voice and sings a blend of folk and torch song.

And that was still true a year and a half later.  Although it was a bit more folk than torch.

On stage was Tasha and Emma (no last names given).  Emma played lead and backing guitar lines while Tasha sang and played guitar.

Tasha had a strong presence despite the low turnout so early.  She even made a comment about being from Chicago and no one reacted–“Not a single whoo?”  She later joked that she was going to say that Chicago was the Philly of the midwest but she was afraid to.

Tasha’s voice is really resonant and lovely.  Her songs were slow and thoughtful and combining that with her voice, I felt like some of her songs sounded like 60s British folk songs–an unusual touchstone for a young person from Chicago.

Some songs rocked a little harder and Emma played some cool feedbacking effects on a song or two.  On another song, she played keys which fleshed out the song pretty nicely.

I really enjoyed her set a lot, and by the time she was finishing up, the crowd had built some more and she received some loud applause.  Someone even asked me what her name was (she had forgotten to say it again later in the set).

  1. Dream Still ™
  2. Lake Superior ™
  3. Bed Song 1 ™
  4. History ™
  5. new song
  6. Michigan
  7. Would You Mind Pulling Me Close? §
  8. Year From Now ™

™ Tell Me What You Miss the Most (2021)
§ single (2021)

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Igorrr (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, September 20, 2023)

Posted in Igorrr, Melt-Banana, Otto von Schirach, Philadelphia, PA, Underground Arts on September 22, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: September 20, 2023] Igorrr

I bought tickets to this show back in December–I was really really looking forward to seeing Igorrr after reading about his live shows.  I thought that I had missed him a few years back–he was supposed to tour with ministry but left the tour before coming to the States.  So I don’t really see any evidence of him having played Philly since like 2018.

But I wasn’t going to miss this opportunity.

Igorrr is the creation of French musician Gautier Serre.  He mashes up genres in a crazy quilt of styles which often changes every few seconds.  He has a base of heavy metal but he throws in hip hot, break beats, classical and opera–it’s thrilling and confusing.  I loved his album Savage Sinusoid which Metal Injection gave a perfect 10/10 score, and named it the “Batshit Crazy Album of the Year.”

The follow up, Spirituality and Distortion focused more on the metal component of his repertoire.  Sinusoid was heavy mostly because it was so erratic and there were heavy components thrown in.  But Spirituality is a heavy metal record–with Igorrrr elements like baroque music, harpsichord and Middle Eastern melodies floating around and between the heaviness.

When Melt Banana cleared off their gear, all that was left was a table and a drumset.   So when Serre came out and started doing some amazing splicing and breaking up of sounds, I thought for a short time that the whole show was going to be this.  And that was cool.  I enjoyed watching him (in the moody light) manipulate sounds and create the wacky composition that is “Paranoid Bulldozer Italiano.”  (more…)

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Melt-Banana (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, September 20, 2023) [IGORRR]

Posted in Igorrr, Melt-Banana, Otto von Schirach, Philadelphia, PA, Underground Arts on September 21, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: September 20, 2023] Melt-Banana

I’ve known about Melt-Banana for years.  I knew they were loud and fast and were from Japan.  But I didn’t know much beyond that.  Turns out they’ve never had a permanent drummer.  They like the freedom of a drum machine.  For over twenty years they had a bass player (Rika Hamamoto) but when they decided to tour again recently, they decided to go just as as duo Yasuko Onuki – vocals and Ichiro Agata – guitars, effects.

After getting all of their gear set up, Yasuko calmly stood with a colorful videogame controller looking device in her hand.  A wall of amps and a laptop behind her.  Off to her left a few feet was Ichiro, with a guitar, a huge array of pedals and his own wall of amps.

He played fast and he looped his sounds and did a million things most of which I can’t even fathom.  Yasuko had her device and from time to time, she would wave her hand and presumably push a button on the gadget and the drums and bass blasted out of the speakers.  And these drums sounded great–they sounded real and not like a preprogrammed device.  I actually wondered if they were somehow triggering the drumset that was set up behind them (they weren’t).

Yasuko sings very high, very fast and sounds kind of angry.  But she never looked angry.  And she never broke a sweat (while Ichiro was a sweaty mess).

They played a whole bunch of songs, I can’t even imagine how anyone could tell them apart.  But someone did, as the setlist below is from the NY show but I believe it is the same (or roughly so) of ours–comparing my clips to what the songs are, it seems like the setlist was the same each night.

About half way through, Yasuko brought over a mic stand with a piece of paper taped to it.  There were 8 lines in Japanese.  She said they were going to play 8 very sort songs and proceeded to play the 8 songs in less than 3 minutes.

After that they were back to longer songs.   The last three songs of the set are around the 4 minute mark.

It was wild and fun and unpredictable.  And the crowd was totally into it.  In fact, this guy who cut in front of me to be right on the stage said he was going to see them tomorrow as well.  He moved away for the last song so he could join the inevitable pit and did not return for Igorrr.

Melt-Banana haven’t put out a new record in about ten years.  But they tour all the time.  So catch them if you can.

  1. Chain-Shot to Have Some Fun ≡
  2. The Hive €
  3. Vertigo Game €
  4. To Raffle or not to Raffle ∇
  5. Lie Lied Lies €
  6. Case D in the Test Tube ℵ
  7. So Unfilial Rule (0:14) (Discordance Axis song) ψ
  8. T for Tone (0:16) ß
  9. Lock the Head (0:28) ß
  10. Scrubber (0:17) §
  11. We Love Choco-Pa! (0:16) ©
  12. First Defy (0:11) ⊗
  13. Screw, Loose (0:24) §
  14. His Name Is Mickey (At Last She Got Him…) (0:22) ⇔
  15. Killer Garden in the Bottle ∞
  16. Sakura Spiral ∞
  17. My Missing Link €
  18. Infection Defective €
  19. Candy Gum €

BOLD songs are part of the “short song” segment

∞ split single with Napalm Death (2016)
€ Fetch (2013)
ß Bambi’s Dilemma (2007)
ψ 13 Hedgehogs (MxBx Singles 1994–1999)
≡ Cell-Scape (2003)
⊗ MxBx 1998 / 13,000 Miles at Light Velocity (1999)
⇔ Scratch or Stitch (1995)
© Cactuses Come in Flocks (1994)
§ Speak Squeak Creak (1994)

∇ Japan is Loud [Adult Swim compilation 2022]
ℵ Noise [Adult Swim compilation 2016]

 

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Otto von Schirach (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, September 20, 2023) [IGORRR]

Posted in Igorrr, Melt-Banana, Otto von Schirach, Philadelphia, PA, Underground Arts on September 20, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: September 20, 2023] Otto von Schirach

I bought tickets to this show back in December–I was really really looking forward to seeing Igorrr after reading about his live shows.  I thought that I had missed him a few years back, but I don’t really see any evidence of him having played Philly since like 2018.

But I wasn’t missing this show.  I was pretty delighted to see that Melt-Banana were opening, but I didn’t know anything about Otto von Schirach.

So who is he?

Bermuda Triangle born Otto Von Schirach is one of a kind human/alien, His magical presence & energy makes you overwhelming happy. This Miami Native puts out many different types of epic Electronic music and always has new life and sounds to share, hence he is always touring around the earth. His Shows are more of a sonic ear cleanse, aura cleanse and will magnify your pineal gland! You will be extremely happy after his live performance.

Otto is really really into triangles.  He wears a headband with a triangle hanging off of it.  Unless I am mistaken, he has two songs about triangles (one of which “Triangle Pit” has these lyrics: (more…)

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Together Pangea / Thick / Reckling (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, August 24, 2023) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Philadelphia, PA, Reckling, Thick, Together Pangea, Underground Arts on August 24, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: August 24, 2023] Together Pangea / Thick / Reckling

I have wanted to see Thick for about five years now.  It seems whenever they play a show I can’t get to it for one reason or another.  This show was announced and I thought they were headlining.  But they are not.

Together Pangea is a band whose name I like a lot.  But I do not like their music.  It’s not that different from bands that I do like, it just didn’t do anything for me. So I decided I didn’t want to go to this show.

Thick is a fun rocking band from New York.  As I’ve said every time I keep missing them, I hope they come back soon.

I’d never heard of Reckling.  They are a pretty standard fast, catchy punk band.  Fun stuff, but not especially memorable.

 

 

 

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Sparta : Wiretap Scars 20th Celebration Tour (Underground Arts, Philadelphia, PA, August 1, 2023)

Posted in Geoff Rickly, Philadelphia, PA, Sparta, Thursday, Underground Arts, Venezuela, Zeta on August 3, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: August 1, 2023] Sparta

Since 2020 I have had four opportunities to see Sparta. Two were cancelled because of the pandemic.  One saw them opening for Get Up Kids (a show I was interested in, but not enough to go) and now this one.  And while those two cancelled shows were probably good, seeing them for this one was undoubtedly better.

Sparta formed out of the breakup of At the Drive-In (Mars Volta was also formed from that breakup).  Sparta sounded more like ATDI because the songs were short and punky, even though Cedric the lead singer went on to Mars Volta.  Guitarist Jim Ward sings lead on Sparta songs and his voice is unique and sounds just as great as it did when Wiretap Scars came out twenty years ago.

The band came out–a trio now–with Matt Miller on bass and Neil Hennessy on drums. Jim Ward stood on the far side of the stage (not too far away) and the band launched into the album.

It was great to hear these songs live.  I hadn’t listened to the album in quite awhile, although I did listen to it a week ago to refamiliarize myself.  And I remembered how much i loved at least half of the album.  And the rest I enjoyed.  Hearing (and feeling) the guitar riffs and the excellent bass lines was fantastic.

The crowd wasn’t as dense as I would have thought and there was surprisingly, no mosh pit (which I appreciated).

The whole album sounded great–fresh and new and really great live. (more…)

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