I saw Gogol Bordello at Union Transfer almost exactly ten years ago. I re-read my post about it and I said that I had a ton of fun, but my memory of it was that it was chaotic and crazy. I haven’t really wanted to see them again even though I have a lot of respect for the band and I know that they live shows are amazing.
It was kind of a busy concert week so I didn’t even think about going. It sounds like this show was all about their brand new album which I hadn’t listened to. But I really should try to see them again one of these tours.
Puzzled Panther are from New York City. Their debut EP was produced by Eugene Hütz. The band is Led by Gen Z rockers Victoria Espinoza and Kay Bontempo, and often play as a duo (not sure if they were a fuller band for this tour). Their bio says they are
generating a new wave of infectious blissed-out psychedelic mix of Madchester with the danceable frantic attack of New York post-punk
I don’t really hear that–they seem more of a simple punk sound. It doesn’t really grab me, but maybe they’re more fun live.
Boris and the Joy is Boris Pelekh guitarist from Gogol Bordello who has a side project of indie-folk-electro-pop band Boris and the Joy.
Boris, the Ukrainian/Russian singer, composer and guitar player has toured the world as the guitarist of gypsy-punk band Gogol Bordello for a decade and fronting his own unit Hey Guy. His life’s journey and the philosophy of joy are the fibers of the emotionally colorful Boris & the Joy.
It’s pretty mellow–a stark change but probably a nice warm up.
[DID NOT ATTEND: March 19, 2026] Sweet Pill / Heart to Gold / Spaced
I missed Sweet Pill when they surprise opened for Pool Kids at the Ukie Club and since then I’ve been trying to catch them. I missed them two years ago when they played Union Transfer (that show is up on YouTube–see below). Then they opened for Zeta at the Ukie club–a show I really wanted to go to but couldn’t make.
So this was an album release show for their new record and I was pretty psyched to go. And then my son came home from college and I had a bunch of other commitments to take care of so I couldn’t make it either.
The funny thing is that my friend’s daughter whom I ran into at a Pool Kids show a few months ago loves Sweet Pill and she was at the show–it would have been crazy to run into her again.
Sweet Pill actually reminds me a lot of Pool Kids–similar impressive guitar work (finger tapping!) and great strong female vocals. I really want to see them before they get too huge.
It turns out that Sweet Pill cancelled the rest of the tour a few days later for personal reasons. I hope everything’s okay with them. And I also hope that when they reschedule the tour, they throw in an other Philly show so I can see them.
Heart to Gold is from Minnesota and they play a similar kind of upbeat sounding punk with big guitars. I guess they’re calling it high energy emo punk. Whatever it’s called, I dig it
Spaced is a hardcore band from Buffalo. They are certainly heavier than the other two bands and probably got the crowd really revved up. Short songs, loud vocals. Fun stuff.
When Mike Gordon announced a short March tour and one of the stops was Union Transfer, I immediately grabbed a ticket. I have very warm memories of the last time I saw him. I assumed it was like six years ago so I was really surprised to discover it was actually TEN. I was also surprised to see that he had played UT in 2018 and I wondered why I didn’t go (I had tickets to Nada Surf that night). But it has been 8 years since Mike has been here.
The 2016 lineup was guitarist Scott Murawski, percussionist Craig Myers, drummer John Kimock and keyboardist Robert Walter.
This years lineup was similar but different: guitarist Bob Wagner, guitarist Xavier Lynn, drummer John Kimock and keyboardist Robert Walter.
Like last time, Mike and friends played for almost 3 hours (a brief intermission in the middle). And like last time, Mike didn’t do a lot of soloing–he’s not a show offy bassist, although he does play some great stuff–he always has a great groove and I enjoy when he messes with his pedal effects to create a variety of sounds.
There was a line to get in, but it moved quickly and when I got in the merch line was really short. My wife had bought me a poster tube since I like posters so much and I actually brought it with me this time. But while I stood there (and I could see into the hall) nothing was happening. Then I saw that the card reader wasn’t working and these two guys were trying to fix it. With a few minutes before the showtime, I quit the line and went in. I had a great spot right in front of Mike. Although the people around me were pretty odd.
One guy had a stuffed doll with him and he kept holding it up trying to take a picture of it with the band (which I get but holy cow he did it like 30 times). After he moved away, the spot was constantly being filled by other people who really had no regard for personal space (which might just be a Phish thing). (more…)
[DID NOT ATTEND: March 1, 2026] Peaches / Model/Actriz
I was really surprised when I saw that Peaches announced a show at Union Transfer. Although I see she did play there in 2022.
I don’t know very much about Peaches. I know enough to know that she is sex positive and very very explicit. I did think that this would be a fun show to experience once (like Gwar, but with very different fluids) but I already had tickets to see comedian Ed Gamble who I was really excited to see live.
Maybe if Peaches comes back in four more years I’ll try to see her. I’ve seen some clips from the show online and it looks pretty wild.
I saw Model/Actriz four years ago and really want to see them again. In fact, I found out about this show first because they were announced as the opening act. I think they were pretty much brand new when I saw them and I’m glad that they’ve been getting more popular. I do hope to see them again and it looks like they tour a lot more often than Peaches, so I’ll assume they’ll be back soon.
[POSTPONED: February 1, 2026] Dry Cleaning / YHWH Nailgun [moved to May 6, 2026]
Back in 2022, a family emergency prevented me from going to this show. I was interested in Dry Cleaning who at the time were a kind of trendy British band. They are of the spoken deadpan vocal/wild guitar noise variety. I thought they’d be fun to see live once.
They announced a new tour in February of 2026 and then announced it would be postponed
Dry Cleaning have rescheduled their imminent tour of North America, cutting a handful of dates and postponing the rest until May. The band cited “the increasingly hostile economic forces that govern touring” in a statement that you can read below.
We have had to take the difficult decision to move our Jan/Feb ‘26 US tour to May. This is due to a number of factors, not least of which the increasingly hostile economic forces that govern touring in the present day. Thankfully we have managed to reschedule the majority of the original shows and all tickets will remain valid, if that suits you, and refunds available if it does not. Regrettably, we have been unable to make this work for all dates due to the shortened routing. Refunds will be available from your place of purchase and we will do everything in our power to play for you as soon as we can.
The new date actually works out better for me and I’m looking forward to the show.
YHWH Nailgun (pronounced Yahweh Nailgun) is an American experimental rock band formed in 2020, known for their abrasive sound that blends elements of punk, noise, and electronic music. The quartet consists of vocalist Zack Borzone, drummer Sam Pickard, guitarist Saguiv Rosenstock, and synthesist Jack Tobias. They are indeed noisy and abrasive. I’m curious to see them do this live and I hope they are still the opening band in May.
I’ve known about Sudan Archives since her first album came out. I wanted to see her in 2020, but her show sold out. Then it was just before the COVID shutdown and her show wasn’t cancelled but hardly anyone went so I could have gone (but I didn’t know that and probably wouldn’t have gone anyway). I had a ticket to see her a couple years ago but didn’t make it. But then I finally saw her at All Things Go in 2023,so I was excited to get to see her again at her own show.
I had not heard of Halima, but she seemed to have some buzz around her. She came out looking fierce in a half jacket with huge shoulders. She had beads in her hair, marched out to the mic all by herself and started her backing music.
It was really impressive that she stood there with just the mic and her backing music playing as she sang her genre-unspecific music. I really enjoyed the spare backing sounds of her songs. omoge was a series of soft notes as she sang gently over them. Her second song (which I never found the name of) was a bit more bouncy with some deep bass notes.
I really liked the sounds of cocoa body–a kind of percussive melody accompanied by deep bass notes. Most of her songs were pretty short, but this one did have a middle instrumental section where Halima showed off her great dance moves.
Halima is British but she lives in Brooklyn. I loved hearing her talk–there’s something really cool sounding about the way British singers say Phillleeee. (more…)
[DID NOT ATTEND: December 18, 2025] Built to Spill / Guerilla Toss
I love Built to Spill. I’ve seen them half a dozen times and they’re always fun. Doug Martsch doesn’t really do anything in stage, except shred like a maniac, but somehow the shows are always fun. For the longest time I had seen Modest Mouse and Built to Spill the same number of times. But the last two Built to Spill shows I’ve had to miss for one reason or another. I was hoping to get BTS to catch up, but it didn’t happen. Hope the come back next year.
I had missed Guerilla Toss back in October when they did their headline show. So I was excited that they were opening on this Built to Spill tour. Although I missed a bunch of shows because of the surgery, this was the only one I was really bummed about.
[DID NOT ATTEND: December 13, 2025] Algernon Cadwallader / Gladie / Snoozer
Algernon Cadawallader has reunited and played a bunch of shows. Before they reunited I had not heard of them. But I had since listened to them and thought they sounded pretty great.
I haven’t been able to see them the last two times they were in town. But I secured a ticket for this show.
And then I had surgery and couldn’t even leave the house. I think I’ll give them one more chance and if I miss that one I’ll gibe up on them entirely.
I saw Gladie open for Otoboke Beaver back in 2023. Since then Gladie has been getting a good buzz about them, which is cool because they were really good. I would have definitely enjoyed seeing them again.
Snoozer is an “alternative group from philly. delco brothers make weird rock.” They play slow slacker rock.
After seeing Tyler the Creator earlier this year, I thought my daughter might also enjoy seeing Earl Sweatshirt, his former partner in Odd Future.
What was fascinating was that Tyler’s show was MASSIVE. He sold out Wells Fargo Center. He had two stages, lots of lights, and a whole routine. Earl’s show was at Union Transfer and didn’t even have a backdrop. There was no light show, just the venue’s lights. And all of that is totally fine, it was just such a contrast.
Earl had been on the stage for most of the night. Hanging out behind the DJ table, bouncing with the people around him. But I didn’t know it was him until he came out from behind the table and started his set.
I was fascinated at how short his songs were. Riot! is about a minute. gsw vs sac was just over a minute. He did 22 songs in under an hour.
Earl is a bit of a mumbler, but he has a lot of charisma and knows how to modulate his flow. and yet overall, it’s still a pretty chill set.
Like with the others, there were people walking around, filming, dancing, smoking. For Earl’s set a guy with a really big beard (Daryl, I think) walked around and got a shout out but didn’t actually do anything.
According to setlist, many of the songs were unreleased. So when the short songs ended (abruptly) the crowd had to take a second to respond. There was also a kind of pause where they played music and he talked to the DJ or something? Everything about the whole night just felt like a bunch of guys hanging out rapping. It wasn’t that it was unprofessional, it just felt totally relaxed and low key–much like Earl’s music. Like friends hanging out.
The biggest reactions came from his songs from SICK! and of course, Molasses from Doris was a big hit with crowd rapping along. Earl seemed to really enjoy the crowd for this song and they way they rapped back–“make some noise for yourself Philly.”
The tone picked up a lot when ZeLooperz came back out to rap on Vision and it made me laugh that Earl just kind of stood around watching him. Earl is very very chill. Then Cletus Strap came to the front and did one of his own songs while Earl acted out the lyrics somewhat–Earl has a verse on the record and did his own verse when it was time.
About half way through Earl’s set he recognized the DJ, Black Noise, who I don’t think was DJing all night. It was very hard to tell what was going on most of the time.
When he announced the song E.Coli the crowd was super psyched–I understand his record with The Alchemist is quite a favorite. It was pretty unusual for me to hear people rapping back at him. Not singing, but more or less talking. Fascinating.
There were at least two more medical situations (and it wasn’t hot in there or anything). Earl started talking about how y’all need to drink water. He also offered to buy granola bars for the city, LOL.
My daughter definitely didn’t enjoy this show as much as Tyler’s. And that’s fair–she didn’t know really anything that was played during the night and it was a long, non-stop night. She knows I hate to leave early even if the show isn’t going to change very much. She asked if we could leave in like 15 minutes, but I looked at the setlist and saw that the show was only going to be about 25 minutes longer, so she agreed to stick it out.
When he finished the set, it didn’t seem like he was going to come back out for an encore. I knew my daughter wanted to leave but I told her that if he didn’t come out in like a minute we’d leave. I always think an encore will be a fun ending.
Earl came out and did (apparently) one half of the song Quest/Power (he did the Power side). And that was that. His encore was about a minute. Crazy. I’m not sure it was worth staying, but on the plus side, we didn’t stay for merch, we got out really fast and were on the road in about 5 minutes. So we made up for most of that time, I think.
It was definitely up there with one of the least enjoyable concerts I’d been to. I assume if I knew more of the music I would have been more into it. I assumed it would be a fun show like Tyler’s (whose music I don’t really know either), but it felt more like I was a plus one guest at a party of close friends.
FiloTV recorded the whole set from the stage and you can see someone in the front row holding out vinyl for Earl to sign (I guess). For like the whole show (he didn’t acknowledge it).
SETLIST (I think)
Riot! § gsw vs sac £ FORGE King of Hearts (Unreleased) Warrior (Unreleased) 2010 ∇ INFATUATION £ 8/22 (Unreleased) Sirius Blac (Earl Sweatshirt & The Alchemist cover) Truffle (Unreleased) Fire in the Hole ∇ Molasses ‰ Azucar § Live £ The Mint § Vision (with Zelooperz) ∇ I’m Not Really Trying* (Cletus Strap song rapped by Cletus) E. Coli (The Alchemist cover) Gamma £ TOURMALINE £ Word to the Truest (Unreleased) Nowhere2go § Shattered Dreams § Exhaust £ (paused for medical emergency)
encore
Quest/Power [Power only]
£ Live Laugh Love (2025)
∇ SICK! (2022) § Some Rap Songs (2018) ‰ Doris (2013)
This is my third time seeing The Beths, a New Zealand band that’s taking the U.S. by storm. Las time they played here they sold out Union Transfer. This time, they sold out TWO NIGHTS at Union Transfer.
We immediately got tickets to night one and for the first time, saw them from a chair off to the side (thanks ADA seating). Although they interact so nicely with the front, that it’s kind of a bummer to not be in on the action.
But the sound was great (I know it always sounds better further back, but I like being close).
So The Beths are a four piece: Elizabeth Stokes, singer and guitarist. Jonathan Pearce who plays lead guitar. Benjamin Sinclair on bass and Tristan Deck on drums. They are delightful and funny and play fantastic songs. Liz is a great songwriter and the boys make divine harmonies.
Last time they played nearly all of their then new album. This time they played nine out of ten songs from their newest album. And they opened with the title track a bouncy song that had everyone delightedly singing along.
After the even punchier No Joy they played two older songs one from Expert and one from Future Me Hates Me.
Then they moved back to the new album with the super fun first single Metal.
At one point during these songs, Benjamin did something that made a tin whistle fly into the air which he caught and started playing. Later both Benjamin and Jonathan activated the tin whistle cannon and we were delighted to see them snatch the instruments out of the air and start playing. The also have some shakers in their songs. Liz uses a banana shaped one. If you go to Benjamin’s review of the following night, you can read about the amusing trick they played on Liz and her banana. (more…)
I saw Gogol Bordello at Union Transfer almost exactly ten years ago. I re-read my post about it and I said that I had a ton of fun, but my memory of it was that it was chaotic and crazy. I haven’t really wanted to see them again even though I have a lot of respect for the band and I know that they live shows are amazing.
I Just Read About That... 