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Archive for the ‘Union Transfer’ Category

Magic Sword (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, April 22, 2023) [TWRP]

Posted in Magic Sword, Philadelphia, PA, TWRP, Union Transfer on April 22, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: April 22, 2023] Magic Sword

I saw Magic Sword open for Avatar back in 2021 and I knew I’d want to see them again.

What I wrote about them then stand up pretty well for this show:

There are three members: The Keeper (red, keyboard, audio-visual), The Seer (blue, guitar), and The Weaver (yellow, drums).  Oh yes, they are all masked (and not COVID masked, but like a fencing mask with a glowing light (in the above color) for the eyes).  All of their songs are pretty heavy with a main riff (and bass) coming from the keys and really heavy drums.  And then The Seer plays some extended impressive and super catchy guitar solos.

Every song feels like the exultant triumph of a cheesy 80s sci fi movie.  Which is not to say that their music is cheesy (it really rocks) but that it would be placed in a cheesy movie–and would sound great.

In fact, the band has written epic stories (and comic books) that go along with their music.  These songs are the soundtrack to those stories. So it all makes sense.

The set opened with a proclamation in a deep voice explaining that Magic Sword was here to defend all that good in the world.  And then the trio came out.

It’s all vaguely preposterous, but they are completely into it (The Weaver is excellent at getting the fans pumped up) and the music is so good, that it all works wonders.  A handful of people in the crowd had purchased Magic Sword swords (a tiny imitation of the real Magic Sword sword) and waved their blue glow around.

I felt like they played newer songs–songs that were a little more complicated with some excellent stops and starts in them.  But, since they are all instrumentals, it’s hard to know what songs they played.

But most importantly, mid way through the set The Keeper held aloft the blue glowing Magic Sword and all was well in Philadelphia.

I really thought my son would enjoy this show and he said he enjoyed Magic Sword a lot.  So that’s cool.

When the show was over we went to the merch table and I was pretty tickled to see that if you didn’t know what you wanted, you could roll a D20 and see if luck was on your side.  The guy in front of us rolled it and was granted the right to have his picture taken holding THE Magic Sword.

Cool.

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Andy Shauf / Marina Allen (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, April 21, 2023) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Andy Shauf, Marina Allen, Philadelphia, PA, Union Transfer on April 21, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: April 21, 2023] Andy Shauf / Marina Allen

After not seeing Andy Shauf a bunch of times the last few years, I also managed to not see him again this year.

There were three other shows happening this night, two of which I was really torn about.  So even though I would like to see Andy Shauf some day, the other shows were booked long before this was announced.

I am pleased to see that Andy does seem to come around quite a lot, so I’m sure he’ll be back next Spring.

Marina Allen is opening for him on this tour.  According to her label she is a

once-in-a-decade five-tool musician: She writes beautiful melodies and brilliant lyrics, expresses her ideas with an unusual voice of extraordinary depth and range, thinks in fanciful arrangements, and constantly navigates the knife-edge between too much and too little.

I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a blurb quite like that before.

I listened to her first song on Spotify “Falls on Me,” and I would have guessed that it was literally from the 1970s.  She has an absolute classic-sounding voice.  I can’t get over how much she sounds like a blast from the past. I can’t decide if I love it or hate it.

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Sunset Rubdown (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, March 31, 2023)

Posted in Nicholas Merz, Philadelphia, PA, Sunset Rubdown, Union Transfer on April 2, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: March 31, 2023] Sunset Rubdown 

I really like Spencer Krug’s other (one of many) band Wolf Parade.  When the Sunset Rubdown album Dragonslayer came out, I really liked it as well. Krug is a weird songwriter with an unusual sense of what a song should be like.

Sunset Rubdown more or less broke up after Dragonslayer for reasons I’m unclear about.  They toured throughout 2009 and then disbanded.  Sometime in December 2022, Krug decided to get the band back together for a Tiny Tour.

As Krug puts it

“Fast forward twelve-and-a-half years” from their final show in Tokyo in late 2009 “to Krug whimsically sending the band a group email about a possible reunion, after having dreamt about it the night before. Each of the members replied with an enthusiastic “Yes” that same afternoon, and a dormant volcano began to rumble…”

I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to go to this show.

When it was first announced, on December 6, it was at PhilMOCA and it sold out almost instantly.

Then on

December 9,  (Three days later) there was a message

OK, let’s go. Due to popular demand, the Sunset Rubdown show has been MOVED from PhilaMOCA to the First Unitarian Church of Philadelphia! All previously purchased tickets will be honored at the new venue and additional tickets are ON SALE NOW! …but for how long?

Now I don’t go  to the Church, so I wasn’t going to go to this show.  But then later that day:

Damn, this sold out instantly. Should we move it to a bigger room or…

On January 5, the show was moved to Union Transfer and I bought my ticket the next day.

By the time the show came up, I wasn’t entirely sure I was going to go.   There were two other shows that night that I was vaguely interested in.  But I decided to take advantage of this reunion.  (more…)

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Nicholas Merz (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, March 31, 2023) [SUNSET RUBDOWN]

Posted in Nicholas Merz, Philadelphia, PA, Sunset Rubdown, Union Transfer on April 1, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: March 31, 2023] Nicholas Merz

I has listened to Nicholas Merz’ record before this show and hadn’t liked it very much.  Merz’ delivery is really slow and deep and is almost comical.  he’s also got this kind of cowboy vibe which is really kind of weird.  But the thing i disliked most about the record was the overuse of saxophone.

So I didn’t care if I arrived a few minutes late. But it turned out the traffic was really light that night and I wound up pretty early.

I talked to a couple of people who were discussing Godspeed You Black Emperor.  And then Merz came on.

With one spotlight shining down on him, he sauntered slowly to the center of the stage as swirls of music played on the speakers.  After an introduction, he began singing in that slow deliberate way of his.  It was terrible.  but it was also mesmerizing.  i couldn’t stop watching.  And soon enough, without him changing anything, I found myself enjoying it.

The swirling music made me a little light headed, perhaps.  And that spotlight pulsed like a strobe, lighting him up in various ways.  When that song wrapped up, he walked to a pedal steel guitar at the back of his setup and sat down.  He played a simple chord structure, manipulated the sound a bit and looped it.  It wound up having the same slow woozy feeling.  (more…)

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Ibeyi / Ojerime (World Cafe Live, Philadelphia, PA, March 25, 2023) [RESCHEDULED] [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Ibeyi, Ojerime, Philadelphia, PA, Union Transfer, World Cafe Live on March 25, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: March 25, 2023] Ibeyi / Ojerime [rescheduled from October 4, 2022]

I first heard of Ibeyi quite some time ago. They are sisters Lisa-Kaindé and Naomi Diaz.  They were born in Cuba but moved to France as small kids.  Both of their parents are musicians, and the sisters have a great musical connection.

I had heard that their live show was amazing and I put them high on my list of bands to see.  They were supposed to play Union Transfer back in October and I was really looking forward to seeing them there.

The show was moved to World Cafe Live which wasn’t a super big deal, although I fins getting to World Cafe Live to be far more of a pain than getting to Union Transfer.  Then I listened to the newest album and it was okay.  I still think “Deathless” is a staggeringly wonderful song, and I sure it’s genius live, but I had kind of lost interest in Ibeyi in the last few months.  And when The Rural Alberta Advantage announced a show for the same night, they ultimately won out.

Sometimes if you are not sure how a band is going to be live, you might be able to get a sense based on their opening act.  Not a foolproof plan, but it can certainly be an indicator.  I hadn’t heard of Ojerime, but when I looked her up, I saw she was described as a “nostalgic R&B queen, [whose] debut mixtape ‘B4 I Breakdown’ tracks a difficult journey through depression and self-discovery.”

That had all the elements of someone I did not want to see.  Like, at all.  So, that helped to solidify my decision not to go.

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Unwound (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, March 16, 2023)

Posted in Philadelphia, PA, Union Transfer, Unwound on March 17, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: March 16, 2023] Unwound

This Unwound tour was announced with much fanfare.  It had been 20 years since the band had last toured.  And they didn’t think they’d reunite

“When we put Unwound on the shelf in 2002, we never thought we’d return to the project,” drummer Sara Lund said in a statement with today’s announcement. The band held its first reunion practice, secretly, in April 2022.

but

“Starting over again is a rebellious act against our failure,” guitarist/singer Justin Trosper added.

There was a compounded problem in that their bassist Vern Rumsey, died in 2020.  When introducing the last few songs of the night (the only time he spoke) Trosper dedicated the finals songs to Vern saying that he was the soul of the band.  Jared Warren filled in for Rumsey.  Scott Seckington has also joined on guitar–the band was (pretty much) always a three-piece, but I thought Seckington was an excellent addition to the overall sound.

But it turned out that the early 1990s band that I was familiar with was Unrest.  Indeed, I didn’t know Unwound at all.  But I had grabbed a ticket because the hype got the best of me.  I listened to their albums and really liked what I heard.  So I wasn’t disappointed that I got the ticket.

There was the usual pre-band music playing over the speakers, but about five minutes before the band went on, the sound was switched to a live broadcast of NOAA weather–a perfectly weird sounding recitation of ordinary weather information.  It worked perfectly.  The also played the NOAA weather when the band was over. (more…)

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Versus (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, March 16, 2023) [UNWOUND]

Posted in Philadelphia, PA, Sonic Youth, TEKE::TEKE, Union Transfer, Unwound, Versus on March 16, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: March 16, 2023] Versus

Back in the 90s, I loved a whole bunch of band that I discovered from a compilation called Ear of the Dragon.  I had known some of the bands already (which is why I bought the compilation).  It featured bands like The Dambuilders, aMiniature, Seam and Versus.

I loved everything about Versus.  Their sound was interesting–catchy and dissonant alternately.  And I loved the vocals of Richard Baluyut and Fontaine Toups (who has the best name in music).  They put out a number of albums and EPs in the 1990s and t hen went dormant.

In 2010 they put out a new album that I missed entirely.  Same with their 2019 release (which is on a label I’ve never heard of).  I basically had assumed that they were broken up for good.

So imagine my surprise to see that they were opening for Unwound on the night that I happened to get a ticket.  (TEKE::TEKE from Montreal opened the first night–I hadn’t heard of them but they are a Japanese psych rock band, hmmm).

The band came out on stage and while I recognized Richard and Fontaine, I didn’t know the other two.  They weren’t introduced, but I think they were  the rest of the Baluyut family: James on guitar and Edward on drums.

They opened with Mummified, a track off their newest album that has a really long instrumental opening.  I didn’t know it, but the band sounded great.  And after two minutes when Richard started singing, he sounded great too.  But it was when Fontaine added her vocals that everything came flooding back why I loved this band so much. (more…)

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The Beths (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, March 3, 2023)

Posted in Hans Pucket, New Zealand, Philadelphia, PA, Sidney Gish, The Beths, Union Transfer on March 4, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: March 3, 2023] The Beths

I saw The Beths about a year ago at Underground Arts.  Since then they have now moved up from the 650 person venue to Union Transfer (1500) which they also sold out!  Great new for them!

The Beths are actually suddenly everywhere and had we played our cards right we could have seen them like four times this year (opening for The National and a couple of other places).  But this wound up being the only show we’ll see them at.  And that’s fine because it was great and certainly tides us over for a while.

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.  When introducing each other, they told “fex” about each other.  The New Zealand accent is awesome–fex would be Facts.  Like the fact that Benjamin Sinclair has a blog and Instagram account with the awesome name of Breakfast and Travel Updates.  (more…)

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Sidney Gish (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, March 3, 2023) [THE BETHS]

Posted in Hans Pucket, Philadelphia, PA, Sidney Gish, The Beths, Union Transfer on March 3, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: March 3, 2023] Sidney Gish

As soon as The Beths announced they were playing Union Transfer, I bought myself a ticket.  And then a little while later I bought S. one because I thought she would really enjoy a night out for rocking good natured fun.

I didn’t know the opening bands.  There were originally two: Hans Pucket dropped out of the tour.  The Beths posted the rather cryptic

Sad news is that @hanspucket unfortunately won’t be joining us this time, we’re gutted about that. But we promise to drag them over another time. So it’ll just be us and the genius Sidney Gish.

I’ve been listening to the Hans Pucket album and it’s really good.  Hope they make it over here some time.

Sidney Gish is a singer I’d never heard of, although clearly everyone else in the room had.

She has released two albums (the second one in 2017) and now is about to release a third.  What’s she been doing for the last few years?  Graduating from Northeastern apparently.

Anyway, it seems that her first two albums were viral sensations (especially her second album No Dogs Allowed).  Because everyone was singing along to all of the songs (except the new one). (more…)

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Dry Cleaning / The Spirit of the Beehive / Nourished By Time (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, February 1, 2023) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Dry Cleaning, Nourished By Time, Philadelphia, PA, The Spirit of the Beehive, Union Transfer on February 1, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: November 5, 2022] Dry Cleaning / The Spirit of the Beehive / Nourished By Time

Dry Cleaning are a kind of trendy British band.  They are of the spoken deadpan vocal/wild guitar noise variety.  I don’t love them, but I think their music is really interesting.  I thought they’d be fun to see live once.

But we had a family emergency and it wasn’t time to go to a show.  So, I didn’t really mind missing this one. (more…)

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