New Music, Emerging from your Local Scene
Go see Nashville’s Luke And The Late Nights this Friday, April 23rd at The Basement. As a part of Chicken Ranch Records Nite, LATLN will be opening for bands The Clutters, We Were the States, and Tiger! Tiger!.
This is not a show to be fashionably late to, friends. Be there by 9pm! $5. –Mackenzie Grosser
The Art of Shooting – besides having a friggin’ awesome name – are a trio from Brooklyn that plays a mixture of noise rock, alt folk and psych rock. Tense, moody, often dimly lit, these guys’ songs reserve surprisingly noisy turns, alternated with moments full of tenderness and emotion, making it a consistent source of catharsis from the struggles of life – which are the core of lead singer Kelly Irene Corson’s lyrics. Don’t miss their CD release party at Pianos on April 27.
Austin’s own DJ Car Stereo (Wars) is bringing out his second full length, Explains It All, at the Beauty Bar tomorrow night (Friday 4/23). Free hand-decorated copies go out to all attendees, plus those arriving early will be treated to gratis beer and vodka. Neiliyo and Hot Britches! will also be performing sets after everyone’s good and loose.
Three of Brooklyn’s most inventive experimental ensembles — Little Women (in the picture), Abacus and the Suite Unraveling — will celebrate the emergence of new music with a triple album release party at Bruar Falls. Suffused with over driven electric guitars, squonking horns, pounding drums, and a ferocious and provocative live show, the three groups are bound not so much by their unity of sound as they are by the ferocity with which they strive to transcend the boundaries of genre and style. On April 29 at Bruar Falls, these bands come together not just as a gesture of mutual support, but as a statement of community in the face of a continually fragmenting sonic world. In order of appearance, the night will feature Abacus, the Suite Unraveling, and Little Women. Each group will perform a 50-minute set of original music. Special guest artists Strong Look will open the evening with a 30-minute set at 8pm. Bruar Falls is located at 245 Grand St. Williamsburg Brooklyn. The show is 21+ and free. – (as posted in The Deli’s Open Blog – post your band’s entries, videos, and Mp3s here).
One of the latest releases to come from the Sacred Bones 12” series is the new ep from Daily Void entitled Eclipse of 1453 EP. The music of Daily Void has always been raw and primal and this ep is not exception. The band reaches into the darkest elements of punk and then punches you right in the jaw.
Daily Void celebrates the release of their ep on April 24th at Empty Bottle with The Styrenes and John Bellows.
Dirty Mittens will be giving away a handmade, limited run (100), three-song demo from the album they’re working on at Mississippi Studios on Friday.
"We’re super excited about this album," said guitarist Ben Moral. "It’s been in the works since last summer, and we’re still working on mixing it. Jim Brunberg of Mississippi Studios is generously contributing his time to the effort."
The band is also stoked (and you should be too) on these awesome V.I.P. cards they will be handing out at the show. The idea is basically like when you go to a coffee shop and get a bunch of macchiatos and then they give you one for free. Except instead of macchiatos, it’s shows. A buddy of theirs who runs the site ibrontosaurus.com designed and illustrated these really amazing punch cards, and if you come to five shows and get it punched, they’ll give you something free.
"We didn’t really want to limit this to one particular thing, you know, so we’re just saying ‘we’ll hook you up’ – which could mean a free show, shirt, CD, or even something crazy like coming to practice and swilling some brews with us, or having us take you out to dinner, or whatever," explained Moral. "We just want to say thanks to those folks who come out to our shows all the time."
This idea came about because of a confluence of events the band is calling Mittenstastrophe 2k10. This weekend, there will be three (3) chances to get a punch: Mississippi Studios Friday night, Aladdin Theater on Saturday during the day, then Saturday evening at the Willamette Week‘s Eat Mobile event. Is there a better way to spend this almost summer weekend?
Check out some of the demo tracks here.
– Shuggypop
La Strada, recently winners of the Deli’s “Band of the Month” poll, will be celebrating the release of their album, “New Home,” at the stunning new Knitting Factory in Williamsburg on April 30. These six Brooklynites have come together to produce the richness of a small orchestra with a bounty of instrumental variety. Highlight tracks, such as delicate and melodious “My New Home,” lively and shuffling “Wash on By,” and tender and peaceful “Julia,” intermingle airy strings, beaming horns, dizzying accordion lines, and chiming glockenspiel and triangle embellishments, with high-flying vocals and tricky rhythms. “New Home” was released on April 20, the first date of La Strada’s two week Spring tour. It would be a wise decision to take the band up on what they propose: “La Strada wants to marry you! Please say, "I do.’" – Meijin Bruttomesso
A new electronica act with a cleverly celestial nome de guerre and a handful of digital tracks, Spesus Christ comes home… well, the Oakland/Portland-based trio returns to Portland from their other Bay Area locale for a "homecoming" show this Saturday at "what used to be the Funky Church on Tamarack (just north of Division)," according to producer/mixer Cameron Spies.
Filling out the bill are the seriously jamming synth-pop duo Adventures! With Might, electro-ambient Soap Collectors (which also features Spesus Christ’s Lizzy Ellison), stomach-friendly folk from Leviticus Appleton, and mournful beatmasters Your Canvas.
Behind the moans and machines, Spesus Christ pulsates an unclassifiable twinkling and tapping of beats with stream of consciousness raps. Right Cameron?
"Our sound is a mixture of analog and electronic instrumentation. It includes elements of down-tempo hip-hop, rock music, indie, and smatterings of about everything else we like listening to. It’s sort of problematic to try to describe our music using genre titles like we’ve just done, so I suggest that you just listen to our stuff."
Take the man’s advice and download the simplistically titled yet multitudinously layered EP 1. Evolving so rapidly, their concert poster can’t even keep up with them – the $2 cover has been nixed, the show is donation-based.
And gushing with new material, Cameron says, "We are planning to release an EP every month for the next six."
But until the first is mixed (possibly by next week!), Soap Collectors also celebrate a tape release but remind you that "Soap Collectors are people who gather together varieties of soap and compulsively log and organize them into neat piles."
Save me Spesus.
– Chris Young
Do Division Fest has announced their 2010 line-up and it’s a solid one. This two day event will feature Chicago bands including The Hood Internet, Pelican, The Ponys, CoCoComas, Bailiff, Rego, Soft Speaker The Poison Arrows, Headlights, and more. The out-of-towners include YACHT, Warpaint, Earl Greyhound, and Maritime, among others.
The Do Division Fest takes place on June 5th and 6th (on Division Street from Ashland to Leavitt), and for the full line-up you can visit their website.
We continue our "Best of NYC Countdown", covering every day one of the artists that made our Year End Best of NYC list (a chart compiled by a jury comprised of local bloggers, music writers, promoters, record sotre personnel and DJs). Many of the bands in this list will play The Deli’s Best of NYC Fest in Williamsburg in May (6 shows in 3 different venues between the 13 and the 15).
Not all power trios are fast paced and noisy: many El Jezel‘s songs take their time to build, through atmospheric instrumental intros, sparse sonic brushes of effected guitars and whispered vocals. The result is some kind of Post Rock that’s ready to explode into memorable melodic and/or noisy, shoegazy openings . The project sparked when George and Dan randomly met at house parties in Massachusetts years back and discovered that they actually only lived a town away from each other. Both eventually linked up with Jessica about ten years ago, which led to playing open mic sessions in downtown Manhattan and ultimately the three formed a band. Recently performing along the East Coast, El Jezel brews bigger plans for its new EP, due to be released in the next few months. – Gina Alioto
There are only two steps you must follow upon reading this sentence. Firstly, watch the video up there ^. Secondly, go see Open Hand in the flesh on the 24th at Origami Vinyl Record Shop in Echo Park. Begin!
Deep Elm Records recently released a massive 18-song free sampler called We Dream Alone. The digital album includes a track from Nathan Xander’s 2009 release The Fear called “Trial By Fire”. Nathan has since joined forces with Witchouse to form Nathan Xander & Witchouse. The above video also comes from The Fear and was released back in October.