NYC

Interview with 16 Large: DC Deli’s Band of the Month (November)

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DC electro rock duo 16 Large are more than just a genre-bending producer of dance beats. They are an ever evolving sound machine that have collectively been rocking the scene in some form or another for nearly 20 years. This alone wasn’t the only reason that they skyrocketed to the top of last month’s Band of the Month poll. With a successful self-release, music video, performances at 9:30 Club, and WHFS Battle of the Bands final placement- their resume of rock continues to grow. So we caught up with Trevor Krainik (Vocals, Synths) and Allen McDaniel (Synths, Drums, Programming) to find out more. Here they tell us about influential siblings, DC’s dancefloor revival, and their upcoming new tracks. Now on to the interview…

Their debut EP Self released in April, is available for free download on their website right now! Check out the video for "Make Me Crazy" from the album below.

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NYC

Bryan John Appleby to Tour the West

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After months of instrumental experimentation in a Ballard warehouse, indie bard Bryan John Appleby re-emerged with a host of emotive narratives, disguised as four-minute folk songs. Fire on the Vine, Appleby’s first full-length album, was released over two years after he first turned heads with the six-song EP Shoes for Men and Beasts in 2009. Using everything from conventional instruments to housewares, the songwriter creates a unified soundscape with a clarity that belies its complexity. Appleby’s delicate yet resonant voice drifts over carefully constructed guitar melodies, giving life to lyrics that suggest a restlessness only assuaged – or at least pacified – by the road. The culmination of that musical exploration is an album that should solidify his place in the region’s field of folkies.

Appleby will kick off a west coast tour in the new year, after an appearance at the Seattle Folk Festival on Dec. 10.

December 10 Seattle Folk Festival Seattle, WA

January 12 Neumo’s Crystal Ball Seattle, WA Reading Room

January 13 Doug Fir Lounge Portland, OR

January 15 Moe’s Alley Santa Cruz, CA

January 17 Slo Brew (all Ages) San Luis Obispo, CA

January 18 Bootleg Theater Los Angeles, CA

January 20 Mia’s Lounge Flagstaff, AZ

February 17 Neptune Theater Seattle, WA

 -Kate Shepherd

Glory – Bryan John Appleby – Produced/Engineered by Alan Matley

NYC

Weekly Feature: North Highlands play Glasslands on 12.15

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The palette that North Highlands paints on Wild One mostly resides on a muted spectrum with flights of bright colors. The record feels like the soundtrack to the slight transition period between summer and fall as the last embers of the warm season burn and give way to brisk, chilled days, but the songs have sprung from another type of shift – the growing pains of post-college life. The songs exude a youthful vivacity but also inherit an uncontainable restlessness. – Our writer Nancy Chow interviewed the band’s front woman Brenda Malvini, read the feature here or on the pdf file of our latest print issue here.

NYC

Dude York Release Third Album

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November 30 saw garage pop trio Dude York release their third album in as many months. Dewark follows on the heels of the four-track-deep Satanic vs., and delivers much of the same raw, pulsating energy offered by its predecessor. Grounded by the propulsive opening track “Fuck City”, the album’s six songs bring to mind surf rockers without a sunny beach, instead confined to an echoing garage. Crunchy guitars and elastic, thrumming bass lines recall fellow west coast denizen Ty Segall’s lo-fi surf-twang. Dewark’s penultimate track, “Comics” is a pop-rock hymn, with fuzzy, organ-like guitars leading into the finale, “Comix”, an ode to the paperback bible of the American youth. Still, Dude York denies any nostalgic sentiment: “we’re through with 2011, see you in the future.” The upbeat noisemakers are set to close out the year at the Funhouse on Dec. 30.

 -Kate Shepherd

NYC

Weekly Feature: Car on The Moon plays Union Hall on 12.14

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The musical landscape of Car on the Moon is breezy, soulful and stripped down. Somewhere in the center of a Venn diagram of blues, folk, Americana, chamber pop, and singer-songwriter-acoustic, you’d find the sounds that most clearly captivate Elias and his partner-in-crime/percussionist Danny Festa. With Orling’s carefully parsed melodies, and Fest’s understated playing, the songs have a quiet reverence about them, but with enough drive and instrumental diversity (banjos, ukuleles, all the percussion instruments that can fit in a barn in upstate NY) to keep the party going. – Read Charlie Davis’ interview with the band here. The band will be playing Union Hall on December 14.

Chicago

Soft Speaker @ Empty Bottle

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Back on November 8th Soft Speaker released their second full-length album Vortobos. The album, which features a cover by one of my favorite local artists Jason Brammer, is a nice step forward for rock band. It is filled solid guitar riffs, well-crafted tales, and solid production. You can hear the band discuss the album on Vocalo’s MusicVox here.

You can catch Soft Speaker with Crystal Stilts and Hollow tomorrow night, Dec. 2nd, at Empty Bottle.

(He Wore A) Lion’s Hide by SOFT SPEAKER

Chicago

Hemmingbirds @ Subt

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Hemmingbirds released a new video this week for their track "Mellow Gold Haze" and they are performing tonight, Dec. 1st, at Subt with Glittermouse, Sleep Kitty, and Mutts. "Mellow Gold Haze" is the first single off the album "Death Wave".

San Francisco

Experimental Groundbreakers Seventeen Evergreen Release New Video

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If you like thrift stores and battles, then today is your lucky day! San Francisco experimental duo Seventeen Evergreen is back with a new, totally tripped out (and therefore amazing) video for their latest single “Polarity Song.”

The track will be featured on a new EP Psychiatrist, out 12/16 via Lucky Numbers. Expect a full-length album in February 2012.

–Amanda Dissinger

Seventeen Evergreen – Polarity Song from Lucky Number Music on Vimeo.

Philadelphia

The Deli Philly’s December Album of the Month: Anchor – On the Water

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“A folk collective of oddballs, loons and hooligans via West Philadelphia” – that’s the description that appears on the Bandcamp page of On the Water. Originally, the solo side project of Fletcher VanVliet, the frontman for weirdo avante-rock outfit Da Comrade! and Chernobyl Collective conspirator, has amassed members from other artistic walks of life and local music acts like TJ Kong and the Atomic Bomb, Ghost Light, etc. to expand to a full-blown eight-piece tour de force with VanVliet (acoustic guitar and vocals), Dan Martino (accordion and vocals), Morgan Jamison (toy piano and vocals), Barrett Lindgren (drums), Stephen Landis (violin), Robin Carine (electric guitar and vocals), Taylor Jamison (bass), and Sean Cox (banjo). 
 
On their latest release Anchor, the folk outfit chose to record all the album’s tracks live at Sex Dungeon Studios capturing the warmth and vibrant energy that you might experience from their live performances. “Goldfish” opens the EP with gentle acoustic guitar strums that morph into a unified sonic outburst before VanVliet’s raspy, slightly eerie storytelling voice states – “I woke from a dream just now where all just seemed just so” – as Landis’ violin adds old world mystery to the story. You find the protagonist of the tale battling with his own demons in his “dream world” – a place often linked to joy and escapism, but not for the song’s main character. “Some unseen torrent is punishing me. I’ve grown to love this burden, the thrill of drowning in the change.” He struggles to “put everything into its right place” though “everything is as it should be.” Coupled with the steady marching instrumentation of Lindgren’s bass drum joined by the tinklings of the toy piano, succinct plucks of the banjo, and long, languid strokes of the violin, the dream moves towards the light and hope where he knows that his love is out there just waiting for him to wake. “Goldfish” is filled with breathtaking imagery which culminates with a sing-along and a spiritual awakening on the imaginary open waters. Bravo – what an intense journey On the Water has taken us on the EP’s opening track! The band follows it up with the bluegrass-tinged, upbeat road-weary “An Elephant Memory” that plays out like a Kerouacian travelogue. “We were searching desperately for something, anything and now you’re back on the west coast, that’s where you belonged after all…So it was me and my buddy loose on the streets, we were kids again and it felt like the very first time I’d bled. Getting lost every night, too fucked up, I was blind as I watched a good friend dying.” The next track “Cat” is a swaying, lonely, touching description about a man in bed with his furry friend which honestly could very well be mistaken or actually be about a lover (now, get your mind out of the gutter). It jams and shifts into hoedown mode with a piece called “Patience” and its anthemic closing line “we are free in the most wonderful of ways.” The band keeps us buried in the Deep South as VanVliet changes his vocal inflection mimicking a hillbilly drawl in the peculiarly titled track “I’m a Boy Made of Atoms.” The album closes out with the song “Farmhouse,” but unlike the album’s opener “Goldfish” where the protagonist is asleep and knows that his love is waiting for him in the “real world.” In “Farmhouse,” he is wide awake, and it’s only in his “dream world” where he can have that love he once possessed back again. “If I can rest my head in memories, I can let myself begin again. So why can’t we let ourselves begin again?”  
 
Besides the wonderful lyrics (which I have shared plenty of them with you) and simply stellar songwriting, what stands out most to me making Anchor a beautiful piece of artwork is the chemistry that can be felt through each performance of the songs. But what may explain the somewhat intangible chemistry that I am referring to best strangely enough for me has nothing to do with the performances of the music. It’s the humorous intro of the closing track “Farmhouse” that captures the “oddball” comfortable nature of a band that truly enjoys being together and playing with each other. That’s the x-factor that you will not most likely find from any Craigslist ad or television contest making the album a must have for eccentric folk music lovers.
 
You can listen to and purchase On the Water’s Anchor EP HERE. They will also be performing this Sunday at Kung Fu Necktie with Pearl & the Beard and Auctioneer. – Q.D. Tran
 

NYC

From the NYC Open Blog: The Archive play Pianos on 12.18.

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Formed in NYC in 2010, after playing a handful of well-received shows at Mercury Lounge, The Cake Shop, and Cameo Gallery, droney and somewhat emotional indie rockers The Archive headed to Chinatown’s Mavericks Studio this spring to record their debut album. Working with producer Bobby Lurie (The Billy Nayer Show), engineer Allen Farmelo (Talk Normal, Glenn Kotche), and mixer Karl Derfler (Tom Waits, No Doubt, Roky Erickson). The song “Disarm” (streaming below) is a taste of The Archive’s debut record, expected to be released early next year. The band will be playing Pianos on December 18 with Oh My Blackbird, The Ravages and The End Men. – (as posted in The Deli’s Open Blog – post your band’s entries, videos, and Mp3s here). The Deli’s NYC Open Blog is powered by The Music Building and APS Mastering.

L.A.

Princeton announces new album and Bootleg residency

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You can only name your band after a prestigious university if you make smart choices, and that’s precisely what LA based band Princeton does. Led by the identical twin team of Matt and Jesse Kivel, Princeton is set to release their sophomore effort Remembrance of Things To Come in February of next year. "To The Alps," a song available to listen to on their Facebook page off the new album, alone contains layered drums, xylophone synths and a plodding bassline along with one (or both?) of the brothers’ baritone voice ringing clearly over the top. It’s lush pop that never feels too heavy in its execution or delivery. For this album, the brothers teamed up with the seven-piece Los Angeles New Music Ensemble to help create the orchestral feeling of the album. They combine a love for classical composition and electronic dance music that fuses together seamlessly. It’s looking to be an expansive work that should not be missed. Remembrance of Things To Come will be available on February 21, 2012 on Hit City. Also, they’ll be playing a Monday night residency at the Bootleg Bar in January starting on the 2nd of the month. – Taylor Lampela