Lady-led and glamorous Brooklyn troupe, Mother Feather (who placed at #78 in our 2011 Year End Poll for emerging NYC artists), will be flocking to Santos Party House with fellow female-infused groups, dance-party rock duo, Hank and Cupcakes, exotic indie poppers, My Pet Dragon, and electro-quartet Dolchnakov Brigade on Wednesday, March 28. This past fall, Mother Feather let a four-track EP fly, highlighting flight motifs and their spirited, bouncy, charismatic, and danceable sonic personality. Rustle your feathers and migrate downtown to Santos to catch the spunky, invigorating, and visually stimulating line-up starting at 7pm. The show is 18+. – Meijin Bruttomesso – photo by Steven M. Meyer
Keeping in tradition with their previous releases, The Debutante Hour showcases upbeat and fun songs inspired to the roots of American music on their new release “An Awkward Time with The Debutante Hour”. "Doo Wop Girl", (streaming below) is propelled by uptempo hand claps and features the band’s signature imaginative harmonizations, while “M. Bovary” stands out for its raw truth and emotion, portrayed by the simple background melody and the blatant lyrics. There are plenty of other gems including “A Book You’ll Never Read” that brings history, delicate vocals and jolting melodies together in one successful package. The band will be playing their last NYC show until the fall at Union Hall on March 30th. – Christine Cauthen (Photo by shhanalog)
La Sera is the solo project of Vivian Girls’ Katy Goodman. The material in her sophomore record "Sees The Light" almost completely abandons the previous lo-fi psychedelic aesthetics, but still finds inspiration in the pop sound of the 50s and 60s, which permeated the artist’s output both in her band and previous solo effort. The record seems to thrive on slower tempo tracks like the opener "Love That’s Gone", and when the distorted guitars appear – like in "Please Be My Third Eye" and the Smitheque "Break My Heart" (streaming below) – they feature a sound that’s more Ween than The Jesus & Mary Chain. La Sera just premiered this double video for "Real Boy" and "Drive on," definitely two of the best tracks on the record. California based fans will be able to see Katy live at Mammoth Lakes, with Neon Indian.
NYC based three piece New Myths weave electronic dance elements with fuzzy psychedelic guitars, cinematic drumbeats, melodic strings, and haunting melody lines. This all female electro-dream-pop outfit is the project of drummer Rosie Glassman, bassist Marina Ross, and singer/guitarist Britney Boras (of Brit and the Cavalry fame). They went to grade school and jazz school together, and then found each other again, years later, in the NYC music scene. New Myths have released their debut self-titled EP on March 11. – (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.
Backwords is like the beginning of spring, a cool breeze blowing as blossoms that had been lying dormant finally begin to poke their heads above ground. Smooth and airy, with a small amount of grit, this band manages to be both catchy and buzzy without being overwhelmingly poppy or shoegazy (a difficult line to walk). Think The Microphones with a splash of Best Coast. And, like the beginning of spring, backwords is back. Fresh off sxsw, the band delivers their new CD "By the Neck" at an album release party at Glasslands on Monday, March 26th. If you miss that, there are both Manhattan and Brooklyn shows in the future, so it looks like they’ll be sticking around for a while. Hopefully the same can be said for spring. – allison levin
Coming up on April 28, New York/Brooklyn’s The Split will hit Arlene’s Grocery with their pop meets beat meets garage rock sound. Exactly five months ago, the quartet released their self-titled album, which features laid back vocals, peppy drumbeats, and upbeat melodies. Album highlights are feel-good fun track, “Here Before We’re Gone,” punky “Tell Me What You Want,” and closer, bassy 60’s- esque jam, “Nobody But You.” Find The Split’s album on Bandcamp and finish off April with them at Arlene’s! – Meijin Bruttomesso
Fronted by operatically trained singer Sarah Kinlaw, SoftSpot has an echo of delicateness and ingenuity. Kinlaw and her longtime multi-instrumentalist bandmate Bryan Keller have known each other since kindergarten, but only started making music together in the past few. The longtime friends were recently joined by artist drummer (and ex Deli writer) Andrew Spaulding, who has helped nail down both their look and their sound to make them a burgeoning an art-rock force, as the experimental trio of Bushwick Brooklyn combines pop drones over earnest, pulsating melodies. SoftSpot will be hitting up the East Coast this spring, and will stop by the Cameo Gallery on April 6. – Devon Antonetti
New York residents by way of Sydney, WIM offers piano driven melodic rock featuring controlled guitars, delicate arrangements and big rich choruses sung in harmony. Released in November, the band’s self titled debut album is hauntingly pretty and occasionally also punchy and fun. WIM just wrapped up four shows at SXSW and is now back in the Big Apple for an April residency at Pianos. The first of these shows is slated for Thursday, April 12th. In May, WIM will be jetting off to the UK to play the Great Escape Festival. – Corinne Bagish
The Guggenheim has a unique history of pairing independent-minded musicians with touring exhibitions. From 2009’s ‘It Came from Brooklyn,’ to Matthew Barney’s Cremaster Cycle freakout, the results have been mixed, but the institution has always embraced visual/aural experimentation as few museums have. But with John Chamberlain’s work taking over the rotunda for the next couple months, the museum is practically begging for musical accompaniment. In his first show since his death late last year, Manhattan artist John Chamberlain will have his colossal structures dominate the museum until May 13 in the expansive collection, John Chamberlain: Choices.
His brand of three-dimensional abstraction re-assembled the detritus of American consumerism into a Frankenstein of metal and chrome. No matter the scale of these pieces, Chamberlain always worked in enormous proportions. And the same can be said of the four musicians chosen to perform among the artist’s assemblage over the next two months.
Beginning with Portland’s Grouper and NYC’s Julianna Barwick (pictured) playing together on Fri, April 13, the museum is matching soundtrack to exhibition with Divine Ricochet. The vastness of Liz Harris’s soundscapes, coupled with Barwick’s orchestrally looped vocal arrangements, could very well cause these sculptures to float into space if things get too otherworldly. But assuming gravity has it’s way, make sure to also check out Cold Cave’s lush synth pop later next month on April 27, followed by the hypnotic Zola Jesus, when she collaborates with composer JG Thirlwell on May 10.
John Chamberlain’s maxim was always: “It’s all in the fit.” So I’ll be looking forward to seeing (and hearing) what you get when you take a loop machine and wrap its sound around auto parts. – Mike Levine (@Goldnuggets)
Birthed from Bushwick ugly warehouses and decadent weekends is a Brooklyn-based quartet called Jangula. Their new EP "Strange Child" (streaming below) takes some of those debaucherous nights and combines them with a utopian vibe that together bring to mind a post-apocalyptic Shangri-La. Their music has been described as "Beach Boys meets Joy Division" and more recently, The New Yorker compared them to the post punk UK pioneers The Monochrome Set. They are celebrating their album release at The Studio at Webster Hall on Friday, March 23rd. Get your free download of the album here and go debauch yourself you decadent thing! – Read Amanda Dissinger’s interview with the band here.
Recent Deli Artist of the Month nominees Dead Stars bring the sound of the 90s back with gusto – their grainy but extremely melodic power-trio-rock will tickle the sonic appetite of fans of early Foo Fighters. The band is premeiering the video for the single "I get By" below, and playing live at Bowery Electric tomorrow (03.23) for the anniversary party of the SoundDessert Blog. Also on the bill Cold Blood Club and Tatiana Kochkareva.
Let’s not forget why we go to shows in the first place…. we are hoping to witness an event! Late Guest at the Party are exactly that. Their music is catchy, unadorned… it’s britpop sent back to us from wherever it’s been hiding for all this time – and it’s been gone way too long. Listen to the floor-shaking bounce of ‘Icebergs’ (streaming below) or to the clave-happy rhythms of ‘Electric Bongos’ (bizarre video here). The band has distilled the pop formula to a confectionary sweetness: this is music that does exactly what it’s supposed to, it delivers the show. Don’t be late at their Pianos’ party on march 23. – Mike Levine @goldnuggets
