Category: Concerts

Colleen Green plays the TLA tonight, April 29th! The West Coast songwriter continues to tour in support of her album I Want to Grow Up, one of 2015’s best. She goes on at 7:30PM, so be sure to get there early. Continue reading “Concert Preview: Colleen Green at the TLA on 4/29/2016”

Bob Mould returns to Philadelphia on April 26^th, headlining a mighty double bill that includes punk rock icon Ted Leo. Mould, former frontman of Sugar and the legendary Hüsker Dü, has shaped an equally formidable solo career. Continue reading “Concert Preview: Bob Mould and Ted Leo at Underground Arts on April 26th”

Thao and the Get Down Stay Down bring their sunny, folk-tinged pop to Underground Arts on Saturday, April 16th, headlining a great bill that includes Saintseneca and Little Scream. They recently released what may be their best album yet, A Man Alive. The album was produced by Merril Garbus of tUnE-yArDs, and it bubbles over with positive energy. While it’s hard not to snap along to the rhythm of songs like “The Evening” and lead single “Nobody Dies”, Thao and the gang maintains their unique idiosyncrasies. Even the slower songs keep you looking up, as Thao Nguyen’s voice and songwriting shine.  A Man Alive is a perfect album to welcome in spring. Continue reading “Concert Preview: Thao and the Get Down Stay Down at Underground Arts on Saturday, April 16th”

— by Ian Norris

Your favorite experimental Baltimoreans since Zappa are back in action with some unlikely guests. Excluding Deakin (Josh Dibb aka the Deakmeister), who has been busy polishing his Kickstarter-funded solo debut scheduled to come out later this year, Animal Collective’s Avey Tare (Daniel Portner), Panda Bear (Noah Lennox), and Geologist (Brian Weitz) have teamed up with Wiki, Hak, and producer Sporting Life of New York’s hip-hop outfit RATKING to embark on a world tour in support of their forthcoming album Painting With. Fortunately for us, Union Transfer is the first stop of the tour; unfortunately, the groups’ odd allegiance has generated much attention, causing most U.S. dates to sell out immediately, and with good reason.

AnCo has come a long way since its formative years in Baltimore County, honing its fusion of ambient, psychedelic, and folk, equally influenced by krautrock and horror movies. With all members of the collective having solidified their respective stylings of electronic, from Panda Bear’s critically-acclaimed Person Pitch and Avey Tare’s inventive Slasher Flicks, the good ol’ gang is back, in more ways than one. With its newest single “FloriDada,” Animal Collective has returned to its more organic, percussive, freak-folk roots that it nearly perfected in its albums Feels. Channeling the left-field pop of Merriweather Post Pavilion, vivid colors of Strawberry Jam, and the cacophonous textures of Sung Tongs, the neo-psychedelic outfit has hybridized its past influences into a newly improved brand of accessible, highly melodic, and quasi-danceable pop that we have grown to love. And it’s damn well better than Centipede Hz. Painting With will be released by Domino Records on the day of the show, February 19th.

RATKING isn’t as much of a wild card for the tour roster as some might think; in fact, it makes a good deal of sense with AnCo’s great influence of the hip-hop group’s atmospheric, wall-of sound sampling, and cerebral lyricism, as well as their collaboration with Avey Tare’s former noise project Black Dice. As grimy and abrasive as RATKING’s name suggests, referring to a cluster of diseased rats being tied together by the tails, their music weaves stories and images of the decrepit lows of passion. Making their XL label debut with 2014’s So It Goes, the trio has blown up among the underground rap community, including features with King Krule (Archy Marshall) and tour dates with Death Grips. Their live sets often include motion pictures of gory violence and social alienation, similar to that of Godspeed You! Black Emperor; although, Wiki “One Brow” will typically bludgeon himself in the head with his microphone simultaneously. To put these guys’ talent and ridiculousness into perspective, I have a friend driving up from Northwest Indiana to Philadelphia, an eleven-and-a-half hour drive, just to see RATKING with me. Don’t you dare miss it.

As WKDU’s resident jazz weirdo (at least until Marcel—er, the Night Fly, returns from his Southern Californian sabbatical), I feel some responsibility to keep the fine followers of WKDU abreast of Philadelphia’s jazz goings on. Fortunately, Ars Nova Workshop, longtime supporters of some of the best jazz and improvised music Philadelphia has to offer, recently announced a couple of killer shows for the month of January: the Tomeka Reid Quartet this Thursday, January 7 at the Art Alliance, and Nels Cline/Larry Ochs/Gerald Cleaver Trio at Boot & Saddle on January 15.

Continue reading “Concert Preview: Ars Nova Workshop, January 2016”