Concert Review: Tennis @ Underground Arts (November 7, 2013)

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By Shannen Gaffney

Denver based indie pop group Tennis played on November 7th to an intimate and excited crowd at the Underground Arts space in Center City Philadelphia, which opened just last year. If you haven’t been to Underground Arts before, you’re missing out! The coolest new semi-hidden venue in Philly, it’s a small industrial warehouse-type of basement, covered in Christmas lights and art pieces.

They began the set with “Petition,” and played most of the best songs from 2012’s Young & Old: “My Better Self,” “Traveling,” and “It All Feels the Same,” along with some new songs. Their new EP, Small Sound, is a continuation of their cutesy, airy pop sound and has been released on the band’s own label, Communion. Alaina’s signature lush vocals are the focus point of Small Sound. On their single, “Mean Streets,” she sings, “Born and raised on the mean streets / That’s where she learned how to keep the beat”. The rest of the EP is full of similarly playful lyrics and melodies that got the small but energetic crowd dancing all night.

Here are some pictures from the show!

Top Played Artists 10/28/2013 – 11/4/2013

1 OF MONTREAL Lousy With Sylvianbriar
2 DR. DOG B-Room
3 DEER TICK Negativity
4 YUCK Glow And Behold
5 KING KRULE 6 Feet Beneath The Moon
6 PARQUET COURTS Tally All The Things That You Broke [EP]
7 KEVIN DEVINE Bubblegum
8 BELLE AND SEBASTIAN The Third Eye Centre
9 THOSE DARLINS Blur The Line
10 FUZZ Fuzz
11 SLEIGH BELLS Bitter Rivals
12 POLICA Shulamith
13 DALE EARNHARDT JR. JR. The Speed Of Things
14 HAIM Days Are Gone
15 MAN MAN On Oni Pond
16 FRANKIE ROSE Herein Wild
17 PHANTOGRAM Phantogram [EP]
18 THE BLOW The Blow
19 BEST COAST Fade Away
20 UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA Blue Record [EP]
21 CHVRCHES The Bones Of What You Believe
22 HEAD AND THE HEART Let’s Be Still
23 RUBBLEBUCKET Save Charlie [EP]
24 OBITS Bed And Bugs
25 MAZZY STAR Seasons Of Your Day
26 CHELSEA WOLFE Pain Is Beauty
27 DISMEMBERMENT PLAN Uncanney Valley
28 COURTNEY BARNETT The Double EP: A Sea Of Split Peas
29 ALBERT HAMMOND JR. AHJ
30 VOLCANO CHOIR Repave

Dance Sounds From The Underground – Part 1

By Chris Burrell

Untz, untz, untz, untz…

It’s been nearly impossible to ignore the proliferation of dance music in America over the past few years.

For better or worse, the massive commercial success of EDM has elevated the DJ to rock star status and spawned quite a polarizing dialogue about the state of dance music in the US. While some of this success has given America a bad rap in the dance community (re: Paris Hilton, Pauly D, Molly), let us not forget that before EDM was a ubiquitous acronym, Chicago and Detroit birthed house and techno music respectively.

Regardless of your stance on the uptick of neon-clad sunglasses at night fist pumpers, it’s hard to argue that the bright spotlight on dance music has afforded some highly talented artists an avenue to reach a much wider audience than ever before. With now household names such as Fool’s Gold, Mad Decent, Brainfeeder, DFA, and Ghostly having been major innovators in a variety of dance scenes for years, this blog-o-series serves to give a little shine to some lesser-known ‘Merican labels that are seriously holding it down.

From Brooklyn to LA and Detroit to Miami, stay tuned to this space for the 411 on the American dance music underground through the lens of its most excellent labels. The first post in this series highlights two fantastic and extremely diverse vinyl focused labels from the left and right coasts.

Also, check out the Rhythm Method on Thursday nights from 9-11 PM EST to hear some of these releases being spun on the airwaves by yours truly, @CrispyChrisX.

Continue reading “Dance Sounds From The Underground – Part 1”

Concert Review: Godspeed You! Black Emperor (October 16, 2013)

Courtesy of Flickr user Kmeron
Courtesy of Flickr user Kmeron

By Jonathan Plotkin

Let’s just get this out of the way now: I don’t listen to Godspeed You! Black Emperor. My friends have told me all about them and I’ve seen that scene in 28 Days Later that uses one of their songs to show the utter hopelessness of waking up in a post-apocalyptic world. But save for the one time I heard Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven while driving my friend back from New York, I’ve heard more about them then I’ve actually heard them. So when  I saw them on on Wednesday I really had no idea what to expect.

Post rock, much like prog rock, is a genre I’ve always wanted to get into but never got around to doing so, mainly because the songs are so long and dense. That doesn’t stop me from reading about post rock while I should be doing homework though so I have a good idea about what the genre means. I always hear it described as “music for the Apocalypse” or “the soundtrack to the end of the world.” This has colored my opinion of the genre, but it’s more like looking through a foggy window instead of just walking outside and climbing some trees.

Continue reading “Concert Review: Godspeed You! Black Emperor (October 16, 2013)”

Top Played Artists 10/22 – 10/28

1    OF MONTREAL    Lousy With Sylvianbriar
2    DEER TICK    Negativity
3    YUCK    Glow And Behold
4    DR. DOG    B-Room
5    KING KRULE    6 Feet Beneath The Moon
6    PARQUET COURTS    Tally All The Things That You Broke [EP]
7    SLEIGH BELLS    Bitter Rivals
8    FRANKIE ROSE    Herein Wild
9    THOSE DARLINS    Blur The Line
10    KEVIN DEVINE    Bubblegum
11    MAN MAN    On Oni Pond
12    UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA    Blue Record [EP]
13    OBITS    Bed And Bugs
14    FLATLINERS    Dead Language
15    BELLE AND SEBASTIAN    The Third Eye Centre
16    BEST COAST    Fade Away
17    CHVRCHES    The Bones Of What You Believe
18    THE BLOW    The Blow
19    RUBBLEBUCKET    Save Charlie [EP]
20    CHELSEA WOLFE    Pain Is Beauty
21    ELF POWER    Sunlight On The Moon
22    NO AGE    An Object
23    RJD2    More Is Than Isn’t
24    ST. LUCIA    When The Night
25    MGMT    MGMT
26    CRYSTAL STILTS    Nature Noir
27    SUPERCHUNK    I Hate Music
28    TIM KASHER    Adult Film
29    TOUCHE AMORE    Is Survived By
30    WASHED OUT    Paracosm

Surfer Blood talk Halloween costumes, flax crackers, and haunted practice spaces.

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We spoke with Surfer Blood members John Paul Pitts, Thomas Fekte, Tyler Schwarz, and Kevin Williams before their midnight show at the TLA on October 4th. Read below to find out about new obstacles they encountered moving onto a major label, their favorite horror movie, and what they’re thinking of dressing up as for Halloween.

Shannen: How did you guys all meet?

JP: Well, we’re all from the same town; we all grew up there at least. We went to high school there, and we were all playing in bands that were a little bit left of center. We all were sort of aware of each other and what we were doing, and yeah, I mean one day we started recording demos of some of the Surfer Blood songs. It wasn’t really serious and I guess Tom heard it and brought it up to me that he’d like to play guitar.

Shannen: Do you remember what some of those first songs were?

JP: A lot of the songs ended up on Astro Coast, our first record. I don’t think it was ever really supposed to be a proper record or anything, it was just something that we started and I felt really, really compelled to finish. So yeah, some of those songs ended up on the record later.

TF: I think the first song that I had heard was “Fast Jabroni”. That was a really early one that you guys had written.

TS: There are some demos that we’ve never even put out that I have on my computer. Well my laptop was stolen, so I must have lost some of them, but we had some kind of pirate-sounding songs.

Shannen: I think you guys tweeted the other day that you recorded on a Dell. Was that the laptop that got stolen?

TF: Yeah, I tweeted a really ridiculous run-on sentence that was ranting about Macintosh, even though I have nothing against Mac. I was just basically saying you don’t have to have a Mac, and we made a record on a Dell.

JP: There is so much digital noise on that record, though. If you listen closely there are so many parts where it’s just like (makes noise).

Continue reading “Surfer Blood talk Halloween costumes, flax crackers, and haunted practice spaces.”

Top Played Artists 10/14 – 10/22

1    DR. DOG    B-Room
2    DEER TICK    Negativity
3    OF MONTREAL    Lousy With Sylvianbriar
4    UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA    Blue Record [EP]
5    FLATLINERS    Dead Language
6    YUCK    Glow And Behold
7    MAN MAN    On Oni Pond
8    HAIM    Days Are Gone
9    THOSE DARLINS    Blur The Line
10    BELLE AND SEBASTIAN    The Third Eye Centre
11    NO AGE     An Object
12    CHVRCHES    The Bones Of What You Believe
13    SLEIGH BELLS    Bitter Rivals
14    KING KRULE    6 Feet Beneath The Moon
15    RJD2      More Is Than Isn’t
16    OBITS     Bed And Bugs
17    SUPERCHUNK    I Hate Music
18    SEBADOH    Defend Yourself
19    RUBBLEBUCKET    Save Charlie [EP]
20    HUNX AND HIS PUNX    Street Punk
21    DIARRHEA PLANET    I’m Rich Beyond Your Wildest Dream
22    FOOTBALL, ETC.    Audible
23    WASHED OUT    Paracosm
24    MODERAT    II    Mute
25    VOLCANO CHOIR    Repave
26    ISLANDS    Ski Mask
27    PORCELAIN RAFT    Permanent Signal
28    CROCODILES    Crimes Of Passion
29    BEST COAST    Fade Away
30    JAGWAR MA    Howlin’