Posts Tagged ‘Philadelphia’

HURRY – ” Fascination “

Posted: June 2, 2017 in MUSIC
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Philly band Hurry’s new LP is pure power pop in the vein of the Posies and Matthew Sweet, revealing a band that is serious about its frivolity. When Hurry expanded to a trio for 2014’s Everything/Nothing, there were two ways to view Matt Scottoline’s formerly solo project. One: a solid Philadelphia band making fuzzy, mid-fi indie rock. The other was as an offshoot of Everyone Everywhere, who released two of the first truly outstanding albums

Hurry’s third LP “Guided Meditation” sounds like a credibility bid for Scottoline’s fledgling new band. The cover might be a Brian Eno homage, but there is no magical “Enoxification” happening here. Scottoline’s vocals aren’t subject to the same fuzz as the guitars. And there you go: Hurry decided they’re really a power-pop band at heart, not indie rock.

Regardless of how much Scottoline’s beloved Yo La Tengo or Guided By Voices influenced the writing of Guided Meditation, this is more in the lineage of the Posies and Matthew Sweet, acts who would’ve been considered pure pop had they existed in a different decade or just simply sold more records. And like them, Scottoline writes from a position of weakness, of being “dumb and in love” and not always both at the same time: he’s incapable of handling life due to the prospect of a new crush on “Fascination” (“overthink and overplan imagining you hold my hand”), uses relationships as a shield from life’s responsibilities (“Under Her Thumb”), retreats the moment those responsibilities start piling up (“Nothing to Say”) and ends Guided Meditation wishing for a kind of zen existence that requires nothing out of him (“I Wanna Be You”).

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Hurry doesn’t overcomplicate things musically—they abide by the Weezer Method that states all vocal melodies should sound good as guitar leads and that instant gratification can be replicable gratification. Hurry are capable of expanse and modest grandeur, though like Everyone Everywhere, they find a kind of psychedelia in everyday fatigue—“Love is Elusive” cruises through six-and-a-half minutes of flanger clouds towards a sunburst of layered harmonies and “Nothing to Say” feels like companion piece to Everyone Everywhere’s definitive “I Feel Exhausted” if cubicle-bound anxiety was traded for a three-beer daze at happy hour.

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ALEX G (SANDY ) – ” Rocket “

Posted: May 11, 2017 in MUSIC
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Alex Giannascoli has been killing it since race and he has remained my favorite musician, lyricist, and overall artist for the past 2 years. Seeing him evolve off of his idiosyncratic sound and add onto it with more layers of experimentation and character is phenomenal. ive been waiting for this album for a long time

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“Rocket” is Philadelphia-based artist Alex G’s eighth full-length release—an assured statement that follows a slate of humble masterpieces, many of them self-recorded and self-released, stretching from 2010’s RACE to his 2015 Domino debut, Beach Music.

Amid the Rocket recording process, Alex G made headlines for catching the attention of Frank Ocean, who asked him to play guitar on his two 2016 albums, Endless and Blonde. More than any stylistic cues, what Alex took from the experience was a newfound confidence in collaboration. Rocket wears this collaborative spirit proudly, and in its numerous contributors presents a restless sense of musical experimentation – effortlessly jumping from distorted sound collage to dreamy folk music to bouncing Americana.

Rocket illustrates a cohesive vision of contemporary American experience; the cast of characters that Alex G inhabits have fun, fall in love, develop obsessions, get in trouble, and—much like rockets themselves—ultimately they burn out. Alex, though, in a collection of songs that’s both his tightest and most adventurous, is poised only for the ascent.

releases May 19th, 2017

SHEER MAG – ” Need to Feel Your Love “

Posted: May 10, 2017 in MUSIC
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Beyond the noxious haze of our national nightmare – as structures of social justice and global progress topple in our midst – there lies a faint but undeniable glow in the distance.
Like so many before us we are drawn to the beacon. But only by the bootstraps of our indignation do we go so boldly into the dark to find it.
And so SHEER MAG has let the sparks fly since their outset, with an axe to grind against all that clouds the way. A caustic war cry, seething in solidarity with all those that suffer the brunt of ignorance and injustice in an imbalanced system.
Both brazen and discrete, loud yet precise, familiar but never quite like this – SHEER MAG crept up from Philadelphia cloaked in bold insignia to channel our social and political moment with grit and groove. Cautious but full of purpose.
By making a music both painfully urgent and spiritually timeworn, SHEER MAG speak to a modern pain: to a people that too feel their flame on the verge of being extinguished, yet choose to burn a bit brighter in spite of that threat.

With their debut LP, the cloak has been lifted. It is time to reclaim something that has been taken from us. Here the band rolls up their sleeves, takes to the streets, and demands recompense for a tradition of inequity that’s poisoned our world.
However, it is in our ability to love – our primal human right to give and receive love – that the damage of such toxicity is newly explored.  Love is a choice we make. We ought not obscure, neglect, or deny that choice.
Through the tumult and the pain, the camaraderie and the cause, the band continues to burn a path into that great beyond.  But where are we headed?

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On NEED TO FEEL YOUR LOVE, they makes their first full-length declaration of light seen just beyond our darkness. Spoken plainly, without shame:
This – is Sheer Mag.

SHEER MAG – ” The First Three EP’s “

Posted: May 10, 2017 in MUSIC
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Sheer Mag is a rock band from Philadelphia formed in 2014. A combination of 1970s rock and punk ethos, the band continued to gather attention and has released three 7-inch singles.
This tape is their mini discography combining all of their works (their first three EPs).

Their first EP was released by WILSUNS RC on September 2014, and the second EP called “II” was released by WILSUNS RC & KATORGA WORKS on April, 2015. Their latest EP called “III” was released by WILSUNS RC & STATIC SHOCK RECORDS on March 2016.

This tape is release with the permission by the band members.

released November 30th, 2016

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PALM – ” Walkie Talkie “

Posted: April 28, 2017 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Palm does not write music for passive listening. Out of jagged edges and complex, interlocking pieces, the Philadelphia quartet makes off-kilter art rock that demands — and rewards your full attention. Guitarists and singers Eve Alpert and Kasra Kurt write deeply intertwined melodies that seem to bounce off each other with razor-sharp precision; Gerasimos Livitanos‘ twitchy, punctuated bass lines mesh with Hugo Stanley’s hectic, forceful drumming. The overall effect of cohesion is transfixing. It’s immediately evident during a live performance: Often, the band hits on a groove onstage that seems to rely on a law of physics from another planet.

Palm’s 2015 debut album, Trading Basics, sounds like Spirit They’ve Gone-era Avery Tare made by riff-writing math majors. Experimental but precise, curious but composed, the songs feel put together like a Jackson Pollock jigsaw puzzle. Palm’s forthcoming EP, Shadow Expert, hones this sound. Shadow Expert is just as complex, but draws from the band’s sunnier side; the songs are slightly punchier and brighter.

“Walkie Talkie,” the first single from Shadow Expert, is breakneck and bouncy. It’s aptly named: Throughout the track, Kurt’s and Alpert’s guitars alternate in quick, janky riffs, their voices often echoing this pattern. The result feels like messy communication, like a two-way radio stunted by static or emotion.

Palm’s members explain that they have a propensity to deconstruct and reconstruct as they write. The band describes its songwriting process as an exercise in organization as much as creation. “Walkie Talkie,” the band says, was written this way, with the lyrics cut out of magazines — another creative means of organization.

Like much of Palm’s best work, “Walkie Talkie” is busy, but not crowded. It’s a dense collection of ideas that leaves you little room to collect your thoughts; by the time you do, the band has already reconfigured them for you.

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Palm’s new EP, Shadow Expert, comes out June 16th on  Carpark Records . The band goes on a U.S. tour this summer.

WAXAHATCHEE – ” Silver “

Posted: April 18, 2017 in MUSIC
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Katie Crutchfield’s southern roots are undeniable. The name of her solo musical project Waxahatchee comes from a creek not far from her childhood home in Alabama and seems to represent both where she came from and where she’s going. Katie Crutchfield has been nothing but honest as the artist Waxahatchee . Her careful words carry keen insight — and she writes sharp songs to match. Waxahatchee’s fourth album, Out In The Storm, takes a hard look not just at broken relationship, but also at the spiraling aftermath.

“I don’t want to call it a break-up record, but it was a romantic and professional relationship that fell apart,” Crutchfield says. “I had to end it, and it rippled throughout every little corner of my life.”

“Silver,” the album’s first single out today with a video directed by Catherine Elicson, is the sound of the world crashing down around you — and that humbly recognizes that “the whole world keeps turning.” The guitar-driven track has a diaphanous sheen that unfolds in slow motion, but with weight that sparks a difficult epiphany.

Out In The Storm comes out July 14th on Merge Records. Waxahatchee goes on tour with The New Pornographers through America starting April 18th.

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LOW CUT CONNIE – ” Dirty Pictures (Part 1) “

Posted: March 26, 2017 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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“Touch my body, touch my soul, revolution rock & roll,” singer-pianist Adam Weiner sings at this Philadelphia band’s SXSW getdown, like a preacher certain that he’s firing the Lord’s work across the room. Weiner may look and sound like a missionary from a distant age – sporting Marlon Brando’s tenement-lothario T-shirt from A Streetcar Named Desire; hammering his ivories like Jerry Lee Lewis, bent over from a standing position on his piano seat. But Low Cut Connie, who are a roaring quintet that sounds as loud and full as the early E Street Band, are absolutely contemporary in their drive to old-school joy.Tracks  “Revolution Rock n Roll” and “Dirty Water,” both on this album, Weiner’s showmanship in the cover of Prince’s pneumatic march “Controversy,” also on “Dirty Pictures.” Live He spends time strutting through the crowd, passing out high-fives; standing on the bar in the back, conducting the Connies then, after the big, final chord, Weiner jumps to the floor and marches out the door to the street. Low Cut Connie, like the Seventies Elvis, had left the building. For a good time, be there when they get to your town.

RYAN ADAMS – ” Streets Of Philadelphia ” (Bruce Springsteen cover)

Posted: February 28, 2017 in MUSIC
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January 24th, 2017. Live @ BBC Radio 6 Music.Ryan Adams perform a beautiful cover of Bruce Springsteen’s classic “Streets Of Philadelphia”.

The timing of the release of Adams’ cover is particularly apt, given that the 89th Academy Awards took place in LA on Sunday. The cover was recently recorded as part of BBC Radio 6 Music’s upcoming celebration of the year 1994 – which will be broadcast on Friday (March 3) – with Adams taking on Springsteen’s track from the Oscar-winning film Philadelphia, which although released in 1993 won the Oscar for Best Original Song at the 1994 ceremony.
Ahead of 6 Music Celebrates 1994 on Friday March 3rd, Ryan Adams performed an exclusive cover of the Bruce Springsteen 1994 classic Streets Of Philadelphia for Lauren Laverne in the 6 Music Live Room.

BEACH SLANG – ” Sometimes Always ” The Jesus and Mary Chain Cover

Posted: February 5, 2017 in MUSIC
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Beach Slang’s James Alex.

On February 10th, Beach Slang will release the second installment of their mixtape cover series Here, I Made This For You (via Polyvinyl). The latest release from the project is a cover of the Jesus and Mary Chain’s “Sometimes Always.” . The cover follows the Adverts’ “Bored Teenagers.” Other covers on the EP include Tommy Keene, the Modern Lovers, and the Candyskins. Last year, Beach Slang released a new album, A Loud Bash of Teenage Feelings.  A curious title, perhaps, coming from a fortysomething songwriter, but for such a miscreant romantic as Alex – mission statement: “We’re here to punch you right in the heart” – rock’n’roll is the eternal elixir of youth.

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Our cover of “Sometimes Always” by The Jesus and Mary Chain appears on Here, I Made This For You Vol. 2, our second covers mixtape, due out February 10th, 2017.

The OBSESSIVES – ” The Obsessives “

Posted: January 19, 2017 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Scrappy Philly punk duo The Obsessives are releasing a new 7″ called “My Pale Red Dot” via Derrick from label Broken World Media and Near Mint. It was mastered by Cam from Sorority Noise, and they recently toured with Modern Baseball side project Broken Beak, so you know they’re in good company. We’re premiering “Avocado” from the 7″, which is definitely up a similar alley to Sorority Noise and (newer) Modern Baseball: crunchy, poppy rock with a youthful singer who has something to say. 

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