May 31 : "hUMAN wIDTHDRAWL ii (Sadie)" - 185668232 (Philly)

New Music / Freshly Written & Recently Released

Philly Music!

An interesting phenomenon that I've seen now twice during 2013 is hearing songs of the same or similar name by two unrelated bands. This happened back at the end of January when I heard two completely different songs named "Cash for Gold", one played by Brooklyn band "Writer" (CLICK HERE) and the other by Philly band "Windsor Park Walkers" (CLICK HERE).

A second time it happened was when I heard "Withdrawl" by Philly band "Depression", now renamed "Black Tombs", which I wrote about in my previous blog (CLICK HERE). And also within the past few months, my friend, Iam S. Mick, came out with a song titled "hUMAN wIDTHDRAWL ii (Sadie)"

"hUMAN wIDTHDRAWL ii (Sadie)" is the sixth out of twenty-eight tracks on a very ambitious album, "pRODUCt pLACEMENt", which is available for download at the artist's site. The tracks cover a wide range of topics, looks at varied life experiences. The topic of this particular track is a relationship breakup, and the ensuing "withdrawal" that lasts longer than he might have expected.

Iam says in the song ::: "i keep messing up chasing the wrong love, spending the wrong energy on the wrong people. there's too much baggage & heavier even if i don't love them as much. sitting there taking one single buse disallows me to grow. i'm more sensitive than you'll ever know. many songs i cannot play any more for i don't feel them & i'm not going to live a lie. ambiguous convoluted thoughts mashed together so they can't be forced down someone's brain whole mind. it takes half as long as the time spent together to go through total human widthdrawl. the only person to laugh at my awful jokes also got most hurt by my flaw."

And here's the track "hUMAN wIDTHDRAWL ii (Sadie)" playing right here on my blog page.

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6/27/20 UPDATE! ::: OOPS! Looks like the band removed this song from their webpage!

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To visit Iam and 185668232, here is the click to his Wix page (it takes a minute to load), where there are links to all his other pages ::: 185668232 on Bandcamp (CLICK HERE)

..... And as one odd and very peculiar footnote, both artists spell "Withdrawal" as "Withdrawl".

May 19 : "Out of Medication" & "Smashed Teeth" - Depression (Philly)

New Music / Freshly Written & Soon to Be Released

Philly Music!

INNER STRENGTH

I met Jason Elliss at a recent Panophonic show. Tom Lugo of Panophonic had introduced us. Here's a shout out to Tom "Hey Tom"

Jason has asked me to do a review of his two new soon-to-be-released albums, "Out of Medication" and "Smashed Teeth". Both albums are performed by Jason's solo project, "Depression".

Jason and Tom started working together only a few months ago on a joint project, "Under the Wire", which seems to be taking off nicely. However, as much as Jason enjoys the work with Tom, there are a lot of things that Jason felt he had to express, things he had to get out there, that were too dark, and, frankly, too personal for the joint project. Jason's recent life has had a number of bad rough spots. But more about that a little later.

jason started playing music in his mid teens when he and a bunch of friends formed a band, "Standin for Nothin". Jason's first venture into music was playing the drums. The band played together regularly, but never did any shows.

When Jason was 17, he joined a metal band, "Another Common Tragedy", as a vocalist. This band did do shows, including some of the big venues, such as the Troc!

Always impatient to expand his horizons, Jason later learned guitar and keys and synth.

Jason's music outfit, Depression, started more recently as an outlet for some dark experiences … … Jason confides, "Depression is my little journal I keep in my back pocket."

Some years back Jason had some extremely bad experiences with drugs, including later going into a rehab that turned out to be a problem in itself. Jason lost his father which added more tumult to his life. And, beyond that, there was an unfortunate circumstance when some of his teeth were knocked out. And that's the background behind the album title, "Smashed Teeth". And, during all this, when one would expect to have the trust and support of those close to you, he found that people were pulling away from him. So the track "Withdrawl" is not about him pulling away from others, but others pulling away from him.

When you listen to his music, you'll hear some harsh sounds that relate some of these bad experiences..

But music contains a lot of emotions, some expressed as a main focus, and some that are underlying and might go almost unnoticed. When I listen to "Withdrawl" and "Shattered", I find them to be not all bad characterizations. I hear small glimmers of hope, and I hear small glimmers of strength and fortitude. Maybe its the particular harmonies that he uses. The tempo shows a determination to move forward in spite of the odds.

Jason's got the strength to move forward in spite of all that has happened to him. Not letting these other people drag him down. He's a devoted father to his young daughter.

Jason's work has a unique design in terms of its themes. Each piece seems to focus on one individual emotion or one characteristic and is an expression of that one dynamic. Most of the songs have no beginnings, they have no ends, but evoke present existential states of being.

Of the two albums of I've been hearing, "Out of Medication" is the earlier of the two (although both are current) and was done on a computer keyboard, while "Smashed Teeth" was done with a synthesizer.

The song "Withdrawl" is on the "Smashed Teeth" album and is playing right here on my blog page.

Jason has two shows coming up, both the same night, June 26 at Kung Fu Necktie. One of the shows will be as his solo act, Depression, and the other will be with Tom as a member of Under the Wire.

If you want to visit Jason in the meantime, here is the click to his Facebook page. There you can see pictures of Depression's first show which Jason did yesterday at the Brewerytown Spring Festival ((which unfortunately I did not get to see; I was working at our Farmstand)). … Depression (CLICK HERE)

May 17 : "Debt Slaves" - Mohican (Philly)

Philly Music!

I've been introduced to some very interesting bands at North Star. One of them was "Mohican" which I recently saw for the first time.

The music they played that night was instrumental with some very deft and complex arrangements that seemed to flow with such ease and grace. I was impressed.

On the band's page is their album "Honest Red", which was released in March 2012. Tracks cover a wide range of subjects.

One track about a very unique and timely topic is "Debt Slaves". The song opens with a forward-moving yet uneasy motif, followed by some slow-moving debt pain as well as some light-hearted spirited debt accumulation. And it ends with a more relaxed tone that might be saying "This is all part of life?" I don't know for sure. But it certainly is an interesting track. And it's playing right here !!!! :::

Mohican has a number of shows coming up: June 7 at The Fire, June 8 at Milkboy Philly, and June 16 at The Barbary. To visit their webpage in the meantime, here is the click :::: Mohican (CLICK HERE)

May 12 : "Newark" - Chimes

New Music / Freshly Written & Recently Released

Also playing with Jackie Paper at Hong Kong Garden a few weeks ago was New Jersey band "Chimes". The words that came to mind as I heard their live performance was "heavy sparkling". They did a good show that Saturday night, but they're a new band and don't yet have a large presence on the Internets.

Current song playing right here on my blog page is "Newark", by Chimes :::

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6/27/20 UPDATE! ::: OOPS! Looks like the song as well as the band website have both disappeared!

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Chimes has another concert coming up on June 1 at Lincoln Continental in Union City. To visit Chimes in the meantime, here is the click :::

May 05 : "Bag Full Of Junk" - Seismic Thrust (Philly)

New Music / Freshly Written & Recently Released (Nov 2012)

Philly Music!

The name says it all. "Seismic Thrust". That's exactly what the music was at their show at Hong Kong Garden. Exactly. The pulse, the force, the motion, it was all there. It was my first time hearing them and they caught my interest right away.

... But ? ! ..... (yes, there's a but) ... Similar to The Big Drops which I wrote about in my previous blog, Seismic Thrust seems to have two personalities. The wild music at the live show and the tamer, more mellow persona on line. So, as with The Big Drops, I can't find anything on line that closely resembles what I heard at the show, so I'm playing on my page a good track, a good sound, but it's different. ... The song is "Bag Full Of Junk" that was released just this past November by the band and is their lead track on the album "Py Thanksgi" :::

I had heard Seismic Thrust a few weeks ago when they played on the same bill as Jackie Paper at Hong Kong Garden. Seismic Thrust has another show coming up this Saturday at The Thriftstore here in Philly. If you would like to visit them in the meantime, here is the click to their Bandcamp page ::: Seismic Thrust

So it's good to be back here. I've been away from the online world for the last couple weeks. My laptop did a slow death for about a week and then it took me several more days to find a good and similar replacement. ... More posts to come soon.