Not often is the "new" version or the cover of a song better than the original, but this is one of those rare exceptions. The song is Asbury Park band Wreath's version of "Sundown". The original was done by Gordon Lightfoot in 1974. I was around then :) and I remember the original. I heard it often.
But Wreaths' version has the original beat, especially with the atmospheric instrumental background. This version was recorded at Big Blue North Studio in Utica, NY, last year (Feb 2014).
Wreaths was the second band I heard when I went to Bowery Electric back on May 21 (am behind in my writing after surgery. Don't snitch on me; Dr. knew I was going there). It was my first time hearing them. This was one of those situations where I had gone to see a different band but heard this band for the first time and liked them as well. A double payoff! The band generously gave me one of their new cd's; the new album is also titled "Wreaths". I've been listening to it and like it, but I keep going back to their Soundcloud page where they have "Sundown". I hope that makes it onto one of their cd's soon.
If you'd like to keep tabs on Wreath's concert schedule, here is the click to their Facebook page ::: Wreaths (CLICK HERE)".
Finally I'm starting to get back to regular life after being home-bound for weeks and weeks after foot surgery. Have permission to go back to work this week.
Each place where I work has their favorite radio station, and at the job where I'm going tomorrow, they listen to a station that was playing this track a real lot in the few weeks before I had my accident. Maybe it was because the band was planning a US tour. In fact they actually came to Philly a couple weeks ago. But I haven't been able to go out to hear bands since May, so I missed out.
I'm wondering whether I'll still hear it tomorrow. The song is "Stolen Dance", played by German band "Milky Chance." (love the sultry vocals).
======================================
6/27/20 UPDATE ::: OOPS! The music is NOT AVAILABLE IN OUR COUNTRY! YIKES! So much for listening to this band!
I had to do some serious negotiations to get my doctor to allow me to go to work in NY on May 21 and then go to a concert afterwards. Foot surgery was to be on the agenda, but not right away. Don't even THINK about snitching on me. Hahahaha."
The music event I wanted to go to that night was a show by Brooklyn band Writer. They were playing at Bowery Electric. Writer consists of brothers Andy and James Ralph. I had seen them play once before at Pianos and was eager to see another show. For the May 21 show they were a team of three; I don't know if the trio is a permanent change.
The style on stage had changed since I saw them last: more haze, more fuzz. Very often music that's characterized by haze and fuzz can be very laid back, but Writer's haze and fuzz was presented with the same force and thrust as the music I heard them play at Pianos back in January. Beyond that, with the new band member, the arrangements were quite different. The keys were less prominent than they had been back at Pianos in 2013.
Playing here right now on my blog page is "EI", which is the first track on their now sold out 7"lacquer recording, "I Make Neon".
Writer doesn't have any upcoming events listed on their page. In the meantime, here is the link to their Tumblr page ::: Writer on Tumblr (CLICK HERE). And here is he click to the writeup about their previous show that I attended: Writer at Pianos on Jan 22 2013
A few months ago our church book group read "The Unwinding" by George Packer. The full title is "The Unwinding - An Inner History of the New America". It chronicles societal changes that have taken place in the U.S. of A. over the past few decades, part of which includes the weakening of the middle class.
The initial self-description at the top of the book jacket's inner flap says "American Democracy is beset by a sense of crisis. Seismic shifts during a single generation have created a country of winners and losers, allowing unprecedented freedom while rending the social contract, driving the political system to the verge of breakdown and setting citizens adrift to find new paths forward. In The Unwinding, George Packer, author of The Assassin's Gate: America In Iraq, tells the story of the United States over the past three decades in an utterly original way, with his characteristically sharp eye for detail and gift for weaving together complex narratives."
The author divides the book into three sections, each representing a time period over the past decades. He tells the story of America by tracing the lives of over a dozen individual Americans in various walks of life, including, among many, a factory worker, a ceo, an entrepreneur, and a couple politicians and entertainers.
We get to know each of the "characters", their families, and their communities as we read about how their lives change decade to decade. We learn about both successes and failures and that many of what might be considered failures were actually outside of our characters' own doing and control.
The book brings an unnerving feeling with its depiction of a gradual onslaught against people's financial well-being and our country's participatory democracy.
Our characters respond to this onslaught in various ways. A couple people succumb, many try to cope or reinvent themselves, but there are a couple stories interspersed in this that I think are truly heroic.
One such story showed the heroism of a woman trying to stand up to a bank foreclosing on a property while at the same time showed the evil behind some of the forces in America today. When the woman tried to fight the bank by going to the courthouse where the foreclosure proceedings were being held, she couldn't find and no one could tell her where the proceedings were taking place. Why? BECAUSE THEY NEVER EXPECTED ANY DEFENDANTS TO SHOW UP! When she, by trial and error, found the right courtroom, her entry into the room and her very presence flustered the officials, because no defendant EVER came to fight them and defend herself. She was shocked, as was I when reading this, that the bank's reps rapidly took care of and disposed of dozens of foreclosure cases in a day, taking people's homes minute by minute. And not all the plaintiffs were even in the courtroom to begin with! Some were there only electronically!
While you may think a story about economic life might be dull, you'll find the way the author has told the story through the lives of these multiple characters to be quite engaging. While I recommend this book, I will be the first to admit that it is a downer. However, the stories are timely and relevant; they explain a lot about what has been going on in our country. Through the tales of these very diverse and interesting characters and the wide fabric that the author weaves, you can get a greater understanding of the way our economic and political life is working ... and isn't working. These are the stories of living the dreams and the broken dreams.
Is this Nashville? Is this Brooklyn? It's a little bit of both. Clear Plastic Masks is an interesting band that claims both Nashville and Brooklyn as home bases. The influence of both can be heard in their music.
I heard Clear Plastic Masks for the first time just about a year ago this week (May 29, 2014), when they did a show at Pianos. I made a note to keep my eye open for another show. That time came along just a few weeks ago when they did a show right here in Philly at Milkboy. This year compared to last shows even a greater texture and nuance in their performance. Unfortunately it all can't be captured in the recorded versions, so you'll have to see them live. (although they do point out for the song below: "Mixes are not final and unmastered.")
But the website recordings still represent their music well. Here is "Everything Nothing" which the band posted on Soundcloud about a year ago.
===========================================
6/27/20 UPDATE! ::: OOPS! Looks like the band removed this song from their page!
===========================================
Clear Plastic Masks is on tour right now and has a very busy schedule lined up. Unfortunately, another visit back here isn't on the list. But you can visit them on Facebook. Here is the click ::: Clear Plastic Masks (CLICK HERE)
Sometimes the music is very much in sync with what's going on in life. Such was the case a few weeks ago when I saw live for the first time Philly band "BlendMode". They did a nice show at North Star.
I've been busy communting, spending a lot of time on the train. In fact, I went to see BlendMode after working a day up in North Jersey. When I went in to North Star and started to listen to them play, it seemed to fit right in with the rest of the day and almost be a continuation of the most recent event, my train ride back from North Jersey. Each piece was long and had a continuous fast steady rhythm. There were very few breaks in tempo. And the pictures and scenes going by were the sounds of the other instruments that would seemingly appear out of nowhere and "blend" in, playing a dozen or two bars over the rhythm and then recede. The rhythm would keep going steady and then some more short surprises from the other instruments would come in. The band is quite eclectic, melding or "blending" a bunch of genres. I never knew what was coming next.
My personal take was I felt like I was still traveling. I enjoyed the show and hope to see them again.
BlendMode has a limited amount of music posted on the internets. This is their one track from Soundcloud. It's "TweedMode Show - Silk City - 2015 02 04".
===========================================
6/27/20 UPDATE! ::: OOPS! Looks like the band removed this song from their page!
===========================================
If you like their sound and would like to see them, you're in luck. BlendMode is doing a show tonight at Silk City Lounge. If you would like to visit them on Facebook, here is the click ::: BlendMode on Facebook (CLICK HERE)
I've been listening to New York band "The Mystery Lights"' pages on line for quite a while. Their music has largely a garage feel, punctuated with some psych highlights.
I've been lucky enough to see them three times, once at Mercury Lounge (7/30/12), once at Baby's All Right (1/29/14), and just a couple weeks ago at Johnny Brenda's (3/26/15!). Philly was the last stop on their recent national tour. While they do a lot of shows, they very rarely come to Philly. And their many shows in Manhattan and Brooklyn are late for me, seeming to be either the night before I have to work early, and/or too late for the last NJT/SEPTA departure home.
So I was very "psyched" to see that they were going to be playing at Johnny Brenda's on a free night. High energy is one of their trademarks, and while they've been able to carry that high energy over into their recordings better than some other bands, it's even better to see them do a live show on stage.
I like the intensity of their music. There's just the right amount of "rough-around-the-ages" garage sound combined with more sophisticated writing and arrangements to make their sound a unique experience. At the Johnny Brenda's show, they played songs from their new album released last month, "At Home W/The Mystery Lights". They also played tracks from their March 2014 ep, "The Mystery Lights EP". At Johnny Brenda's the band played around with some of the tempos and arrangements as they had at Baby's All Right, so a listener is essentially hearing new work even as they play songs already heard.
One of the songs they played out of last year's album is "What Happens When You Turn the Devil Down", which is more representative of the psych portion of their persona. Listen to the lush arrangements. It's playing right here :::
===========================================
6/27/20 UPDATE! ::: OOPS! Looks like the band removed this song from their page!
===========================================
I like "What Happens When You Turn the Devil Down" a lot; I wanted to feature it with this writeup, but I also like the song "Before My Own", also appearing on the 2014 album. I listened to both songs a zillion times, but still couldn't decide which one to show here, so I'm including them both. "Before My Own" is more representative of their "garage on steroids" persona, and is playing right here :::
The Mystery Lights has an upcoming show soon; they're going to be headlining at Alphaville on April 21. In the meantime, if you'd like to visit them on Facebook (with links to their music), here is the click ::: The Mystery Lights on Facebook (CLICK HERE).
UPDATE UPDATE :::: June 22, 2016 :::: The band has evidently deleted all tracks from its Soundcloud page as well as most tracks from Bandcamp. :( ... I don't know what that's about. ... It's especially difficult for somebody when you're not familiar with a band and are considering going out to a show, but the band has only one sample song on their site. That normally for me is a negative ("What's up with them?"), but in this case you'll have to take it from me that these guys are good!
NEW UPDATE UPDATE ::: December 8, 2016 :::: The band has new music up as well as new versions of some of their original standards. Check out more recent music and comments here!
March 20, What a Day! What a Night! I had worked up in North Jersey and was planning on getting back to Philly in time to see Jackie Paper and Seismic Thrust do a show together at Everybody Hits. I've seen both bands before and like them a lot and didn't want to miss this opportunity to see them both play together, especially when I didn't have work the next morning.
But sometimes the best-made plans don't work out exactly as envisioned. It turned out Friday we had that freak snowstorm, which partially messed me up. Missed one bus, the next didn't show, and the next was late so I missed my train. The next train got stuck for over an hour at New Brunswick due to someone on the train ahead of us having a medical emergency and their having to get ems. (I was wondering why it was taking so long since major medical facilities are only a block from the station.) And then, of course, we missed the train to Philly out of Trenton.
I wound up getting to Everybody Hits very late, after both Seismic Thrust and Jackie Paper had played, so I had to ask for updates on what the bands had played.
Zach from Philly band Seismic Thrust says they're working on a new album and played songs that will appear on that. Here is "Jean Jacket", one of the band's newer songs. Not sure if this is going to be on the new album.
Seismic Thrust has another show coming up on April 20 at Bourbon and Branch. Here is the click to the band's Soundcloud page ::: Seismic Thrust on Soundcloud (CLICK HERE)
================================================
I also got a chance to talk with Michelle from Jackie Paper. She gave me one of their new albums which is a compilation of work they've done over the years. The album is available in either cd or cassette format. Here is "Into Oblivion", one of their newer works.
While I had missed my two favorites that I had seen before, I arrived just in time to see New York band Whitewash do their show. In checking around for music each week, I had come across Whitewash a few times and was interested in seeing them, but the scheduling never seemed to work out. So this was a great opportunity. Here is "No Sunglasses", a song posted on their page about a year ago.
Whitewash has two shows coming up soon. The first is on April 2 at Nola, Darling, and the second is April 20 at Palisades. To visit Whitewash on Soundcloud, here is the click ::: Whitewash on Soundcloud (CLICK HERE)
The last band to play and the headliner of the evening was Philly "fuzz-punk" band Mumblr. They've also done a number of shows that I never got to see. Here is their song "Philadelphia", from their newly-released album, "Full of Snakes" :::
Mumblr doesn't have any other shows coming up in our area right now, but they do have a show in DC at Above the Bayou on April 10. To visit Mumblr on Bandcamp, where you can hear their music and see their raw and powerful lyrics printed out, the click is here ::: Mumblr on Bandcamp (CLICK HERE)
Both Mumblr and Whitewash did good shows; I know I'm going to go back to hear both of them again. My rotten Friday turned out well in the end! And I really liked "Everybody Hits" as a venue. It was my first time there. It's actually "batting cages" that doubles up as a diy venue from time to time in the evening. Open room, high ceilings, great acoustics. If any band you like lists a show there, GO!
A few weeks ago I went to see music outfit 18568232 do a show at Eris Temple Arts. 185668232 is my friend, Iam S. Mick (yes, that's his real soc sec #). Iam not only performed in the show but curated the event as well.
The music or "sound" of 185668232 has undergone a dramatic change since I first started listening back in 2011. When I first met Iam, most of his work came from familiar sounds performed with traditional musical instruments. His music room had a variety of instruments that many people would envy.
Over the past couple years, he increasingly played with the sounds generated by those instruments and started to change them or distort them electronically. Then over a period he gradually added more electronic sounds, crossing the border to include more "noise" than traditional musical sounds.
185668232 has done quite a number of albums with topics ranging from the casual to the more serious comments about society.
One of the tracks that I like the most is "mONAURAL bEATS (recorded/mixed/mastered practice)", which Iam posted about a year ago. Iam classifies this as "dreamesque", a genre that he's named or created. I think this fits the name perfectly. ... And, personally, I think it is also a metaphor for the progression I've seen his work take over these last few years. At the beginning of the track is a more conventional sounding melodic line. Over the course of its 3:59 minutes, it adds more noise to its persona..
This is the page for "mONAURAL bEATS (recorded/mixed/mastered practice)" ::: "mONAURAL bEATS" page (CLICK HERE). There you can find a link to the rest of his Soundcloud page.
While Soundcloud contains a lot of his individual tracks, Iam's Bandcamp page includes his concept albums ::: 185668232 on Bandcamp (CLICK HERE).
Iam asks me what had I been thinking about before I post a photo on Facebook, and then what did I think about after the posting. I've returned the questioning back to him in terms of what was he thinking about as he wrote various instrumental lines in his song "Underscore", which is one of my favorites. Iam did an updated version of the song at the Eris Temple show. Of course it was more noise than the original. It was a "one time only" arrangement, never performed before and never to be performed again. You can hear the original version of "Underscore" through the link to the interview that we did a few years ago. "185668232 - THE INTERVIEW"
.
This was my first trip to Eris Temple Arts, and I think it was the right venue and ambience for these shows: part diy storefront venue / part house party... 185668232's next show will be at The Pharmacy on March 19.
===============================================
It was about a week later that I saw a listing that quickly grabbed my curiosity. It was for a show by Daisy Berkowitz, a Marilyn Manson alum. While I never was really into Marilyn Manson, I was interested to see what the transition might be from playing in a band at major venues to doing solo work on the small venue circuit. So I did go out to see him play at Delancey Lounge.
Here is "Defensive", by Daisy Berkowitz a/k/a Scott Mitchell Putesky :::
===============================================
I did a "Mix and Match" that night. After seeing Daisy Berkowitz play at Delancey Lounge, I went over to Arlene's Grocery where I saw Bushwick's "The Benjees" do an outstanding show. This was the second time I had seen them, the first time being at Pianos over last summer. They were just as good as the first time I saw them, and, again, playing a lot better than anything their web page could convey.
I don't know whether it was the arrangements or the sound work this time around, but the keys seemed to play a much more prominent role in the music than at their show at Pianos over the summer.
The band currently doesn't have a lot of music on line, and, very oddly, they seemed to have all but abandoned their own Soundcloud page, leaving only one song up, while transferring their music to another page (of the recording co? I don't know). They said at the show that an album should be coming out later this year. In the meantime, here is "Fukushima" :::
The Benjees have another show coming up at Arlene's Grocery on April 10. Here is their web page where you can find out more about them :::
================================
7/5/20 ::: OOPS. Website seems to have disappeared.
================================
=================================================
One of the delights of commuting by New Jersey Transit is their "Music In Motion" program, where they have live music being performed for the evening rush. I've seen performances at both Hoboken Terminal and Secaucus Junction Station. (I think there are also some in Newark). The performances cover a wide range of genres, and the week before last I was able to hear "The Garden State Saxophone Quartet", which plays both classical and pop.
Here is their rendition of The Beatles' "Eleanor Rigby". I was especially intrigued how they handled the rhythm portion of the music since there were no percussion instruments and the saxophones themselves had to do that job :::
This is a picture of their show at Secaucus Junction last week. While some people just speeded through on their way to change trains, many did stop to listen. (I stood in front of them to get the picture). The main waiting room at Secaucus Junction has high ceilings and excellent acoustics. All bands should try to go there!
This week I have every breath planned out to be working, so I have to say a :( that I won't be able to get to see Tygerstrype on Tuesday. But I'd recommend that everybody else head over to The Barbary on Tuesday night.
Tygerstrype always puts on a good show, and this show in particular promises to be exceptional, because the band has some exciting new music to introduce. They're planning a new album, "We Learn to Love Our Chains", from which they've given us a sneak peak in their recent posting of "Prince". But within the last few days they've also posted a new song, "Freak Me", which takes their music off in a new direction. "Freak Me" is a "refix" of the song with the same name by r&b band "Silk". Here it is! :::
I try to see as many Tygerstrype shows as I can, but work schedule says I'm going to be missing this one. Tygerstrype is Gabriel Guerrero and (my friend) Alden Towler. Here is the click to their Facebook page where you can find out more about their music and their upcoming show: Tygerstrype on Facebook (CLICK HERE)
The last band I saw in 2014 was Philly's "Weird Hot". One of their more popular songs is "I Was at a Party", which is playing right here!
Weird Hot has more concerts in Philly planned for the next few months. Check out their web page for more info: Weird Hot on Facebook (CLICK HERE).
========================================
On a personal note, I just got through a couple very busy work months, which is why I'm way behind in posting about the music I've heard. Am "catching up". :)
David Welles, lead singer of Bushwick Cyberpunx band "Onwe" started the event by jumping down off stage and handing out "love letters" on looseleaf sheets to audience members standing in the first row (to the men as well as the women, I might add). Onwe was the fourth band up that night. High power performance both with the sound and the visuals, as the singer at one point pulled a couple members of the audience up onto stage with him.
Here is a sample of one of their songs, "jk bb".
Onwe is on tour (playing in Europe this week), but will be back in New York and playing again at Palisades on February 26. In the meantime you can check them out on Bandcamp
========================================
On a personal note, I just got through a couple very busy work months, which is why I'm way behind in posting about the music I've heard. Am "catching up". :)
New Music / Freshly Written & Recently Released (August)
Another band I enjoyed at Palisades that night was Staten Island band "Bueno". The thing that stood out about Bueno's show was their vocalist's stylings as well as his on-stage presence. Here's a sample from their Bandcamp page. This is "C-C-C-Convenient":
This appears to be just a teaser, the first song out of what will be an album to be released later this year.
If you're interested in seeing them, you're in luck. They have a show scheduled for Thursday, January 29th, at Shea Stadium. In the meantime you can visit them on Facebook or Bandcamp.
========================================
On a personal note, I just got through a couple very busy work months, which is why I'm way behind in posting about the music I've heard. Am "catching up". :)
