Latest Posts

Tonight: Bryan Johnson and Family Release Show

November 6, 2014

Bryan Johnson and Family‘s upcoming release, Cool Your Jets, is shaping up to be maybe the best thing they’ve ever done. The two singles they’ve released, “Dead Fox” and “Cerulean Eyes,” take the elements of bands like Weezer, Vampire Weekend, and The Shins and, in their best moments, inject them with the intimacy of a campfire singalong. The rest of the tracks could be yours tonight as the Studio at the Waiting Room hosts the band’s release show. Ten bucks not only gets you into the show, but gets you a shiny new copy of the album as well. Filling out the bill: local emo superstars Del Paxton and superstar local punkfunkers Mallwalkers. Show kicks off at 8pm. FB event here.

Tonight: Wildhoney

October 28, 2014

Tonight at Mohawk Place: a pretty interesting bill to make your Tuesday feel good. Baltimore’s Wildhoney will be coming through, supported by locals Hot Tip and Alpha Hopper. A good shoegaze band has a knack for bringing out the best in a song by softening the edges, and Wildhoney can definitely do that. There are elements to their newest EP, Seventeen Forever, that I bet are going to tear some people apart live. But at their best, what they’re doing just sounds gorgeous . Hot Tip and Alpha Hopper, as you may know, sound much more aggressive. Check this post and this post for proof. Definitely interested to see how it’ll all play out live, but feeling pretty thumbs up about it. Show starts at 8pm. $5 at the door, which is a steal. Facebook event here for more info.

Tonight: Filmstrip

October 15, 2014

Cleveland’s Filmstrip is an interesting band to listen to because they sound like guys who could explode into cathartic-but-too-obvious fuzz at any moment, but who choose not to. It’s reductive to call a band “mature” just because they aren’t ear-splittingly loud, so let’s just call them patient. Besides, “mature” indicates at best that they’ve totally figured themselves out, and at worst that they’re past their prime, and none of that is true. Their three most recent singles showcase the band tinkering with a few sounds: slower, melodic indie rock on “Stuck on Explode,” something like Neil Young & Crazy Horse on “Up on the Promenade,” and countrified punk a la The Men on “Waiting on a Train.” Hard to say where they’re headed, exactly, but I think the maturation is ongoing and that the best is yet to come. So check ’em out tonight at Nietzsche’s with local psychedelic doomsurfers[...]

Tonight: Pile

October 12, 2014

You know your band has to be good when a band as great as Krill writes their best album about how terrible they feel about how good you are. That’s Pile, talented enough to make Jonah Furman feel bad and bastard enough to come to Buffalo while I’m out of town. So please, enjoy this for me. Check out Dripping to get a taste of where Pile has been. It’s the most fun you’ll have while fighting off the creeping suspicion that your heart has been replaced with dust and spiderwebs. Then, check out “Special Snowflakes” to get a taste of where Pile is going. It’s more expansive, more ambitious and still gets stuck in your head. Hot Tip, Del Paxton and Softlines are all playing. Hot Tip and Del Paxton I’ve seen a few times each and can vouch for the fact that they rule. Softlines I only know[...]

Hot Tip Releases Simple, Fitting Video for “Human Cage”

September 22, 2014

Some of the best music videos (any maybe pieces of art in general?) are single concepts carried out simply and directly. I’m thinking of one in particular, the video for The Pixies’ “Velouria,” but Hot Tip‘s new video for “Human Cage” is pretty much in the same vein. It’s a single, claustrophobic shot following singer Katherine Goewey through some cornstalks. That’s also not a bad way to describe the song: there’s all this noise closing in and Katherine’s wails are all you really have to hold on to and even then, it’s not like she’s waiting for you. Check the video out below:

Alpha Hopper – Let Heaven and Nature Sing

September 8, 2014

The title of Alpha Hopper’s Let Heaven and Nature Sing hints at harmony and order, and despite the fuzz and the dissonance, the album churns like a fantastic machine, pistons and gears lifting and pulling in sync. The two main drivers: the jagged, restless guitar work of John Toohill and Ryan McMullen and the stressed-out, frustrated vocals of Irene Rekhviashvili. Drummer Doug Schneider is no slouch either, holding things together behind the noise. But it’s the interplay between Rekhviashvili’s strung-out shouts and the guitars’ driving crunches that gives Let Heaven and Nature Sing much of its character. Take opener “Western Walk.” It starts off with an uneven stomp of a guitar riff which mimics the heavy steps of a drunk on a mission. Before your ear can adjust to the rhythm, Rekhviashvili comes in with her own off-kilter croon, filling spaces you didn’t even realize were there, drawing out and[...]

Tonight: Peterwalkee Records Fest – Day One

September 5, 2014

Labor Day marks the symbolic end of summer (of course the powers that be have decided to attach a stigma to a holiday celebrating the labor movement), but as long as there are festivals and gatherings, I like to think that there’s still a little warmth in our bones. And if the good times have to end, Peterwalkee Records Fest is a worthy last gasp. The two day festival kicks off tonight at the American Legion hall on Amherst Street. Admittedly, I’m not an expert on every single band on the bill, but to my ears the first night is the heaviest. We’ve got: Male Patterns: breakneck-yet-catchy punk from Albany JOHNS: dark, anthemic blend of punk and pop (but not pop-punk) Dead Unicorn: noisey powerpop from Kingston centered on the impending nuclear apocalypse Cruelster: speed up The Marked Men, piss ’em off, make it awesome and from Cleveland Resist Control:[...]

Brimstone Blondes – AGE OF CONSENT

August 25, 2014

Almost every song on Brimstone Blondes’ new album, AGE OF CONSENT, is a take down of some sort. The targets change and their crimes run the gamut from exploitation to allegations of rape, but lead singer Matthew Danger Lippman feels pretty much the same as he’s pointing his finger: a little superior, a little fascinated, a little impotent and a little weird. He separates the world into the exploiters and the exploited and stands, alienated, on the outside, passing judgment. Consider the opening track, “The Photographer,” an indictment of creepo photographer Terry Richardson, who has been accused of sexually harassing and exploiting his female subjects (or maybe an indictment of a younger imitator, given that the age mentioned in the song is 12 years off). Lippman is disgusted by Richardson the “ironic pornographer,” but he’s also seemingly fascinated by the fact that he has “all the girls” right up his sleeve. Despite the sex[...]

Tonight: Beekeepers

August 14, 2014

Carnival Night by Shaken Stylus means that there will be balloons, silly string, kazoos and beach balls at an undisclosed location tonight. It means late evening fire hooping by Kayla Hoop. It also means four fine musicals, Beekeepers (Detroit) and Skirts (Rochester), along with locals Copy Manager and False Paul. It’s been a chilly, gray, rainy and dreary week, so a carnival sounds pretty alright to me. Beekeepers is a great fit for the theme, too. Their music is sometimes boppy, sometimes jazzy, sometimes dark and usually fun in the eccentric and unsettling way that a carnival can be. Skirts, meanwhile, are a bunch of blurs, blending the lo-fi vocal hooks of the Marked Men with surf rock, the Cure and the ever-present influence of the 90s. These songs will be fun to stomp around to, but produced differently, could have also showed up at a killer prom scene in[...]

Today: Vaggie Fest – Day 3

August 9, 2014

If by this point, you’re all Vaggied out, I can only ask you to take heart and soldier on, because this is the big one. Day three of Vaggie Fest is an all-day affair, featuring 13 bands that you are lucky enough to catch for just ten bucks over at Ocean Garden Oriental Foods (right next door to Sugar City). Let me start with the bad news: Pleasure Leftists can’t make it. If you’ve caught them before, then you know that this is a real loss. But they’ll be back soon. Now, the good news: the show is still awesome without them. Five out-of-towners, eight locals. If you’re the thrifty type, I guess it’s worth mentioning that you’re paying just over 75 cents a band (but that feels crass to mention, like informing your dinner guests about the price of each plate). The lineup is: Green Dreams (Rochester, imagine if The[...]

Tonight: Blessed State & Worn Leather

August 1, 2014

The show must go on at The Flower House tonight. New Haven’s Worn Leather and Western Massachusetts’s Blessed State are coming to town, supported by locals Radical Operations. This was originally a five band bill, with four touring bands descending upon our sleepy hamlet with a well-meaning sneer. But God hates bands with vans. Inflatable Best Friend and Brother Gruesome ended up stuck out in God knows where with a transmission that wouldn’t push past second gear. In a world where the police get a real kick out of pulling over a band on tour, the highway is not a kind place for people who can’t drive faster than 25 miles per hour. But don’t sweat: the Flower House will not abandon you. Blessed State, as has been noted both on the event page and in their Bandcamp tags, will be bringing some excellent Hüsker Dü-esque vibes. Worn Leather will[...]

Tonight: La Luna

July 30, 2014

Nothing quite like a perfectly curated bill. Tonight at the Glitterbox: Calgary’s La Luna, supported by Sperm, Hot Tip, Fleshy Mounds and Alpha Hopper. These bands really are five fingers on one hand, whatever that means. La Luna is about 80 percent brutal assaults, 20 percent breakdowns and breathing room (maybe it’s more of a 90/10 split, 95/5, hard to say). The result: you aren’t necessarily drowning in noise, but you’re definitely getting waterboarded. That description stands for Sperm as well. I think so, anyway: we’re being treated to a “new lineup, new Sperm,” so it could be light beer and Simon & Garfunkel for all I know. Doubt it, though: their last tape (released in February) is still sitting on my desk and it still grinds with the best of ’em. Hot Tip, you guessed it, still rules, and if you’ve somehow missed ’em up to this point, you’re[...]

Tonight: The Vonneguts

July 26, 2014

I know you folks like crying, but there’s nothing quite like a real actual rock ‘n roll show, which is exactly what The Vonneguts are bringing to town tonight. These grisly fellas hail from Detroit, and they’re an increasingly rare breed: a band that plays unhyphenated rock that isn’t overblown, willfully stupid or a White Stripes ripoff. It’s good, it’s catchy and it’s easy to like. They’ll be joined by locals that, if you ask me, possess similar purity of intention: stoner rockers Second Trip, pop rockers Victory for Poland and rock rockers Newish Star. You’ll like it. I’m not at liberty to divulge the address openly, but if you’re inclined to go, head on over to the Facebook event and ask an admin. Unless you have a reputation for tearing down light fixtures in other people’s homes, chances are they’ll tell you. Five bucks at the door, starts at[...]

Tonight: Nudes

July 21, 2014

If you’ve ever been to a show in the basement of Spiral Scratch Records, then you know that it can get ear-splittingly loud down there. Which is perfect for a band like Seattle’s Nudes, who sound like they’re living inside a tornado anyway. They’re at Spiral Scratch tonight, supported by locals White Whale and Sleeptalker. If you’ve ever been naked and covered in venomous spiders, then you kind of already have a grasp on what Nudes is bringing to the table. It’s pulverizing and dark: these guys do not wish you well. Probably a blast to catch, though. White Whale’s no slouch, either, though they substitute Nudes’ darkness with rage and angst. Still grinders, but they wouldn’t be out of place on a bill with Sonic Youth at points, either. While everyone brings the anger, Sleeptalker’s going to bring the weird (and I’m not just saying that because one of[...]

Tonight: Mac DeMarco

July 18, 2014

Mac DeMarco gets called a slacker a lot, but that’s only half the story. He reminds me of this kid I went to high school with: let’s call him Mike. Mike, I imagine, was a precocious little youngster, and very bright. Rolling with ease right over the kindergarten curriculum, it didn’t take long for lil’ Mike to get tracked into the gifted program. The gifted program was not much more than a get-out-of-jail-free card. Gifted students, it was assumed, didn’t have much to gain by attending regular classes. Give them a place to go that’s free of structured drudgery and their little minds would flourish all on their own. Mike, bless him, was gifted enough to see not only the pointlessness of his general education classes, but the pointlessness of signing up for field trips and academic triathalons and all the other carrots that the gifted program offered. And, given[...]