Speaking of Buffalo vaporwave acts, another interesting track popped up over the weekend from the underground genre in the form of “D Frenzy” from electronic artist Fotisporn. The dark, disco single samples Billy Ocean’s “Carribeen Queen” while backed by smooth horns and has some serious Darkside vibes. Keep an eye out from future releases from this mysterious project. In the mean time, listen to “D Frenzy” below.
After this weekend’s successful launch party over at Silo City, Silo Sessions, a weekly live video blog, launched its first installment featuring Nat Baldwin of the Dirty Projectors. The blog fittingly kicks of its series with the artist whose performance was one of the inspirations of the project. The stand up bass extraordinaire, who has made it a habit of performing in Buffalo over the years, delivers a stunning and haunting performance in the site’s inaugural session. Silo Sessions will be releasing a new session, all filmed within Silo City’s grain elevators, every week over the coming year, featuring performances from both local and touring acts, many of whom played Saturday night’s event. Follow Silo Sessions website for future installments. Watch the full session with Nat Baldwin below.
Early last month, one man garage act, Arvid, released his lo-fi, debut album Old Factory Living. Recorded on a 4-track cassette player in the Rochester musician’s attic, the 90s alt-rock inspired album is ideal for fans of like era staples Stone Temple Pilots and the Presidents of the United States of America, as well fresher San Fran garage rock acts like Ty Segall and Mikal Cronin. Track 7, “Stage Fright,” sounds like a Mac Demarco/Ducktails collaboration that you wish would actually happen, while the Spaghetti Western-flavored “Wasted” could have been placed on a Tarantino soundtrack without missing a beat. You can download Old Factory Living in its entirety at Arvid’s bandcamp page. In the mean time, listen to the stand out, opening track “Phantoms of the Night” below. Old Factory Living by Arvid
Buzzing black-metal/shoegze act, Deafheaven, will put a cap on the Tralf’s summer season as they roll through town on Thursday, September 18th. After releasing one of 2013’s best reviewed albums in Sunbather, the San Fran based act will make its Buffalo return after playing Soundlab a couple years back, joining fellow heavies like Boris and Swans in the downtown venue’s diverse summer schedule. Supporting Deafheaven on the bill will be No Joy and Indian Handcrafts. Tickets go on sale this Friday for $14 in advance/$16 day of
Herd Fest act the Tins have announced the release of their latest EP, Young Blame, set to drop on July 29th. The EP is currently available for pre-sale here, but luckily, the band has released the music video for Young Blame‘s first single, “They Aren’t Evil,” earlier today to give us a taste of the new material. The single moves away from some of the more new wave vibes of their last LP, Life’s A Gas, and enters a DOM-like melody territory. If you wish to hear the new tracks before streaming begins on bandcamp, you can help celebrate the release of Young Blame with the trio on Friday, July 11th at Buffalo Iron Works. The release show will also serve as a tour kick off (see full itinerary below) that will take the threesome across the U.S.. More confirmed dates will follow. July 11th- Buffalo N.Y – Buffalo Iron[...]
Over at the blog offices last week, we stumbled across the impressive, debut LP, 電効営み , from vaporwave artist Darksleep. The album immediately had us thinking of works from Oneohtrix Point Never, Crystal Castles, and even some Purity Ring, and while we have no idea how to pronounce 電効営, the album quickly grew on us. Check out the entire release over at Darksleep’s bandcamp page and in the mean time, listen to album’s stand out track, “Left on the Curb,” below.
Bilingual tropical punk band, Malportado Kids, will bring their brash island flavor to Spiral Scratch’s backroom this evening. This Rhode Island duo is comprised of members of Downtown Boys, and could be best described as Caribbean, DIY Casiokids. Also on the bill are West Side basement super-group, Hot Tip, and the debut performance from Jamie & the Debt, the new project Mallwalkers and Sexist member Jamie Rowitsch. Music kicks off at 6:30pm. Bring $3 to cover the touring band. Photo Credit – Michael Andrade
Just this morning, Buffalo quartet Aircraft released the new music video for their single “Space Euphoira.” Originally released on a split EP with former Buffalo “it” trio, the Malones, the track will also be included on a future LP from the foursome. As for the Lesionread directed video, which by the way, is one of the best produced local videos that comes to mind, the clip finds the guys traveling the cosmos in a space equipped mystery machine, battling interplanetary villains with surf rock riffs. Keep on the look out for those trademark warped eyes that have become a staple in Lesionread directed videos these days. In other Aircraft news, the band will play at the Burchfield Penny right after work this Friday, but if you can’t make that and have a passport, you can always catch them at their NXNE showcases the following weekend. If you are in the Toronto area[...]
Early this Monday morning, Rochester’s live video session series, Genesee Live, debuted its latest installment featuring Skirts. Formally a dorm room act named Meanagers, Skirts has turned into a peppy five piece act, combining early Cloud Nothings, Pains of Being Pure at Heart, and Los Campesinos type vibes. You can watch the full, basement filmed session (keep an eye out for David Lynch) below. If you have missed any of Genny Live’s prior sessions, you can check out all of the former installments at GL’s Tumblr page.
In what is becoming a regular occurrence, NJ punks Titus Andronicus will make their return to Buffalo this evening at the Tralf Music Hall, their second stop in as many years. Since forming in 2005, Titus Andronicus has slowly built a catalog full of piss and vingar infused anthems, best exemplified on their sprawling, Civil War inspired concept album, The Monitor, all while being led by one of indie-rock’s best front man in the venomous Patrick Stickles. Expect Stickles and crew to test out some new material this evening as the band teased a new album was on the near horizon upon their last visit to town. Providing support this evening will be buzzing Brooklyn act Baked and local female foursome Cross Stitch. Show kicks off tonight at 8pm. Tickets are available at the door for $14.
A few weeks away from hosting their own showcase at the buffaBLOG’s inaugural Herd Fest, Quiet Country Audio has released the latest installment in its video session series. This time around, QCA teamed up with Head North to record live cuts from the the pop-punk four piece’s recently released Scrapbook Minds EP. You may listen to the full, four-song session at QCA’s bandcamp page and watch the clip for “Doubt and Deadlines” below.
If you have been looking for an excuse to head over to Sugar City’s new location (1239 Niagara Street), and have been itching to catch a show at their headquarters after the 2+ year hiatus, then tonight you may cross both of your list as the DIY collective will be hosting Baltimore instrumental act Horse Lords. A last minute addition on the quartet’s tour, tonight’s set should feature a groovy brand of krautrock that can go from minimal to beat heavy to brash at any moment. You can get a better idea by listening to their most recent mixtape below. The show will be a part of Sugar City’s Across The Way: an art adventure event also occurring tonight starting at 5:30pm. Horse Lords are set to go on at 8pm sharp, and while there is no cover, donations are accepted and welcomed.
This September, Riot Fest will celebrate its 10th anniversary with shows in Toronto, Chicago (the festival’s founding city), and Denver. We can thank fest founder Mike Petryshyn for selecting Toronto as a location. Being a Buffalo native, Petryshyn, as so many of us Buffalonians so do, would frequent the city as a youth to catch shows that sadly did not include WNY in their routing, so selecting the Ontario city as a Riot Fest host only seemed right. Riot Fest will return to Toronto on September 6th and 7th at the fest’s new location, Downsview Park. The eclectic and, naturally, Canadian heavy lineup is stacked with bands like the Cure, New Pornographers, the National, Stars, Manchester Orchestra, and many more. Scroll back up to the header pic for full lineup. Tickets, which went on sale in early May, are still available at this link. To make life a bit easier, for the[...]
Since releasing one of the blog’s favorite songs of 2013 in “Car Ride,” Alek Ogadzhanov’s Smart House project has been keeping busy. In between the reshuffling of band members and a future collaboration of some sort with Tom Burtless of Humble Braggers, Ogadzhanov has also taken to revamping some of his older material. One of those revisited songs, which just so happened to slip under our radar, was “Let’s Skip,” released nearly a month ago. Originally a nervy chip-tunes number recorded under the Brat’ya moniker, “Let’s Skip” has been remarkably remade into a lush cut of electro-pop that would make Johnny Jewel jealous. Fans of Cherub, Chromatics, and darker Hot Chip should listen below. You might want to check it out now so you aren’t surprised when this makes our top 20 count down at the end of the year.
In April 2013, all-around WNY favorite electro-pop act, JOYWAVE, released the incredibly catchy single “Tongues” featuring a scatted sample Patricia Patrone of KOPPS (both buffaBLOG party artists I might add). In between locking up their summer on the festival circuit and two opening gigs for the Killers, the band got around to dropping the video for the single, which at the time of this writing, is sitting pretty on the Billboard’s Top 50 Dance Club songs. Dubbed the number one song out of Rochester in 2013 on our top ten count down, “Tongues” has made waves across the blogosphere and eventually demanded the attention of satellite and commercial radio. Watch the boys shoot clothes on naked people below. Oh yeah, probably NSFW unless you have a chill boss.