Portland’s Johanna Kunin’s vocals are strong and firm. In “Hidden Systems” Johanna, along with various other musicians under the moniker Bright Archer, tells the story of nature, history, and love as a lullaby of powerful and dynamic proportions. The song is from the Bright Archer’s recent release Hidden Systems.
With Hidden Systems out now, Bright Archer will be touring the West Coast this August, performing at Los Angeles’ Bardot on Monday, August 22nd.
08.19.11 – Seattle, WA @ Fremont Abbey for Songs About Books
08.20.11 – Davis, CA @ Sophia’s Thai Kitchen
08.21.11 – San Francisco, CA @ Hemlock Tavern
08.22.11 – Los Angeles, CA @ Bardot
08.24.11 – Tucson, AZ @ Plush
08.27.11 – Denver, CO @ The Meadowlark
08.28.11 – Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge
08.29.11 – Boise, ID @ Visual Arts Collective
08.30.11 – Seattle, WA @ Comet Tavern
If you’re going to be on the West Side tomorrow night, come check out “Chicks That Bang” with Correatown, Kissing Cousins and a personal favorite Tic Tic Boom! at Central SAPC in Santa Monica.
The night will be filled with some lovely female musicians and some awesome dude musicians as well. Doors at 9 and $5. DO IT and you won’t regret it.
If you’ve ever read any of my reviews, you know that I have a special place in my heart for albums that are real. I like albums that are more human and less computer. I like real drums, as opposed to drum machines. When my editor-in-chief sent me a track off of This Distance, the new EP from Oax, it hit me right in that “this is real” heart place.
I would even venture as far as to call this EP raw, and I would mean it in the most positive way possible. The guitars feedback. The cymbal hits aren’t uniform. You can hear that someone is playing the music you are listening to, and that someone is Angelini Giorgio. Aside from the closer on the EP, ‘Sutures’, everything on the album was written and played by Giorgio.
On my first listen through, this album made me want to drive. I wanted to feel wind, and watch mountains and hills pass by. I wanted to cruise down Highway 1 and listen to this and remember good times and bad times. Then I read the story behind the album and understood why.
Angelini had been on a hiatus from music, after leaving The Rosebuds and going back to school. Then he went through a hard breakup. Then he sat down and wrote music, by himself. This EP is the result of an emotional dam breaking. I listened to the album a second time and I could feel the lyrics. I empathized with the man singing about the sins he had committed, and the sins committed against him, and the culmination of all these sins and how they make up the lives that we lead.
What I’m trying to tell you is that this music is good. It is really good.
If your as big of a fan of this British folk pop duo as I am, you’ll be thrilled to hear that on Turntable.fm Tomorrow at 11 am PST they will be debuting tracks from their upcoming album Paradise (Moshi Moshi Records) in the Paste Magazine Room. Their debut full-length Yeah, So came out in March of last year and was easily one of my top favorite records of the year. With a sweet sense of folky nostalgia, gorgeous guy/girl harmonies, and bittersweet lyrics, Yeah, So is completely captivating. Paradise will be out on September 13th so here’s to hoping that Slow Club’s sophomore release will continue my love affair. See you on turntable.fm tomorrow!
As of tomorrow, the single from the record “Two Cousins” (video below) will be available to buy on iTunes.
Loving this! Don’t have too long to write but wanted to share a great track today…
“Their music has been infiltrating the web since early 2010 & already garnered fans around the globe, but MNDR a.k.a. Amanda Warner & co-producer/co-writer Peter Wade 1st came together 1 year ago when Warner moved to New York from Oakland, CA. Warner’s melodic sense & underground noise/art influences coupled with Wade’s interest in merging non-traditional sounds with polished songs has proven to be a perfect marriage of minds. In less than 6 months, MNDR has toured the world opening for acts including Miike Snow, & Massive Attack. MNDR continues to be a band member with Mark Ronson & The Business INTL.” (WeLikeItIndie)
“As MNDR’s single “Cut Me Out” has continued to work its way onto dance floors around the world, the Brooklyn-based DJ, Kingdom, decided to work his notorious remix magic on the track. His remix focuses on one simple melody line on which he builds Amanda’s vocal layers from the original track. Kingdom, who has released some hyped mixtapes and a single through Fool’s Gold records, earned his dance cred through unique remixes like this one. So download this official Green Label Sound remix for free right now along with “Cut Me Out” remixes from Drop the Lime, Hervé, and MNDR.” (Green Label Sound)
Since my first introduction, I’ve been completely sold on this band. Their dark and dreamy “psych folk” is charming and completely encapsulating. If Sea of Bees had en evil twin, it would be Tasseomancy. Or, if Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. had a goth little sister, you’d find it in this band. That said, the two Lightman sisters, Sari and Romy, also draw on nostalgia with hints of 60s girl pop a la The Shangri-Las.
I’m very excited for their new record Ulalume! to come out August 30th. In the meantime, you can download their track “Healthy Hands (will mourn you)” below.
I had the distinct pleasure of spending part of my fourth of July weekend with Taking Back Sunday in Phoenix, AZ at The Marquee Theater. It’s been a few years since I last joined them and not only are they back with their strongest album in a long while, but this tour also marks the return of TBS’s original line up.
The show started with The New Regime who were decent, but ultimately forgettable. After a few more drinks The Colour Revolt took the stage and if you haven’t seen this band, you’re missing out. They were the best parts of mewithoutyou with their own style, but end of the day were just super awesome. I bought their record after the show.
Next up was Thursday, a band I loved in my younger days, but who lost me somewhere along the way. Their set was great, exactly how I remembered them. Tight, full of energy. Their set was mostly newer material, but they did bring out the deep classic “Jet Black New Year” off of the somewhat obscure Five Stories Falling EP and the place erupted with happy fans.
Taking Back Sunday took the stage in grand fashion, kicking off their set with “MakeDamnSure,” which made the whole room release all the energy they’d been storing up until that point. It’s always gutsy to open a show with one of your biggest hits, but this definitely set the stage for the rest of the night. Despite the fact that I had promised a review for this show, I needed to mosh to this set. Taking Back Sunday practically demands it (in fact, I think they may have literally demanded it). I did, like a pissed off 15-year-old and it was the most fun I’d had in a while. Their set was a great mix of old favorites and new songs that reminded me why I love this band. So much energy, and a sense of passion that can sometimes be forgotten in all of the “chillwave” and “reverb.” TBS played a great show and they’ve still got it.
Jimmy Eat World, what a show to begin my Seattle based rock journalism efforts with. It has been almost precisely ten years since I’ve seen them live (their Bleed American tour in 2001) and the decade has certainly treated them well. It started a little tumultuously with the departure of Mike Trombino from the “Futures” project in 2004, as he had produced/recorded with/ or engineered every major release of theirs since 96 when he produced their first studio album Static Prevails. It was said that this was due to the band not having enough material to feel comfortable recording a full cohesive album and then later having scheduling conflicts with Trombino. While this was indeed traumatic as far as the production of the album was concerned it gave the band a chance to break away and construct something completely different. They took a little time to get back into the creation phase and after building out a few of the key tracks of Futures they teamed up with Gil Norton who was known widely for his work with the Pixies and Dashboard Confessional and put out an album that was a far reach from anything that they had done before. I found the album to be a testament to the many layers of the group that was continually being displayed through the evolution of each album. The band then toured with Taking back Sunday and Greenday before returning to the studio to record their next album “Chase This Light”
Chase This Light came at an interesting time for me because I was heavily involved in the creation of tour apparel for major label bands for a merch company in Los Angeles and was constantly immersed in the music world. While I didn’t have the pleasure of working on any Jimmy t-shirts they were definitely played through my headphones while I worked away in adobe. When Chase This Light came out I couldn’t stop listening. It felt like an incredible call back to the days of Bleed American where every track could be a single. It was one of those albums where there was no wasted space, every song was worth listening to every time. This time they decided to self produce the album, which involved getting a bunch of talented producers working together with them to create something amazing. (Chris Testa and John Fields as co-producers and Butch Vig as exec producer)
After announcing that they were going to start working on their next album in 2008 Atkins began work in a bit of an unconventional method for “Invented”. He would spend time studying the works of photographers like Cindy Sherman and Hannah Starkey before putting pen and ink to paper and because of this method a lot of the songs have their own distinct message. Each track communicates an individual idea but is woven together to form a fully cohesive set of thoughts communicated through the band’s music.
While putting together the material for Invented, Jimmy Eat World traveled for a tenth anniversary tour of the release of their first studio album Clarity in which they performed ten sold out shows across the US in which they played the album Clarity in its entirety. It was on this tour that the band regained connections to Trombino while playing in San Diego. They then decided to work with him again to produce their most recent work. One of the reasons they worked so well together on this production was Trombino’s willingness to produce in an unconventional method. The band would record their tracks in their home studio space “Unit 2” in Arizona and then send the tracks off to Trombino who was located in Los Angeles. It was an interesting long distance relationship but no one can deny the results. “Invented” very clearly follows the path of greatness that has been made standard by this band. With Atkins new approach to the lyrics and the return to Trombino’s production style (you can hear elements of Clarity and Bleed American pulse through this album) I was again amazed by their work. It should also be noted that another flavor was added to the recording in singer/song writer Courtney Marie Andrews who provided an integral part to the sound of the album and again in the show I just witnessed.
I will admit that Jimmy has seen a little less face time on my playlists over the last few years but this show reminded me of why I’ve been a fan for so damn long. When you run into bands throwing down shows after establishing a pretty extensive catalogue of music there is no telling what can come up, Atkins and crew played almost everything I wanted to hear from the more obscure to the classics to some tracks off of their most recent album “Invented”. I can liken it best to having just had exactly what I wanted from a meal. I walked away from that music feast satisfied and since the show they’ve definitely seen resurgence in my library.
