Creepoid and Moon Women are beloved local bands that haven’t been playing out as much as we’d like. Luckily, the combination of Creepoid drummer Pat Troxell and Moon Women frontman Justin Pittney have been helping to fill the void with their impressive collaborative effort Residuels. In just a short amount of time, they have released an addictive fuzz-garage rock EP, played with the likes of ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead, and even went on tour making it down to SXSW, a rite of passage for most new bands these days. While Residuels have a big show coming up opening for The Stranglers on June 5 at Union Tranfer, I know that the band and their fans will be more at home in their element tonight at Kung Fu Necktie alongside Natural Child Family Band and Eat Skull. And they’ll be joined by debaucherous garage vets The Tough Shits. Kung Fu Necktie, 1250 N. Front St, 8pm, $10, 21+ - Bill McThrill
Clicky Clicky Muisc blog just shared And I Forgot A Long Time Ago How You Feel, a compilation of ten current acts performing early recordings of Lilys (from 1991 - 1995). Here's Philly's own Pet Milk covering "February Fourteenth" and Arc In Round's rendition of "The Turtle Which Died Before Knowing," which you can download for free below along with the rest of the release HERE.
Nick Millevoi is one of the finest guitarist flying under the radar in Philly’s avant-garde music scene. You may have come across his work while performing on the electric 6-string with such acts as Many Arms, Electric Simcha, Archer Spade, Make A Rising, or one of the numerous jazz projects that he has lent his skilled fingers to over the years. However, when he fearlessly performs solo on his 12-string electric guitar creating some otherworldly sounds, that is the best evidence to support the truth behind my opening statement (and possibly that aliens, in fact, do live among us). Millevoi will be joined on the musically adventurous lineup at PhilaMOCA tonight by instrumental psych rock duo Air is Human, who will also be opening the evening for Japanese Guy, the experimental noise side project from Fleet Foxes’ Skye Skjelset with Andrew J.S. and Chris Icasiano. Yeah, things are about to get even weirder at the Moz. PhilaMOCA, 531 N. 12th St., 8:30pm, $7 - $10 Donation, All Ages - Alexis V.
Daytrotter just posted their session with rising 19-year-old emcee GrandeMarshall. You can check out and download his recordings for free HERE (w/membership). Enjoy!
The AudioBox 1818VSL by PreSonus (MSRP: $629) is an audio/MIDI interface that takes hardware/software integration to the next level, delivering a dynamite combination of features for music producers at every level. Enter The Deli and SonicScoop’s Pro Audio Giveaway for your chance to win one, and find out more about the prize HERE, but hurry because tomorrow is your final day to do so. Good luck!
Phoenix offered up the stems for their track "Trying to Be Cool" off their new album Bankrupt! to be remixed as part of Vice's The Creators Project. Philly's own Moon Bounce (a.k.a. Corey Regensberg) was chosen as one of the remixes to be featured. You take a listen to and download it for free below as well as the others HERE.
Check out the latest video from Out Of Town Films with DRGN KING performing "Holy Ghost"! It was one the two songs recorded at an impromptu session hosted by Girard Hall after the band's recent show at Kung Fu Necktie on May 9, 2013. Below are a few words from Out Of Town Films about the evening.
Two weeks ago, we invited local Philly band DRGN King to come play at Girard Hall after their show at Kung Fu Necktie. The plan was to have them play acoustically and to have a few people over to watch the performance. Well, things didn’t go exactly as planned and for the better. The acoustic set turned into a full on electric set and the few people turned into many people. So basically it was a mini-show.
The police were lurking outside since it was midnight on a Thursday and DRGN King were playing pretty loudly. They only had time for two songs. One of which was “Holy Ghost”, a song apparently about looking like Jesus. Enjoy.
The band Literature transplanted to Philly from Austin, TX bringing along their truly infectious jangly indie pop. I instantly fell in love with group’s 2012 LP Arab Spring, and they’ve followed it up with a 7” single earlier this year. The four-piece is slowly but surely spreading the word and making their presence known here in town. They’ll be opening for locals Pet Milk, who have recently experienced some lineup changes with the addition of new female vocalist Sarah Schimenek (replacing Adriane Dalton) and their search for a new drummer or bassist. The show this evening has been moved to MilkBoy Philly due to a water main break at Johnny Brenda’s this past weekend. MilkBoy Philly, 1100 Chestnut St., 9pm, $10, 21+ (Literature Photo by Abi Reimold) - Q.D. Tran
Congrats to Cold Fronts for signing a deal with Warner Bros./Sire Records! We are certainly interested to see what life with a major label will be like for them, and wish them all the best. Cheers fellas!
For those who decide whether to come or go based on the first forty seconds of an album, Restorations’ LP2 is practically tailor-made for snap judgments. After a chiming, anthemic guitar opening, the band already known for fist-raising jams lets all hell break loose with “D,” their most unrestrained opener yet. The drum kit-mauling, earth-shaking bass lines and ascendant guitar riffs can only be described as complete sensory overload, and make it clear that the following eleven songs are going to be fueled by pure viscera. If your preferences run towards structure over huge sound, this release may leave you cold; LP2’s predominant means of exploring the band’s wealth of ideas are stadium-sized instrumentation and endless waves of atmospherics, as well as a dose of ennui.
This is a murkier, more inward-looking Restorations than we’re used to. Everything that was there before, musically, is blown sky-high this time around. They’ve managed to pack ideas into every iota of the song list, aided by Jon Low’s miles-deep production; the density of the music itself is offset by an album-long meditation on place, belonging, and the ramifications of leaving the familiar behind, which makes the outsized sound that much more of an interesting direction. Juxtaposing the existential discomfort with more sophisticated, complex forays into Restorations’ sonic wheelhouse.
The spiraling guitars, one of the album’s specially prominent features, are everywhere, serving various purposes in each song. “Kind of Comfort”’s jittery glam rock aspirations accompany lyrics of searching and wanderlust. Even the more downbeat cuts (“In Perpetuity Through The Universe,” “New Old”) are propelled beyond their subject matter by the songs’ barely-concealed restless energy. At its more pensive moments, like the folk-inflected “Civil Inattention,” there is a restless undercurrent of texture and volatility that never quite lets up.
Album closer “Adventure Tortoise” is all monster buildup laced with extraterrestrial effects, kicking off into a sort of requiem for the band’s neighborhood. “I’d really like to stay to help this place,” growls Jon Loudon through his teeth, but the allure of letting it all go is too strong to resist. The longing for a place “where nobody knows your name” isn’t quite all-consuming enough to inspire real action, but it is definitely the new paradigm Loudon means.
It takes guts to pull off a release that feels ten minutes long but contains more emotional and musical texture than most records. Restorations cover a whole lot of ground on LP2, and for the most part, pull off their ambitions. A bit too sanguine for shoegaze, and maybe too heady for punk, Restorations’ second full-length album brings an intriguing palette of aspirations to their open road-ready sound, prepared to try anything and everything. - Alyssa Greenberg
