Eric Bachmann returns to the Tree Bar, this time as Crooked Fingers, and he’s bringing John Vanderslice along with him. The show is Tuesday, Nov. 6, and the $15 tickets will be on sale at the Tree Bar starting Monday at 7 p.m.
Obviously, this show will sell out, so if you’re as excited as I am about seeing these guys in such an intimate venue (now with an unobstructed view!), I’d recommend getting to the Tree on Monday.
May we never take you for granted, Kyle Sowash.
Comments Off on Crooked Fingers, John Vanderslice coming to the Tree Bar
Posted in Columbus
Tagged Crooked Fingers, Eric Bachmann, John Vanderslice, Tree Bar
Mark Eitzel and Columbus go way back. At one time Eitzel wrote for Tim Anstaett’s The Offence, and his early, Joy Division-esque band Naked Skinnies began here. They were the “hero band” of Ron House, who played lots of shows with Naked Skinnies and helped put out the band’s first 7-inch, “All My Life,” on “Naked House Records” in 1981. Eitzel formed the Skinnies, his precursor to American Music Club, with Greg Bonnell (AMC, Moviola), John Hricko and Nancy Kangas before heading out to San Francisco. Though Eitzel doesn’t recall the period with particular fondness and has yet to permit digital dissemination of the aforementioned 7-inch, it’s better than he remembers it to be and a fascinating look into how Eitzel started out.
Fast-forward to 2012. American Music Club is dissolved (at least for the time being), and Eitzel is about to release a solo album called Don’t Be a Stranger. Eitzel has said of the new record, “I wanted to make an album more reminiscent of records like Harvest by Neil Young or Five Leaves Left by Nick Drake than anything I’ve previously done.” The Young/Drake touchstones make perfect sense on this first preview, which recounts the tale of Eitzel watching a band fronted by a woman who wrote “I love you but you’re dead” on his poster.
Don’t Be a Stranger is out Oct. 2 on Merge Records.
Comments Off on Listen: Mark Eitzel – “I Love You but You’re Dead”
Tagged American Music Club, Greg Bonnell, Mark Eitzel, Merge Records, Moviola, Naked Skinnies
You may know producer Mike McCarthy‘s name from his many collaborations with Spoon. Or maybe his work on Columbus band The Sun’s Don’t Let Your Baby Have All the Fun. McCarthy was also the one who introduced Sam Brown to Britt Daniel in Divine Fits’ embryonic stage.
This year McCarthy also launched his own label, Western Medical Records, just so he could release something from two of his favorite female-fronted, New Wave/punk bands in Austin: Crooked Bangs and Feral Future. Western Meds describes Crooked Bangs as, “Europe 1978 layered onto America 1965 and delivered to a punk scene that’s dissatisfied with 2012” and Feral Future as “heavily rooted in the traditions of anarcho-punk and riot grrrl.” Sounds about right to my ears. Plus a lot of French in Crooked Bangs. I can think of quite a few people in Columbus who will dig this.
McCarthy pressed 500 of Crooked Bangs’ self-titled LP and another 500 of Feral Future’s EP. Pick them up at tomorrow night’s Ace of Cups show, where Philadelphia’s The Eeries open. 9pm, $5.
Comments Off on Tuesday: Crooked Bangs, Feral Future @ Ace of Cups
Posted in Music
Tagged Ace of Cups, austin, Crooked Bangs, Feral Future, Mike McCarthy, The Eeries, Western Medical Records
People LOVE Mumford & Sons. A lot. The band played the Wexner Center’s Black Box on the Mershon stage a couple years ago, then sold out the roughly 5,000 tickets for the outdoor version of the LC Pavilion. So Scott Steinecker, head of LC’s parent company PromoWest, decided to turn the Aug. 14 show into a “festival setting,” which meant renting a stage and turning the LC’s parking lot into a venue that could hold roughly 10,000 people. And the Brits packed that lot, too, selling out double the LC’s regular capacity.
This was the scene: A fence around the perimeter, beer stations everywhere, Late Nite Slice, a burrito bus, plus a large screen next to the main stage and another in the middle of the lot about halfway back. Here’s a view during Dawes’s opening set from roughly halfway back on the left side:
Continue reading
Tagged dawes, Envelope, Festival setting, lc pavilion, mumford and sons
Directed by Milan Karcic. “Manifesto” is from the Columbus band’s recently released Brick & Mortar.
Comments Off on Video: Watershed – “Manifesto”
Tagged Brick and Mortar, Colin Gawel, Joe Oestreich, Joe Peppercorn, Manifesto, Milan Karcic, Watershed
Here’s another track (via WNYC) from the Chris Porterfield project we told you about called Field Report. I’m very much anticipating the band’s self-titled album, which comes out on Partisan Records Sept. 11.
Field Report tour dates (no Columbus yet):
Continue reading
Comments Off on Listen: New Field Report – “Chico the American”
Posted in Stream
Tagged Bon Iver, Chico the American, Chris Porterfield, Field Report, Justin Vernon, Megafaun
What’s wrong with me?
Why am I so moody?
What happened to my family?
Oh, no.
How did I get unhappy?
Picked up a vinyl copy of Jenny Mae’s There’s a Bar Around the Corner at Elizabeth’s the other day, and it reminded me to revisit Don’t Wait Up for Me, and then Bela posted this video for track 4 from that album, “Ho Bitch” — “1st Jenny Mae video, 16 years later.” Synchronicity.
It’s an incredibly simple video that pairs quite well with this devastatingly beautiful song.
Comments Off on Video: Jenny Mae – “Ho Bitch”
Tagged Anyway Records, Bela Koe-Krompecher, Don't Wait Up for Me, Jenny Mae
MP3: Strand of Oaks – Maureen’s
Timothy Showalter’s Strand of Oaks returns to Columbus on Thursday (8/2), this time opening for The Tallest Man on Earth at the Wexner Center. Showalter is one of my favorite musicians and always a fun interview, so I had to ask him a few questions about the direction of his just-released Dark Shores. Gone are the walls of synth of Pope Killdragon, replaced instead by reverb-less vocals and John Vanderslice-approved acoustic arrangements.
You can find an abbreviated form of this interview in The Other Paper this week, but here’s the full email exchange that Tim and I had over the past couple weeks.
Was John Vanderslice someone you had in mind when you were writing these songs, and how much did his aesthetic and input influence the sound of Dark Shores?
Actually the record was started twice. I went back to my friend Ben (Vehorn)’s studio in Akron last October. I had wanted to do this giant synth follow up to Pope Killdragon, and Ben was the perfect person for that. So we recorded about half the record, and it kept growing more epic. I hadn’t finalized lyrics yet so they we’re basically instrumentals. When the lyrics were done I quickly realized that this record was not going to be what I had initially planned. The lyrics became incredibly real to me and the fantasy element didn’t fit anymore.
Right around that time, I was in San Francisco and visited John (Vanderslice) at Tiny Telephone. We clicked immediately and began planning the record. John was a producer in every sense of the word. I trusted his decisions and what he saw in the songs. Our goal with the record was to finally capture my singing right. There’s always been this disconnect with how I sing live and how it’s recorded. John wanted the voice to rise above everything else.
Continue reading
Comments Off on Interview: Strand of Oaks’ Tim Showalter
Posted in Interviews, MP3
Tagged Chris Ward, Dark Shores, John Vanderslice, Mountain Goats, Pattern is Movement, Plastic Ono Band, Strand of Oaks, Sunset Tree, Tallest Man on Earth, Timothy Showalter, Tiny Telephone, wexner center
Last night Britt Daniel, Dan Boeckner and Sam Brown showed up at the Continental Club in Austin billed as “The Hot Skull,” then played their first ever Divine Fits set, pulling off a 12-song secret show that actually remained pretty secret until just a few minutes before the band took the stage.
Here’s a not-too-shabby live video of “Flaggin a Ride” (via CoS), track 2 on A Thing Called Divine Fits, out Aug. 28 on Merge. Boeckner told me recently that writing and rehearsing “Flaggin” was one of those moments where everything clicked, and he realized this band is a real band — a real and awesome band:
“We did this super-early version of it, which is pretty much what ended up on the record, minus some overdubs. The bass just stays the same through the verses, and the guitar was just this weird, clicky, rhythmic, one-note thing that would shift every now and then. We were writing it and just kept stripping away guitar parts until there are actually no chords. I don’t think I play many chords on any of the songs [on the album], except maybe “Civilian Stripes.” Anyway, we kept stripping “Flaggin a Ride” back and back and back. Finally, it was like, this sounds fucking great. I was really excited about it. There’s no guitar chords in that song. It’s all implied. That made me really happy. When we could play that song all the way through, that was when I was like, yeah…”
In Columbus, the question people have been asking is, how did this band come about, and how did Sam Brown — a guy everyone in the Columbus scene knows is one of the best drummers around — get hooked up with the frontmen of Spoon and Wolf Parade/Handsome Furs?
Continue reading
Comments Off on Video: Divine Fits – “Flaggin a Ride” from secret show in Austin, plus some band origin details
Posted in Columbus, Music, Video
Tagged austin, Britt Daniel, Continental Club, Dan Boeckner, Divine Fits, Guided by Voices, Handsome Furs, Hot Skull, Sam Brown, Spoon, V-3
Just like last month, we’ll keep this thing minimalist and not clutter it with addresses, websites, start times, ticket costs, etc. Google is your friend once you find a show that interests you.
So, here are some August shows. I tried to spread the net a bit wider this month — there’s at least one show for every day in August — but obviously there are other shows happening that I’ve missed, and probably some relevant openers, too, so please do add to this list in the comments. And don’t forget the Touring Bands coming to Ohio and Hype threads in the Friendship Farm. And head to the Columbus DIY Messageboard for info on lots of DIY shows coming up.
AUGUST
Wed, 8/1:
Jeff the Brotherhood, Juiceboxxx, Petit Mal @ Basement
Cavo @ LC
A Lull @ Summit
Sovroncourt @ Ace of Cups
Boston, Kansas @ Ohio State Fair
Thu, 8/2:
Lydia Loveless @ Columbus Commons (6:30pm)
Tallest Man on Earth, Strand of Oaks @ Wexner
Temper Trap, Wild Belle @ Newport
Drekka, Jessica 93, Besoin Dead @ Ace of Cups
The Black Owls @ Tree Bar
Hop Along, Nasty Habit, Point Reyes @ Skylab
Fri, 8/3:
The Van Allen Belt, Forest & The Evergreens and goLab @ Till Dynamic Fare
Moon High, The Hill and the Wood, Carl Anderson @ Brother’s Drake
Food (feat. Ed from fIREHOSE, The Garrison, Ampline, Hookers Made Out of Cocaine @ Tree Bar
Buggin Out #7 @ Carabar
The Black Order @ Summit
Bethesda, Time & Temperature, Mike’s Wilson @ Kobo
Continue reading
Comments Off on Columbus concert calendar: August
Posted in Columbus
