Horse Stories, whose fifth LP, November, November saw release January 19th, was a quiet electric ballad Thursday the 21st at Pete’s Candy Store in Brooklyn. Writer, singer and rhythm guitarist Toby Burke stood while Luther Russell assumed a stool and played a bluesy, poppy lead guitar, melodies and some wonderful tremolo assuming prominence.
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Pre-recorded music was the theme of the evening at Mercury Lounge. Coming from the garage as many of us 80s/90s kids do, the idea of pre-recorded music comingling with a live band is anathema to what is going on. Perhaps now it is what is going on.
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The Glasslands, in the boonies of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, boasts a lovely decor of corrugated tin ceiling and some sort of bridge support keeping the building up. This atmosphere suited Tuesday night’s opening band, Dynasties, just fine. The two-man effort distorted and drummed its way through half-a-dozen numbers, with alternating two-chord riffs and brief lead-guitar virtuosos. The songs, though not drastically different from each other, seemed born of the two fellows in the band having spent reams of time futzing around with how best the propulsive and fill-ecstatic rhythm could match the voraciously distorted guitar. What is emitted is a loud, often intriguing sound. Aside from a few brief outbursts, the vocals were largely absent. I wondered what a few melodies might do for the sound.
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Sherlock’s Daughter, with all five musicians playing or otherwise cavorting sound from their instruments, were very loud. The November 19 show at Pianos in Manhattan was intense with volume. Given that these deafening adventures were intermingled with vocals both delicate and dominating, and melodies as catchy as a cold, there were no complaints.
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My hope was that Luis Accorsi, Cracked Latin’s charismatic lead-singer, would not descend from the stage and twirl me ’round. Fortunately he found a much lovelier specimen than myself for that honor. But all of us partaking of the band’s show at Kenny’s Castaways November 6 knew he would be dancing with someone.
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The titles of Múm’s last two releases are indicative of the band’s sound and intent. Both are invitations. 2007’s Go Go Smear the Poison Ivy was, though not widely recognized as such, a return to the wonder and satisfaction of 2002’s Finally We Are No One; while the band’s latest, Sing Along To Songs You Don’t Know, steps furthest away from Múm’s unique ability to make time – music – stand still.
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“I hear the ambulance towards you.” A woman somewhere on Broadway said this into her cell phone as I made my way to the Knitting Factory. Halloween in New York City was busy; and if you weren’t in costume, those who were let you know what they thought about it. Happily, the Factory’s bands (save opener Ortolon) put forth the costuming effort and the audience only listened.
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When the Dandy Warhols began playing “Bohemian Like You” midway through the set, it struck me how very long this band has been in my life. I began to imagine all of the used cars, diners, lawns and parking lots I came of age in, the Dandy’s serenading my hedonism from the car’s open windows. I thought of how loving a piece of artwork has much to do with loving the time in your life occupied by that artwork. Then the Dandy’s fucked up and – with steel balls –started the song over.
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Beneath Joe’s Pub, the bourgeois restaurant/concert hall in downtown Manhattan, 4, 5 and 6 subway trains intermittently rumble, making quake the place and everyone in it without being a fuss. This affords the club an atmosphere, transfixing during a performance, only New York money can buy. The effect is almost worth the privilege of an eight dollar pint.
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Aloha launched their latest tour – extending to Virginia and Illinois – March 10 at the Bug Jar in Rochester, NY. The four band members played almost all of the new EP, Light Works, to an enthusiastic Monday night crowd, which tried its best to respect everyone else’s cramped space while also boogying in some manner.
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