It's a rainy Tuesday afternoon and I'm sitting on my couch, in H&M yoga pants, talking to my #1 celeb. crush over the phone. "I'm just at my flat, hanging out with my bunny rabbit" she tells me. This is not how I would've envisioned my first one-on-one contact with Kate Nash to turn out. However, there's something endearing about it. Also incredibly endearing: Kate is exactly the girl you would expect her to be.
Michael McShane won't stand for any of that live-fast-die-young rock-'n'-roll malarkey.
"The longer I live, the happier I am," McShane declares by phone to discuss his ongoing musical project, Cowmuddy, a Philadelphia-grown blend of Americana and classic rock leavened with humor and DIY sensibility.
"I don't wanna be starting out when I'm 40," says Michelle Zauner, guitarist and singer for indie pop-rockers Post Post. The tongue-in-cheek remark comes from someone who's just old enough to cash in drink tickets at gigs, but the immediacy behind it is real. Carpe diem, carpe musicam.
"I don't want to deal with promotions or sleazy booking agents, I just want to make music." It's a late summer night in Fishtown as Marc Neibauer, the mastermind behind local band, Eat Your Birthday Cake, reveals his dislike for gigs, touring and mostly everything that comes with being a musician - besides, you know, actually making music.
"Born" November 1, 2008, Philadelphia-based Metropolis America's sound tethers the 80s sound to today while adding its own personality. Having formed only 2 years ago, Cristian Mora, Brett Hammond and Rick Eddy had a common goal long before they got together - and through trial and error (and a few bands) they were able to have that vision realized in their last album The Hospital for Regret & Dreams.
Raise high your disco balls y'all. Glass Candy's new EP, Touching Without Feeling was released earlier this year on the Italians Do it Better label. Glass Candy, Consisting of Ida No on vocals and Johnny Jewel producing, have been linked to major names in the fashion industry, compared to pop greats (i.e. Debbie Harry and David Bowie), and have toured with some real indie gems.
Born and raised in Chicago, Todd Carey moved to Los Angeles in the late 90s to study music at the University of Southern California. Then he began fronting the Los Angeles improv band, Telepathy. But despite causing the band so much success, Carey returned to his hometown in pursuit of a new path as a solo artist.
"Don't you think maybe this is something really important if it upsets you that much?"
That was the question my counselor asked me a few years into a musical hiatus. The trouble started at a concert just a few days before. I would normally consider a live show to be a fun activity, but they started causing me some anxiety. In fact, the better the performer, the more discord the music created in my psyche.
George Morgan is on his third year of following local artists with cameras and lights. On screen is over seventy-five (mostly) local bands including McRad, New Liberty and tonight's acts, the Parachuting Apostles, Keystoned, Downtown Harvest and Don McCloskey.
George LeHoop will play the kayak, specifically the electric kayak. He will play cardboard boxes. He will play blank canvases attached with bungee cords to metal frames. He will play anything he can get his hands on. LeHoop will use chopsticks, mallets, traditional drum sticks, brushes and hot rods- pieces of bamboo tied together to bang out his rhythms.
