Tag Archives: san francisco

BLK JKS @ The Rickshaw Stop

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Johannesburg-based BLK JKS played a rawkin’ show last night at the Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco.  And from the looks of the lightly attended crowd, you guys didn’t know what you were missing. Their music is a wild concoction of transcendental African rhythms, Zulu soul and scorching rock and roll.  And they like to jam.  They are all completely self taught musicians and it was fascinating to watch them perform. I was struck by way they handled and played their instruments.  It was definitely different.  There was an air of reverence that translated into this feeling of the instruments playing them versus they playing the instruments.  That or they worked some really good voodoo magic on me last night.

The band’s Mystery EP is out today on Secretly Canadian.  If you’re heading to SXSW, you can check them out for yourself at one of the following shows:

Wednesday, March 18 11:00am
ME Television Studios (KEXP event)

Wednesday, March 18 10:00pm
Paradise Café (401 E. 6th St)

Thursday, March 19 2:00pm
The Parish (NPR event) (214 E. 6th St)

Thursday, March 19 10:30pm
Mohawk Patio (912 Red River St)

Listen to: “Lakeside”

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Deerhunter @ San Francisco’s Mezzanine

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Deerhunter kicked off the Noise Pop Festival this Tuesday at San Francisco’s Mezzanine and holy shit was it good. Ranking right up there as my favorite live performance so far in 2009, but we are just getting started.  They pulled out quite a few new songs early on in the set but after a few quirky interludes from Bradford Cox the band got down to business and had us knee deep in Microcastle yumminess.  For those of you who pulled out early before the encore, you don’t know what you missed. The band delivered a relentless, blistering, mind-blowing wall of sound finale that left me with goosebumps and grins all night long.

Listen to “Agoraphobia” 

How It Ends

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After months of giving Monet the cold shoulder, my little caveman emerged for a brief and intense love fest last week that will surely keep her hooked and immune to his inevitable snubs for many more months to come.

Listen to DeVotchka’s ‘How it Ends‘:

Catch DeVotchka at San Francisco’s The Fillmore January 30 and 31.

Hookey

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hookey

It was 75 degrees and sunny in San Francisco yesterday and Judah’s school was closed for teacher’s conferences, so we played hookey. Which consisted of:

  1. One slice of Arinell’s pizza
  2. One kids sized  cone of Bi-Rite Creamery’s Brown Butter Pecan ice cream
  3. Three hours of non-stop play at Dolores Park
  4. Random outbursts of song to Juliana Hatfield‘s ‘My Baby’:

Vampire Weekend, Cold War Kids @ The Mezzanine

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It was an Indie Pop extravaganza at The Mezzanine in San Francisco this Wednesday. The night began with local band Audrye Sessions putting out a very impressive performance. I posted a cover they did recently of Elliott Smith’s Waltz #2.  One of the more beautiful covers I’ve heard lately.  While their sound doesn’t quite gel with my overall music taste, their live presence gave me motivation to revisit that initial judgement.  Big, orchestral sound and beautiful arrangements.  Very talented and sure to go far.

Next up was Chairlift, who’s performance paled in comparison.  I know many people are big fans of this Brooklyn-based trio and they received oodles of publicity for the song ‘Bruises’ that was featured on an iPod commercial.  (Which I’ve come to realize that if I don’t already hate the band being featured on an Apple commercial, I soon will. The Ting Tings are a perfect example.) But this band does absolutely nothing for me – recorded or live. I mean really, who puts a chorus of ‘stop, drop and roll’, into a song?  Their lyrics are just idiotic. Here’s another one:  “The most evident utensil/Is none other than a pencil/Not a multi-colored stencil.” What?  My 3 year old could write more compelling lyrics. It’s like bad 80s music all over again.  The equivalent of Nena’s ‘99 Luftballons’. 

Thankfully Cold War Kids turned the vibe around with an energetic performance, albeit short.  Their rousing rendition of Saint John was great. Vampire Weekend played their usual set (this was the third time serendipity brought me to one of their shows this year) and they did not disappoint.  Love ’em or hate ’em, they do deliver.  It will be interesting to see how they follow up all the hype from this year.

Listen to Audrye Sessions‘ cover of Elliott Smith’s Waltz #2

Listen to  Chairlift, Evident Utensil (if you dare)

Listen to  Cold War Kids, Saint John

Listen to Vampire Weekend, A Punk

School of Rock: Cold War Kids

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The story of a boy and his toilet paper holder continues.  Judah’s at it again.  This week it’s Cold War Kids, ‘Hang Me Out to Dry’.  While technically not his best work, he gets lots of style points for his Elvis-like footwork. Lead singer Nathan Willett can learn a thing or two from these moves, no?

Cold War Kids and Vampire Weekend top the line up for the Pre-Not So Silent Night Party at Mezzanine in San Francisco this Wednesday, December 10. (Thanks, Joerg for the ticket!)

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Anatomy of a Remodel – Part Deux

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Quite a while back, I posted some photos documenting the beginning phase of our living room update that included rewiring the room for distributed in wall sound with Paradigm SA-15R speakers and a complete overhaul design-wise by friend, colleague and renowned SF designer, Ken Fulk.  Well, I’m happy to unveil the result of our extreme living room makeover. 

I don’t know if there are enough adjectives to describe how awesome it is.  Suffice it to say, everytime I come home I still pause to make sure I’m in the right house.  It’s so sexy, hip and downright functional I don’t quite know what to do with myself.  Do I really live here? It is now my favorite music listening room too – as I sit in front of the fire and control my Sonos playlists with my iPhone Sonos Controller.  (Oh just stop me already!) Technology can be so good.

Speaking of music, I was going through my inbox today listening to some new tunes sent my way and uncovered this nice French electronica album from ElodieO that sounded perfect in my sexy new digs. She sounds like a trip hop version of Nico at times and a French version of Bjork at others.  I was intrigued to learn as well that Serge Gainsbourg and The Cure arranged some of the songs.

Listen to ‘Crazy‘ – a track off ElodieO’s new album, Stubborn.  If you like what you hear, go see ElodieO at The Elbo Room in San Francisco December 15. 

Listen to ‘Crazy‘:

 

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Before

house

After. See that beautiful orchid? I give it 2 months before I kill it.

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Another perspective.

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The piece de resistance - my $100 Craigslist vintage sofa, refurbished and fabulous in mohair. I never gave up on you, my sweet sofa!

house-2

Here you see the ceiling mounted Paradigm speakers.

 

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Blitzen Trapper @ The Indpendent

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I thoroughly enjoyed seeing Blitzen Trapper last night at The Independent. (And was equally amused when I realized I was standing next to The Morning Benders while watching it.  Cool.)  Although I felt like I was seeing an entirely new band.  I saw them a couple of times in the past year supporting Wild Mountain Nation, but this was a wholly different performance.  They stuck to Furr almost exclusively. And lead singer Eric Earley was clearly channeling Bob Dylan. I think the only song from the vault they pulled out was in fact ‘Wild Mountain Nation’.  The music was tight, the harmonies were beautiful.  Much more subdued than their usual blitzkrieg. And I must say my favorite song of the night, while not necessarily one of my favorites on the album, was ‘Love U‘.  They took me someplace else during that song. Awesome.

Onward and upward, Blitzen Trapper!

Listen to ‘Black River Killer’

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Ticket Giveaway: Wintersleep @ Slims – November 24

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I have two tickets to giveaway to see one of my favorite newcomers, Nova Scotia-based Wintersleep, at Slim’s in San Francisco on November 24.  Send an email to theOCMD@gmail.com by this Wednesday, November 19th to win.  I’ll pick a winner randomly.

Reportedly, they put on an excellent live show.  As one fan put it, ‘Wintersleep turned me from a casual listener to a fan in one show.’

Listen to ‘Drunk on Aluminum’: 

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Trendspotting: SF Bands You’ve (Probably) Never Heard Of – Part 1

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I first really started diving into the San Francisco music scene at SXSW this year, thanks to The Bay Bridged and their efforts in organizing the fantastic SXSW Bay Area Takeover event.  Interesting isn’t it?  There is so much great music in our own backyard and I had to go to Austin to discover it.  It was at that point I decided to start playing in my own sandbox.  And I haven’t looked back since.  The only downside to this strategy is that it becomes harder and harder to rope my music friends into coming to shows with me.  “You want me to see who?  Never heard of them.”

The following series of posts – SF Bands You’ve (Probably) Never Heard Of – is a culmination of this research and discovery since March of this year.  There’s a lot of good music coming out of our town – putting San Francisco squarely on the map as a vital music city.  And you should know about it.  Keep in mind that this is not an exhaustive list of all the Bay Area bands around.  Just my favorites. In alphabetical order, of course.

60 Watt Kid

One of the things I’ve discovered in my local band research is that there appears to be some momentum in specific genres – like psyche rock and experimental. 60 Watt Kid encompasses a bit of both to me. Their self-titled debut is chaotic, bizarre and intriguing all at the same time.  

Listen to: ‘Cobblestone Sunglasses’

Citay

It’s 1970 in San Francisco and the hippies are back. Or perhaps they never left.  Listening to the flower power psych rock of Citay will certainly transport you back in time with the influences of some of the greats sprinkled all over the place – from Led Zepplin to Jerry Garcia.  It feels good.

Listen to: ‘Little Kingdom’

Cousin Chris

Cousin Chris (aka Chris Schreiber), is a veritable one man band who released his solo effort Moon Paper in July. The album was recorded at John Vanderslice’s Tiny Telephone Studios. The album is beautiful, with a folky-blues sound and vocals that remind me of Neil Young at times. There’s a good interview with Chris on Stranger Dance.

Listen to: ‘Head Down’

Get this album free via eMusic’s 50 Free MP3 Promo

buy it at insound!

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