Look at the above picture and tell me you don’t want to go to this.
The New York rapper Le1f comes to Skidmore’s state-of-the-art Falstaffs Music Center at 9:00PM on November 30! Oh I know y’all wanna get down and dirty, and what better way to celebrate the upcoming finals week than with music “made with the intentions of music and dance,” according to the man himself? Check out his single “Wut” below:
The opener is Skidmore’s own up-and-coming two-man dance-party Karate, AKA KΔRΔTE. This is gonna be great, guys.
Saying that Spring Big Show is just around the corner is like playing Christmas music a month before Thanksgiving–it’s a bit premature, but I’m not complaining. And what better way to kick off this year’s speculation than with your own ideas? We’ve created a Wallwisher page so you can tell us who you want to see in the halls of the Big Gym next semester. Right now I see a few votes for Local Natives, a few for Frank Ocean, some for… I just gotta say good luck to whoever has to sort this out later. Whatever, it’s not completely overwhelming or anything.
It’s Big Show again! Come on down to the Big Gym Friday, October 12 for a night of music, dancing, and (albeit hard to recall) memories that will last a lifetime! That may sound too cute to be true, but I’m not making this up, folks. Student tickets are available at Case in the SGA booth, and prices are as follows: $8 for students prior to the show, $10 at the door. General admission tickets are also available at brownpapertickets.com for $25 prior, $30 at the door.
We’re excited to bring Mayer Hawthorne and Cults to the hallowed halls of the Big Gym! Aren’t hip and don’t know who these wonderful acts are? Here’s some info:
Mayer Hawthorne
Mr. Andrew Mayer Cohen is a neo-soul singer/songwriter from Los Angeles, CA. He cites influences as wide-ranging as Smokey Robinson and Isaac Hayes to J-Dilla, and his music tastefully reflects this blend of old and new soul. Just listen to his track “The Walk”— pure throwback, brassy horns doubling with tender background vocals, mid-tempo Motown beat, Hawthorne’s croon gluing the package together. (“The Walk” also accompanies a music video that’s a ton of gunslingling fun.) From his own mouth, speaking to to AskMen.com– “I make soul music for hip-hop heads.” Hawthorne may look like the geeky, horn-rimmed kid in the back of the lecture hall that sways to the music playing on his headphones, but at least you know he’s listening to something amazing.
Cults
Cults, the opening band for Big Show this fall, take you back to a simpler time, where you want to grow out your shaggy brown hair and croon into a microphone about how no one understands you. Madeline Follin, the band’s lead vocalist, has a high, sweet, and youthful voice that transforms her angst-y teenage lyrics into some really fun indie pop. She has previously recorded with punk band Youth Gone Mad on their album Touching Cloth. Ryan Mattos (staged and preferred named: Brian Oblivion) is the guitarist of the band.
Together, Oblivion and Follin are the two main band members and their long brown locks are pictured bouncing around on their website. The band is New York City based and the two attended The New School in the East Village. They released their first EP of 3 songs in 2010 on bandcamp, Cults 7” with Forest Family Records. Their release received a Best New Music shout out by Pitchfork Media. Then their self-titled album Cults was released by Columbia Records in June 2011 and was also granted a Pitchfork shout out.
Pitchfork and other Cults fans, drank up Follin’s youthful vocals and the band’s, as said on Pitchfork’s album review, “1960s girl pop…. [cut] with synths, guitars, and softly integrated samples.” Some of these samples are actually conversations the band members had with their fans. But it somehow works with their other dreamy and synth-y sounds.
But what really catches their listeners, is the honesty in their lyrics and their ability to make you sink into that youthful desire to be misunderstood. It makes you want to get up and drink the sunlight, to run away, to stay and dance in a crowd with everyone else—to not care about anything. Just check out the last words of their hit single “Go Outside”: “I think I want to live my life and you’re just in my way.”
Hospitality is a three piece indie pop band based in Brooklyn, NY. Although formed in 2007, the band had been quiet since their self titled EP in 2008 up until the release of their full length album, also self titled, earlier this year. Amber Papini, the singer, taught herself how to sing growing up in Kansass City, Mo. In Rachael Maddux’s review of Hospitality’s album for Pitchfork, she described “quietly groovy drumbeats that turn fully danceable in the flick of an instant, shimmering Afropoppy guitar raining down like confetti, whole brass sections that seem to barge in and sneak away and climb back in through some window.” The album received positive reviews from many music blogs and is said to be a tribute to the comings and goings of life as a twentysomething. Hospitality was named Stereogum’s band to watch in 2009.
We return with two great groups to share– Craft Spells
Craft Spells is a four piece band from Stockton, California headed up by Justin Vallesteros. Self-described as a “the epitome of the recent uprising of the DIY music scene,” the band mixes interesting vocals with swelling guitar melodies, dreamy synths, and looped melodies. Craft Spells generated blog buzz with the single “Party Talk” which lead to the production of a full length album. In the Spring of 2011, Craft Spells released their debut album Idle Labor and has recently announced a new EP due out May 15.
Icky Blossoms
Emerging as a side project of already established Omaha bands Tilly and the Wall and Flowers Forever, Icky Blossoms has started making a name for themselves in the Omaha music scene as well as elsewhere. Currently they are performing at SXSW as well as in local Omaha venues. Former band member of both groups, Derek Pressnall described the beginnings of Icky when Pressnall wrote some Flowers songs with a synthesizer instead of a guitar until the new synth songs became a sound of their own. The band is comprised of Pressnall, Nik Fackler, Sara Bohlin, and J.J. Idt. The band is live and energetic at shows and really know how to get the crowd moving with their catchy lyrics and upbeat keyboard notes.
One of their popular tracks, “Perfect Vision” exhibits the combined forces of Pressnall, Fackler, Thiele and Idt. At 6:50, it’s a longer track, with a sound Pressnall best describes as “a really hypnotic chainsaw-guitar, swirly song on top of a hypnotic groove.” He says the track was inspired by Beyonce’s song “Diva,” particularly its simple yet groovy, recurring rhythms.
On Friday, February 24th, Skidmore will be graced with the presence of Rubblebucket, a band from Brooklyn who describe their sound as “yes wave” and “psych-pop and dance.” Originally from Burlington, Vermont, Rubblebucket was founded by Kalmia Traver and Alex Toth, who met while both studying music at the University of Vermont. Upon graduation, they joined reggae band “John Brown’s Body” and toured the US. It wasn’t until June of 2007 when they met Craig Meyers (percussion) at an art opening at an old Hood Milk factory in Vermont that they began forming what is now known as Rubblebucket. By March of the following year, Rubblebucket had added five other members to the band and released their first album “Rose’s Dream” under the name “Rubblebucket Orchestra.”
Since then, Rubblebucket has released two more albums, “Rubblebucket” (2009) and “Omega La La” (2011) as well as an EP entitled “Triangular Daisies”, and have played shows with groups such as Twin Sister, Kurt Vile and Das Racist. Their music is full of complex harmonies and horn sections, and when listening, it is evident just how greatly influenced Toth and Traver are by John Brown Body’s–whether through the emphasis on horn sections or the general funk-esque rhythms used. All in all, Rubblebucket’s sound is upbeat, complex and easy to dance to. As they said themselves in an interview on blog, “Alright; I’m Wrong” when describing their shows: “We are like little fires maybe and mischievous and weird. We are weirdos. We put our whole spirit into the live show. We perform and dig in hard. We go wild.” If so, Friday’s show should be a great one.
There has been a huge 90’s revival with bands like Yuck, Bleached, and Pavement. Total Slacker is a nice addition to the movement. Total Slacker is very reminiscent of a lot of lo-fi punky type bands from an era not long ago . In fact, the band’s whole aesthetic and theme relates to the 90’s era. They named their band after Richard Linklater’s 1991 film about aimless Austin-ites Slacker. Their lyrics cite “Full House” and New Kids on the Block, and they even have an entire song about a VHS collection.
Total Slacker is a Brooklyn based rock band, with garage and psychedelic leanings. Their live shows are known to be lively Drummer Ross Condon and bassist Emily Oppenheimer grew up in Sante Fe, New Mexico where they attended high school together. Vocalist and frontman Tucker Rountree hails from Salt Lake City. It wasn’t until after moving to Brooklyn that they truly came together as a band.
Want more info read a g-chat interview with Total Slacker over at Impose Magazine.
Widowspeak
When describing Widowspeak’s sound, critics (and the band themselves) have thrown around phrases such as “90’s grunge” “60’s psychedelic” “hazy atmospheric dream pop” and “shoegaze.” While these descriptions may not appear to be cohesive at first, the band’s eponymous debut LP, released in August 2011, employs all of these styles. Their songs are melodic and often upbeat, yet Widowspeak still manages to add the “David Lynch-esque darkness” that they describe themselves as having. Molly Hamilton’s vocals convey darkness through their sultry smokiness, a feeling Rob Thomas continues with his crisp guitar. And it doesn’t hurt that both Hamilton and Michael Stasiak (drums) are both from Washington state. In fact, they describe their music as being “songs about homesickness, about longing for pine forests, reckless youth and dark nights in strange cities.” Throughout the LP, it is easy to see just how influenced they are by their home state.
Though Molly Hamilton and Michael Stasiak originally met as teenagers, Widowspeak was only official formed in May 2010 in Brooklyn, when Stasiak and Hamilton asked Rob Thomas to join. By the following Fall, the group had recorded six songs on a cassette using only garage band and a built-in laptop microphone, calling it the “October Tape”. From there it wound up at Brooklyn’s Captured Tracks, and, merely a few weeks later (and after their sixth show) the group recorded their first 7” single, entitled “Harsh Realm”. They followed up “Harsh Realm” in August 2011 with “Widowspeak”, their first LP, and since have played shows with headliners such as Twin Sister, Dum Dum Girls and Kurt Vile.
Widowspeak will be opening for Total Slacker at Falstaff’s on Friday, February 3rd. Check out some of their tracks here and herein the meantime.
Look at the above picture and tell me you don’t want to go to this.
THE SEC BLOG 