The thing is, you can't not go.
How can anyone in this town justify not supporting a WRIR fundraiser? Where is there a better deal for the money than eight bands, comedy and assorted DJs for only 15 bucks? Why would I skip a party barely four blocks from home? Who doesn't love multiple kinds of birthday cake?
Walking over to WRIR's 11th annual Party for the Rest of Us, I ran into the photographer/printmaker I'd seen already twice this week. She attributed it to my presence at everything. "We need to make you a shirt that says EG - Everything Girl."
Once at the Renaissance, I was one of the early ones, meaning I could hear the DJ by the buffet and it was still full of food. As a favorite DJ put it, "I realized I'm here in time for the cheese cubes!" Her excitement was palpable.
The party's organizer walked by, enthusing, "Oh, my god, Karen, your tights!" I'd pulled out the Barcelona tights for the occasion, always an attention-getter.
Music began with Half Bascule, the quasi metal improv project of Dave and Nathaniel that always kicks ass. No surprise given Dave's massive pedal board and Nathaniel's exuberant drumming (his flannel shirt came off after the first song), but the two demonstrate remarkable compatibility considering how infrequently they play or rehearse.
From an improvised duo of two, I moved over to the ballroom for Brunswick, a 13-piece complete with jazz training, music stands and the inimitable (and noticeably slimmer) Reggie on percussion. For many, it was their first time seeing the band and they were clearly impressed, asking strangers who they were.
Lucy Dacus and her coat-clad band (sparkly t-shirts were revealed once they got hot enough to doff the coats) were next and seeing as Rolling Stone recently dubbed them a band to watch in 2016, the room filled up quickly.
I'd already run into Lucy in the loo, telling her I recall the first time I saw her play (long before the band stage) at Ghost Light Afterparty, where her acoustic cover of Prince's "I Would Die 4 U" made me weak in the knees. Now she's talking about the band soon making music full-time.
They grow up so fast, don't they?
Checking out the comedy showcase, I head a woman talking about her West Virginia/Muslim roots and somehow turning it into humor ("I moved to Richmond so now I drink craft beer and have cats tattooed on my back") before heading out for birthday cake.
With four kinds of cake, I chose chocolate chocolate, but had to cool my heels with other cake lovers until forks were brought out to eat it with. You want to eat with dignity when you're scarfing cake in front of hundreds of people.
Back in the ballroom, the all-female band Christi won my ears with a combination of girl group and punk influences, although as more than one friend pointed out, the incredibly high ceiling in that room compromised the sound quality ("They sound much better at Strange Matter," Paul told me and he would know) somewhat.
But their energy was terrific, the songs were all three minutes or less and lyrics resonated for those of us with girl parts. Besides, it's just such a treat to see an all female lineup, especially rocking that hard. You go, girls.
Night Idea played to a selection of silent movies behind them and their familiar math rock/proggy sound was well-suited to the black and white classics. "I think Richmond has more prog bands than metal bands these days," the film lover whispered to me.
I think Richmond has more independent radio fans than anything else and I can always count on seeing them at this birthday party.
From the dance party king just back from a shoot in Tidewater to the scooter queen recently back from a trip to Costa Rica to the literate guitarist with whom I discussed Elvis Costello's autobiography and Donald Fagen's charisma to the Australian I'd last met in a borrowed suit to the Gen X birthday boy whose party I have to miss Sunday to the former neighbor dapper in polka dots and boots to the various DJs I've come to know to the smiling friends I only saw in passing, it's a guaranteed get-together of just the kind of people you'd want at your own party, aka the rest of us.
You can count Everything Girl as happily part of that rest.
Showing posts with label lucy dacus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lucy dacus. Show all posts
Saturday, February 6, 2016
Tuesday, May 19, 2015
On Being Funny When Jokes are Lies.
You know, it says something about Richmond when I can walk four blocks, pay five dollars and see three bands. I hope. I never stop appreciating that.
And if I do, somebody please smack me.
Make no mistake, it had already been a good day. I'd taken care of a last-minute deadline. I'd had lunch with two interesting women who spend a week every summer taking a 17th century-style batteau down the river. Heck, I'd even seen a lizard in Carver and I didn't even know they had lizards in Carver.
I'd heard a radio show focusing on Philly music, old and new. It caught my ear from two rooms away when I heard the distinctive sounds of Teddy Pendergrass in Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. "The Love I Lost"? Be still, my heart.
But they also had current bands playing in studio, and one particularly mentioned how great the scene is there, affordable and happening. Lots of space to create.
Which it may well be, but you'd have a tough time convincing me it's better than here.
By the time I finished working, the show had already begun, so I hustled out to the sultry sidewalks just after another of the quickie rain showers of the afternoon. Halfway up the block to Gallery 5, I heard beautiful music coming from inside.
It was D.C.'s Hayden Arp, jeans rolled up to just below his knees, and part deadly earnest perfectionist and part open sore. His soft, confessional voice had an audience member (and my hero) giving the international "shush" symbol (hand at throat) to two girls laughing loudly during his set.
This was someone to listen to intently. "The next song is electronic but I'm not going to play it electronically except the amp for my guitar. It's called, I don't know what it's called." When I say he may be too busy feeling deeply to have time to name songs, I mean it as a sincere compliment.
On some songs, words ended softly in the back of this throat, echoing Morrissey's pathos, albeit without an electric guitar and band behind him.
He closed with the soaring "Gabrielle," which he mentioned he's been working on for four years due to internal and external emotions. "It means a great deal to me." That came through in the grandeur of the song, making me sorry I'd missed any of his set.
Considering how young the chill audience was - mostly I saw a big "X" on almost everyone's hands - they probably didn't notice, but his voice and style reminded of young Sufjan Stevens before he discovered disco. For tonight's crowd, that would have been roughly while they were in elementary school, though.
Next up was Lucy Dacus (wearing high-waisted jean shorts I'm pretty sure I owned in 1985) whom I'd seen a couple of times before. Tonight she was backed up by 3/4 of the band Manatree, adding a fuller sound and harder edge to her sound, all of which I liked. Relentless drums were chased by guitars and bass while her husky yet strong voice drove it all.
After pummeling us with hard and fast twice, she proved she could go tender and only occasionally strong in the third song and showed her wit with an anthem couched in a little reverb, "I Don't Wanna Be Funny Anymore."
I don't wanna be funny anymore
I got a too-short skirt, maybe I could be the cute one?
Strong songwriting (lyric: "raised in the era of the milkman") and a distinctive voice (fans of Neko Case would approve) on songs about first love (for the record, she doesn't believe in it) and pillars of truth kept the small crowd inside for every minute of her set.
Telling us it was her Mom's birthday but that she hadn't shown up "Better things to do, I guess"), she then asked a friend to record her and the band as they did a full version of "Happy Birthday" to her Mom with the crowd singing along.
When the crowd called for an encore, Manatree's singer Jack jumped onstage with his band mates. "Looks like my set's been hijacked," Lucy said, surrendering her guitar to him for one Manatree song, which I recognized from having seen them several times.
Part of the crowd moved on at that point, a shame since they missed Boston's Western Den, a quartet of acoustic guitar, keyboards, cello and trumpet with three singers.
"Hi, we're Western Den and we're going to play some really sad folk songs for you," the female singer said. Halfway into the first song, I felt like there should have been lit candles on the stage to complement the mournful horn and ethereal harmonies they were putting out. It had a positively Irish folk sound to it.
If you liked the Romantic poets, this was your band.
A songs like "Eden" began with a hymn first and while I'm as heathen as they come, the three-part harmonies could only be described as heavenly, with just enough echo on the microphone to pretend we were in a castle or garden where the songs were set. They even sang rounds and how often do you hear that beyond childhood and camp?
We learned that the cello player was a recent addition from Los Angeles and that his cello was carbon fiber. By that point, it was tough to imagine what they would have sounded like cello-less because it was such a key piece of their sound.
The guitar player - who also sang some lead vocals- said it was their first time in Richmond. "You guys are so nice here," he gushed. Aw, shucks, we're nothin' but some southerners.
"Tumbling Down" necessitated her saying, "We're not sad people, we just write sad music," before playing a new, unrecorded song ("You heard it here first") and a Saintseneca cover (if you don't know them, look them up"), sounding like a chamber pop take on the Mamas and the Papas if they were just sad and not also obsessed with who was sleeping with whom.
"Desert Grand" was a sumptuous soundscape and their encore song was described as "a very sad folk song" to differentiate it from all the other merely sad ones. The trumpet player left the stage for that song and we learned that he'd recently announced he was leaving the group.
"If you know any trumpet players who sing, send them our way." Yes, do, because the horn works really well with her beautiful voice and expressive hands when she's not playing keys or guitar.
We've got plenty of great trumpet players, but who'd want to give up Richmond for Boston? What I mean is, what musician could afford to give up Richmond for Boston? Do they have $5 shows four blocks from home there?
And while we're checking, do they even have lizards in Boston? Could I be the cute one?
And if I do, somebody please smack me.
Make no mistake, it had already been a good day. I'd taken care of a last-minute deadline. I'd had lunch with two interesting women who spend a week every summer taking a 17th century-style batteau down the river. Heck, I'd even seen a lizard in Carver and I didn't even know they had lizards in Carver.
I'd heard a radio show focusing on Philly music, old and new. It caught my ear from two rooms away when I heard the distinctive sounds of Teddy Pendergrass in Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. "The Love I Lost"? Be still, my heart.
But they also had current bands playing in studio, and one particularly mentioned how great the scene is there, affordable and happening. Lots of space to create.
Which it may well be, but you'd have a tough time convincing me it's better than here.
By the time I finished working, the show had already begun, so I hustled out to the sultry sidewalks just after another of the quickie rain showers of the afternoon. Halfway up the block to Gallery 5, I heard beautiful music coming from inside.
It was D.C.'s Hayden Arp, jeans rolled up to just below his knees, and part deadly earnest perfectionist and part open sore. His soft, confessional voice had an audience member (and my hero) giving the international "shush" symbol (hand at throat) to two girls laughing loudly during his set.
This was someone to listen to intently. "The next song is electronic but I'm not going to play it electronically except the amp for my guitar. It's called, I don't know what it's called." When I say he may be too busy feeling deeply to have time to name songs, I mean it as a sincere compliment.
On some songs, words ended softly in the back of this throat, echoing Morrissey's pathos, albeit without an electric guitar and band behind him.
He closed with the soaring "Gabrielle," which he mentioned he's been working on for four years due to internal and external emotions. "It means a great deal to me." That came through in the grandeur of the song, making me sorry I'd missed any of his set.
Considering how young the chill audience was - mostly I saw a big "X" on almost everyone's hands - they probably didn't notice, but his voice and style reminded of young Sufjan Stevens before he discovered disco. For tonight's crowd, that would have been roughly while they were in elementary school, though.
Next up was Lucy Dacus (wearing high-waisted jean shorts I'm pretty sure I owned in 1985) whom I'd seen a couple of times before. Tonight she was backed up by 3/4 of the band Manatree, adding a fuller sound and harder edge to her sound, all of which I liked. Relentless drums were chased by guitars and bass while her husky yet strong voice drove it all.
After pummeling us with hard and fast twice, she proved she could go tender and only occasionally strong in the third song and showed her wit with an anthem couched in a little reverb, "I Don't Wanna Be Funny Anymore."
I don't wanna be funny anymore
I got a too-short skirt, maybe I could be the cute one?
Strong songwriting (lyric: "raised in the era of the milkman") and a distinctive voice (fans of Neko Case would approve) on songs about first love (for the record, she doesn't believe in it) and pillars of truth kept the small crowd inside for every minute of her set.
Telling us it was her Mom's birthday but that she hadn't shown up "Better things to do, I guess"), she then asked a friend to record her and the band as they did a full version of "Happy Birthday" to her Mom with the crowd singing along.
When the crowd called for an encore, Manatree's singer Jack jumped onstage with his band mates. "Looks like my set's been hijacked," Lucy said, surrendering her guitar to him for one Manatree song, which I recognized from having seen them several times.
Part of the crowd moved on at that point, a shame since they missed Boston's Western Den, a quartet of acoustic guitar, keyboards, cello and trumpet with three singers.
"Hi, we're Western Den and we're going to play some really sad folk songs for you," the female singer said. Halfway into the first song, I felt like there should have been lit candles on the stage to complement the mournful horn and ethereal harmonies they were putting out. It had a positively Irish folk sound to it.
If you liked the Romantic poets, this was your band.
A songs like "Eden" began with a hymn first and while I'm as heathen as they come, the three-part harmonies could only be described as heavenly, with just enough echo on the microphone to pretend we were in a castle or garden where the songs were set. They even sang rounds and how often do you hear that beyond childhood and camp?
We learned that the cello player was a recent addition from Los Angeles and that his cello was carbon fiber. By that point, it was tough to imagine what they would have sounded like cello-less because it was such a key piece of their sound.
The guitar player - who also sang some lead vocals- said it was their first time in Richmond. "You guys are so nice here," he gushed. Aw, shucks, we're nothin' but some southerners.
"Tumbling Down" necessitated her saying, "We're not sad people, we just write sad music," before playing a new, unrecorded song ("You heard it here first") and a Saintseneca cover (if you don't know them, look them up"), sounding like a chamber pop take on the Mamas and the Papas if they were just sad and not also obsessed with who was sleeping with whom.
"Desert Grand" was a sumptuous soundscape and their encore song was described as "a very sad folk song" to differentiate it from all the other merely sad ones. The trumpet player left the stage for that song and we learned that he'd recently announced he was leaving the group.
"If you know any trumpet players who sing, send them our way." Yes, do, because the horn works really well with her beautiful voice and expressive hands when she's not playing keys or guitar.
We've got plenty of great trumpet players, but who'd want to give up Richmond for Boston? What I mean is, what musician could afford to give up Richmond for Boston? Do they have $5 shows four blocks from home there?
And while we're checking, do they even have lizards in Boston? Could I be the cute one?
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