The definitive record of live music in Washington, D.C. and beyond for the 2010’s
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LIVE MUSIC: White Rabbits @ The Black Cat 3/7/12
First things first. I love the band Spoon. If you’re reading this you probably also love the band Spoon. In fact I think it’s safe to say that just about EVERYONE loves the band Spoon. But nobody loves the band Spoon more than White Rabbits.
LIVE MUSIC: The Milk Carton Kids @ Jammin Java - 3/5/12
Driven by the engine of Joey Ryan’s impeccably studied songwriting skills and Kenneth Pattengale’s awe inspiring guitar evocations, The Milk Carton Kids have found themselves occupying a space that hasn’t seen a lot of heavy hitters as of late. Oh sure, there’s The Civil Wars and there’s the ever present Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch (ostensibly the “godfathers” of the modern scene) but gone are the days when names like Simon, Garfunkel, Prine, Croce, Stevens — the list goes on and on — dominated the musical landscape. Which is not to say that Ryan and Pattengale are quite there yet, but damned if they aren’t on the right track.
LIVE MUSIC: Other Lives @ The Red Palace - 2/21/12
I first saw Other Lives back in 2009 opening for Bat for Lashes at the 9:30 Club. It was a chance encounter that not only would shape our little groups philosophy toward concert going (ALWAYS get there for the opener...ALWAYS) but in a large part was the beginnings of the idea to create this site. What I witnessed then was a band that demonstrated a maturity and a commitment to their craft that, as someone who has played music to varying levels of achievement for over 30 years now, hit on an almost spiritual level. For a while I just couldn’t stop talking about it the band and that show to whoever would listen, which became increasingly frustrating when, for whatever reason, they didn’t immediately blossom into the biggest band in the world. The “southwestern Radiohead” instead slipped quietly from the public eye to become a not-so-well-kept secret of music nerds far and wide.
LIVE MUSIC: Dum Dum Girls @ The Black Cat - 2/12/12
Style and substance. The tension between the two has pervaded and, in many ways, defined the output of the Dum Dum Girls during their brief career. Their first LP, I Will Be (March 2010) and follow up EP, He Gets Me High (March 2011), were collections of tight, raucous tunes that showcased the group’s consciously cultivated girl group/punk image.
LIVE MUSIC: Sharon Van Etten @ The Black Cat - 2/11/12
Last Saturday, which was hilariously dubbed as being the most NPR-tastic night of the decade, Van Etten, along with a few friends, brought her heart-stoppingly gorgeous voice and a veritable truckload of melancholia to the Main stage at The Black Cat. It was the largest (inexplicably so) venue that she has played in the District to date, but fans turn out by the hundreds to try and fall under the rapture of her spell.
The Darkness w/Foxy Shazam @ The 9:30 Club - 2/8/12
In brief: Foxy Shazam...we love you. Eric Sean Nalley, you began the show with a proclamation that “You were once a woman...now I’m a MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!” and ended it by declaring “EVERYONE...YOU’RE PREGNANT!!” as you slammed the microphone to the stage. In between you told a disgusting joke about a dog, jumped on guitarist Loren Daniel Turner’s head and humped his neck WHILE he was playing a rippin’ solo. You did somersaults while one man horn section Alex Nauth humped the stage behind you. In short, even though your set was mercilessly short (six songs?), you f@#@ing rocked and we thank you for it. Come back soon so we can get the full dose...or just to check on the 800 or so children you fathered at this show alone.
LIVE MUSIC: Kurt Vile @ The Black Cat - 2/6/12
Redemption. That’s why I went to the Black Cat on Monday. I needed to see Kurt Vile perform in a great venue in front of an appreciative crowd to see just how well the material from his excellent 2011 album, Smoke Ring For My Halo (one of the last, and most painful, cuts from my top-10 list [link]) played in concert and to exorcise the memory of the godawful show he played at the Rock and Roll Hotel last year. Thankfully, Mr. Vile did not disappoint, proving once and for all that the venue, not the man, was to blame for last fall’s debacle.
LIVE MUSIC: Jeff Mangum @ The Lincoln Theater - 1/27 and 1/28
There’s at least one thing all graduates of liberal arts colleges have in common: a formative night of lying on the floor of a dorm room listening to In the Aeroplane Over the Sea discussing the existence of God and the meaning of life while contraband candles or a string of Christmas tree lights glows softly in the background. This experience is most typically followed by subsequent weeks of listening to the album on repeat, searching for more information about who Neutral Milk Hotel is and from where such puzzling and emotionally-purging lyrics could have come. Then, finally, there is devastation as the internet reveals the history of the band and that you have no hope of ever seeing them live in concert or an upcoming album to look forward to. (If this does not accurately describe your undergraduate experience, you should ask for your $160,000 back.)
LIVE MUSIC: RYAN ADAMS @ The Strathmore - 1/24/1
Ladies swoon, and dudes shout “DUDE”; it’s all par for the course when Ryan Adams comes to town. Performing to a sold out crowd, Adams visited the Strathmore in Bethesda, MD last week, and for the most part it was business as usual. Delivering a show full of all the heartbreaking ballads, nervous tics and the the recurring feeling that you’re seeing one talented son-of-a-bitch pour his heart out right in front of you Adams set generally satisfied even if it rarely rose to the Olympian heights that the adoring crowd might have showed up expecting
LIVE MUSIC: Cass McCombs @ Ottobar - 1/21/12
It’s important to note that taking in a performance by Cass McCombs isn’t so much simply about seeing the man performing his songs as it is engaging in an experience. Saturday night in Baltimore that experience was akin to a post-surgery, anesthetic fog, where the real world around you frequently fails to register, but those moments where the world does manage to slip through are, if anything, entirely and utterly pleasing. And this, at least if you’re Cass McCombs, is a good thing.
Cass McCombs @ Ottobar in Baltimore, MDDespite the fact that he is touring behind his second 2011 album, Humor Risk, the majority of that record, and the one that came before it were largely ignored by McCombs and his band. The set began with a druggy rendition of “Love Thine Enemy”, the opening track of Humor Risk, but from there took a sharp plunge into the dark, somewhat unexplored corners of McCombs catalog. The close to 90 minute performance weaved in and out of tracks from his earlier works. Songs from 2003’s A, and 2009’s Catacombs (you can see him perform “My Sister, My Spouse” from the show in the video below) and 2005’s Not The Way, dominated a pleasingly lethargic and moody set whose highlight seemed to be that it was simply happening.
LIVE MUSIC: Wildlife @ The Red Palace - 1/19/12
There is so much that can go wrong when you insert any musical genre before the word “punk”. Pop-Punk? Art-Punk? Post-Proto-Pseudo-Punk? All serve to diminish the actual punk of the thing, but one supposes that they are necessary in a time when the lines between genres become more and more blurred. Even worse, most bands, once saddled with the burden of this blood red generalization to wear prominently on their sleeves, most bands give in to all of the tropes and traditions that they’re new made-just-for-them genre would suggest, and never manage to rise above the branding.
Luckily, Wildlife is not one of those bands.
LIVE MUSIC: Cults @ The Black Cat - 1/14/11
Let’s just get this out of the way: I had every expectation of starting another year of covering shows with a bang, and instead it began with a giant MEH.
Now before you get all up in arms, screaming “But I LOOOOOOVE CULTS” and “You’re a stupid head” hear me out. I love Cults too. There songs are impossibly catchy, impeccably written and without a doubt they put out one of the better albums of 2011, if not the most fun album.
But all of this does not a good live performance make.
THE ROCK SHOW: Drive-By Truckers w/J Roddy Walston and The Business - 12/30/11
For the Drive-By Truckers it’s been a long, at times completely ball busting, climb to the top, but if the fact that the band completely sold out it’s 3-night run at the world famous 9:30 Club is any indication then it would appear that the payoff is now. This was the final show were to cover in 2011, and the Truckers are a band I’ve been looking forward to covering since the site began. Not because I’m a super-fan or anything (though I have been in the past), but more because I, as do many people who were in attendance Friday night, have a little bit of history with the band.
IT'S BEEN A GOOD YEAR: Wye Oak @ Ottobar - 12/17/11
You gotta give it to Wye Oak, when they do a homecoming show, they do it in style. Playing at the completely sold out Ottobar Saturday, Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack ended what can be considered a remarkable year by anyone’s standards in the warm (really warm) embrace of their hometown fans.
This is the third time we’ve talked about the band this year, and so there’s really not that much more to say. You already know how the band began 2011 by releasing their latest album Civilian to widespread acclaim. You already know that they showcased those songs along with fellow Charm City musicians Lower Dens at The Black Cat for an NPR broadcast. You already know that the band has already had one homecoming show this year in throwing a pseudo release party at Baltimore’s 2640 Space, and abandoned church that has been converted into a performance venue for just such occasions. And all of that was before things got really crazy.
It would seem that the rest of the world has finally discovered our little hometown band. The potential was there a few years ago for this duo to take over the world with their music, and it would seem that 2011 is the year that that potential was realized. Whether it was touring the US nonstop in support of Civilian, recording not one but TWO songs for the A.V. Undercover series(Danzig’s “Mother” no less), or finding themselves opening for The National as they close out their year of awesome, it would seem that Wye Oak have, put simply, f@#ing arrived.