indie – Page 11

April 11, 2019

April 11, 2019May 20, 2020 Mew Zikwryder

Announcing the official reissue of Thee Oh Sees ‘Thee Hounds of Foggy Notion’

Oh Sees have announced the reissue of Thee Hounds of Foggy Notion which will be out 5/24 on Castle Face Records. The band also recently announced a run of Fall North American tour dates. You can check out where they are playing below and also check out their forthcoming Spring/Summer shows that include stops at Shaky Knees Fest and Solana Beach.

“Thee Hounds of Foggy Notion / Live Performances Sans Stages And Whatnots With Thee Oh Sees (2008), is a film we made just over a decade ago, and this record is the soundtrack. I loved making it, and I love all that were involved. I’m honestly blissed-out proud to hear over the years that it somehow is loved by so many others, too.

I first met John Dwyer on Flag Day. I was blown away by a trio of roving Coachwhips guerrilla street shows that climaxed at the the scenic vista parking lot high above San Francisco atop Mt. Sutro. Amongst the gathered uninitiated hordes of souvenir sweatshirt selling families, and puzzled elderly global tourist translators, and a white weirdo tuxedo wedding party, was the sonic corruption of the Coachwhips that was collaborating with the all-female, fake-pregnancy, jump-rope-y, real-pit-bull-shredding-fake-plastic-baby fantasy majesty of the performance artist crew Double Dutchess. I’m certain that this exact event was the idea seed for Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion, and that it saved my life a little bit.

When JPD asked me to consider making a video for Thee Oh Sees with the sole stipulation that he didn’t want to do anything fake-y to playback, my head started swimming. What we mutually agreed upon was to essentially reprise Flag Day, and film Thee Oh Sees performing live, but not on stages. My own secret undisclosed personal caveat was to see this as an opportunity to document his process by mixing in some interstitial interviews between the roving live shows. He shut the ‘interview’ idea after I asked the very first question. Instead, what we got was infinitely more true to the free fun reality of the scene in the form of a multitude of glorious stories.

I rented a 15-passenger van, a generator, and the minimal cinematic equipment my trusted cinematographer friend James Wall deemed we needed. Everything sound wise was JPD territory and went through an ancient mixing board that Johnny had housed within a Samsonite suitcase. We ran all the plate mics from the drums, and the lil pedestal mics from the amps through this old mixer, and we all believed that all would be well and swell. As an emergency audio backup, I also grabbed a 12” Sennheiser directional mic in a fluffy wind muff that directly fed into one of our Canon XL-2s. My residual fear that the only thing that ruins docs or indie films is shit sound came true when we discovered that all the multi-tracking through the mixer was hopelessly covered in geiger counter static tics. All of the audio that you hear on the LP is sourced from that single Sennheiser mono mic that we then dual-mono’d in post.

As great as JPD is as a live performer, he was in absolute alpha epic story-teller genius mode during every single spare second of the journey. Brigid Dawson added some delicious gems as she always does. Petey Dammit is a pretty quiet private guy, but even he proved to be very funny when he gets loose. Patrick Mullins on the other hand is literally Castleface. After editing through 40+ hours of footage of live performances and interstitial stories, it became very shockingly clear to myself, and editor Akiko Iwakawa, that his expression never ever ever changes. He is Castleface incarnate.

Massive Love yous and Thank yous to all involved and to all of Yous toos” – Brian Lee Hughes

It’s out on Castle Face Records May 24th

May
3-5 Atlanta, Georgia Shaky Knees Fest

18 Manchester Albert Hall

19 Glasgow QMU

20 Belfast Limelight 18-20

21Dublin Button Factory

23 Cardiff The Tramshed

24 Derby Bearded Theory Festival

June
7 Nelsonville, OH Nelsonville Music Fest

14 Solana Beach, CA San Diego Belly Up
W/ Bronze And Fuckwolf

July
11-13 Carnation WA Timber! Festival

August
9 Pioneertown, CA Pappy and Harriet’s

23 Charleville Cabaret Vert festival

24 Guéret Check-in Festival

27 Ravenna Hana-Bi (Free)

29 Vienna Arena

30 Munich Strom

31 Berlin Kreuzberg Festsaal

September
1 Brussels Les Botaniquesen

3 Bordeaux BT 59

4 Toulouse Le Bikini

5 Paris Le Bataclan

6 London Troxy

7 Amsterdam Paradiso

30 San Francisco The Chapel

October
1 San Francisco The Chapel

2 San Francisco The Chapel

4 Portland Crystal Ballroom

7 Vancouver Rickshaw Theatre

10 Minneapolis First Avenue Ballroom

11 Chicago Thalia Hall

12 Chicago Thalia Hall

14 Toronto Danforth Music Hall

15 Montreal Le National

16 Cambridge The Sinclair

18 Brooklyn Warsaw

19 Brooklyn Warsaw

20 Brooklyn Warsaw

22 Philadelphia Union Transfer

23 Carrboro Cat’s Cradle

24 Nashville Mercy Lounge

25 New Orleans One Eyed Jacks

26 Austin Hotel Vegas

27 Austin Hotel Vegas

29 Albuquerque Sister Bar

31 Los Angeles Teragram Ballroom

April 11, 2019

April 11, 2019May 20, 2020 Mew Zikwryder

Crying High Announces Debut LP, Shares “Hold Yr Terror Close” Track

Arbutus Records signee Crying High has announced his new record ♬ (‘Music’) and shared the new track “Hold Yr Terror Close” on BrooklynVegan.

When talking about the track David Kleiser says, “Sarah Brunning sings with me on this song. We have been very close friends since high school, and this has always been our song. I can still remember how excited she was to show it to me, and how we both sat and took it in; how Chi Fukami had just hit the nail on the goddamn head, and how sad-and-then-safe she made us feel in her honesty and vulnerability. I wanted to reinterpret this Go! Team original as a remind myself and Sarah of the brilliant (as in radiant) truth behind Chi’s message: Fear is real and cannot be ignored, BUT it can be corralled and harnessed if you have your shit together and insist on going wherever yourself takes you. Thats why I think this song is here anyway.

The video was filmed by Airick Woodhed of Doldrums, another dear and long time friend of both Sarah and I. It was shot on 16mm film in High Park, Toronto- which is where I “grew up”

Crying High’s debut album ♬ will be out 4/22 on Arbutus Records.

Kleiser started bringing Crying High to life on the road in 2017 while opening for and playing guitar with Doldrums in Europe. Although Crying High is a new project, Kleiser has been producing weirdo bedroom pop albums for 11 years with The Walls are Blonde (as well as comic books and hand built art toys with ORG), in addition to creating Album art and Music videos for a host of amazing MTL and TO bands. By 2014, while greyhounding between Toronto and Montréal for shows Kleiser and friends began The Rotating Cassette Carrousel project, an ongoing mixtape compilation of demos and home recordings from across Canada. From this, Kleiser began crafting a new and more theatrical solo act that would ultimately become the ‘Karaoke’eko’ cassette, then ‘The Story of Pop Music’, and finally, after learning from and improving upon each of its proto-forms…. CRYING HIGH.
Crying High is vapornoir from Montreal: disco and ebm slowed down beyond dance utility and used as the framework to support late night phone confessional vocals that sing heartbreak, joy, catharsis, pleas and attitudes of gratitudes. On-stage, Kleiser evokes Andy Kauffman’s Hawaiian singer, or coo’s like a delay-and-sweat soaked Slim Whitman; A cheap Angel Olsen halloween costume: A yawn is a silent scream. The voice as Analogue VR: Part banshee on Earth and part Bowie in the bardo. Crying Highs music, lyrics and dancing combine to carry its audience thru a dynamic spectrum of emotion and character: screaming every high, milking every low. Serious face. Happy face! It takes only minutes for an audience to realize that Kleiser is watching each performance along with them.

Crying High is the new project from Toronto born multimedia artist and psychedelic crooner, D Kleiser. A new album of 12 songs will be released internationally by Arbutus Records on April 22nd, 2019. The album is called ♬ . You can call it “Music” if that’s easier. It was produced in Montreal by D Kleiser, and is a wonderful introduction to the proud world of Kleisonia, and all the artifacts of its inward adventures.

Kleiser utilizes the raw power of garage band to produce midi-karaoke versions of AM radio hits from deep within the youtube-algorithmic pata-verse. Largely recorded in bed or at the kitchen table, recruiting whichever friends were proximate to sing into that little-built-in-mic-on-everyones-earbuds. Elements of the album (see: trumpet sections, songs about cats/dead friends) belay Kleiser’s desperate affinity for an era when Airplane Over The Sea was the thing, but this music is truly a direct product of its time. Here, Crying High broadcasts little alternative pop pata-communications into the void in an attempt to forgive it. 斤 could not have been made in any other temporal elsewhere. Sifting thru the mp3 junkyard of 20th-century pop culture to cobble together something pretty. A personal exercise in Memehommage-as-Shadow Work, 斤 comes complete with a solid and timeless moral, simply put: learn to love yourself or you’ll die.

CRYING HIGH – 2019 TOUR DATES

LINKS

Website
Bandcamp
Instagram

February 19, 2019

February 19, 2019May 21, 2020 Mew Zikwryder

Liza Anne joins lineup for 2019 Welcome Campers!

The Wild Honey Pie is back with Welcome Campers, their all-inclusive music festival, for a seventh straight year! Head to Camp Lenox in the Berkshires this Memorial Day Weekend for an unforgettable adult summer camp meets music festival for the kid in all of us. Passes include three days and two nights of free meals, alcohol, sleeping arrangements in bunks with showers and beds, food truck, endless summer camp activities and live music around camp.

This unique event continues to challenge the idea of what a music festival can be, offering attendees an experience unlike any other. Campers will get to enjoy intimate performances from their favorite buzzing bands in addition to taking in all of the excitement that Camp Lenox has to offer such as arts and crafts, kayaking, campfires, nature hikes, swimming, yoga, kickball and more.

The 2019 instalment offers a diverse set of budding and established artists including Wet, Henry Jamison, Half Waif, Plastic Picnic and more.

Enjoy a playlist featuring all ten performers below:

General admission weekend passes start at $400 while limited supplies last and include lodging, meals, alcohol, access to all music performances and all camp activities. Private bunks and transportation from NYC are also available at an additional fee.

Purchase for Welcome Campers can be purchased here.

February 12, 2019

February 12, 2019May 21, 2020 Mew Zikwryder

Indie-pop trio Lex Audrey shares video for pulsating track, ‘Winter II’

Already one of the most promising artists in the scene, Austrian trio Lex Audrey has released the music video for their acclaimed single, ‘Winter II’. The song was released on the 1st of February while the video came out 4 days later on the 5th.

The Vienna-based trio consists of Niklas Pichler (vocals), Patrick Pillichshammer (drums and samples), and Lukas Staudinger (synth and bass). Each of them started playing instruments from a very young age as it allowed them to express themselves freely through the use of music. With Niklas on main songwriting duty, the group comes together to create a track around his creations as each idea comes to fruition. Having been part of the Austrian music scene for almost two years now, their debut album sees Lex Audrey ready to take on the global market as they rely more on electronic soundscapes instead of traditional instrumentation.

The Rupert Höller directed music video is quite simple in its nature, but manages to keep the viewers attention throughout the whole track. Cleverly using a wide array of lighting effects, the video sees the trio performing their track in a darkened room while masterfully choreographed lighting rigs move around them, transforming the ‘dull’ room into an exciting visual treat for the eyes.

Pre-order their debut album, No Intention of Changing the World, here.

Lex Audrey explains the theme of anti-superficiality in “Winter II”; “All they do is yell, and they‘re searching for attention without words, attention for hollow minds”.