Freezepop Is Coming To Philly!

I am very psyched that Boston-based electronic/synthpop band Freezepop is including Philadelphia in their weekend-long three-stop mini-tour celebrating founding member Liz Enthusiasm's birthday this month!  Even cooler, the opening act is Lifestyle, a band that features Freezepop's own The Other Sean T. Drinkwater. So, it's almost like Freezepop opening for Freezepop...or something...

The mini-tour begins Friday, June 22, in Brooklyn, NY and ends Sunday, June 24, in Rochester, NY, but those are just a bit outside my travel radius.  But on Saturday night, June 23, they'll be playing at Kung Fu Necktie in Philadelphia - less then two hours from my front door!

This will be my first chance to see Freezepop live, though I've been a fan since first hearing "Science Genius Girl" almost ten years ago (where does the time go?)  For those of you unfamiliar with the band, they started out as a trio: Liz Enthusiasm, The Other Sean T. Drinkwater, and The Duke of Pannekoeken started plinking away at synths and other electronica in 1999.  Sounding something like a 1980's video arcade set to a dance beat, the band quickly demonstrated a skewering wit in their lyrics and an uncanny ability to transport listeners back to early-80s New Wave sounds.  They sang about love in a shopping mall ("Chess King"), being a contestant on Wheel Of Fortune ("Shark Attack"), and celeb crushes ("Tracey Gold").

As they progressed, their sound filled out from plinky electronic minimalism to full-bodied synthpop, without losing any of the song quality, creativity, or humor that made them so awesome.  "Less Talk More Rokk" became one of their best-known songs after appearing in the video game Guitar Hero; it still remains one of my favorites.

In 2009, The Duke of Pannekoeken left the band and was replaced by Robert John "Bananas" Foster and Christmas Disco-Marie Sagan.  This quartet remains the band's current lineup, and delivered the album Imaginary Friends, which made this blog's Records of the Year list this past December.

If you are in the Philly area or can be there, I urge you to come out for this show!  It promises to be a bunch of fun, and advance tickets can be had for only $10!  Here are a few clips to give you a sense of Freezepop's joyful noise; if you like what you hear, you need to be in Philly on the 23rd.  See you there!

What Are You Doing This Weekend?

If you live in Philadelphia, PA, Baltimore, MD, or Washington, DC (or close enough to get to any of the three), I am once again going to urge you to go see the most awesome live band you will ever see, One-Eyed Doll!

Tomorrow night (Friday 4/13), they will be in Philadelphia at The Fire on Girard Avenue; Saturday night they'll be in Baltimore at one of my favorite venues to see a show, The Ottobar, and Sunday night they play DC at at DC9.  They are touring with Japanese (via New York) "action comic punk band" Peelander-Z.  Both bands are big on audience participation, so this should be a fun series of shows.

I really wanted to try to pull the triple-shot, but it looks like Sunday night in DC is the only show I'm going to get to.  (My old transportation issue again - maybe One-Eyed Doll will be the thing that actually inspires me to learn to drive after all these years...)  But, if you're able to get to any (or all) of the shows, by all means GO!  As I mentioned in my post about their last trip to Baltimore, One-Eyed Doll put on an incredible performance. You will not be disappointed, and at roughly $10 - $12 a night, how can you go wrong?  That's huge entertainment value for your dollar!  And tell Kimberly and Junior that I sent you!

If you go, and you'd like to share your review of the show here on the blog, I'd be pleased to publish a guest post or two.  Let me know either on the comments section here or on the Facebook page!  If you're in DC Sunday night - see you there!

The Dickies at the 941 Club 1/3/09

Great time last night at The 941 Theater in Philadelphia, PA to see Van Nuys, CA's greatest contribution to punk rock, The Dickies. Absolutely had a great friggin' time - a little hole-in-the-wall BYOB venue on Front Street, about 250 - 300 people, a "stage" that was little more than plywood on cinderblocks raised about a foot off the ground: this is how to see a punk show! Heck, you had to go "backstage" to find the restrooms, fercrissake!

I am learning that it takes a little longer for my 42 year old body to recover from the crowd crush and the decibel level (ears are still ringing, dogs still barking from standing on a concrete floor for hours), but the fun was worth it. Am I showing my age by saying I'm kinda glad PA has the smoking ban nowadays because at least I side-stepped the traditional morning-after hack-a-lung-a-thon?

This was a four-band show; unfortunately, we got there a little late and missed the first band, The Trakes.

We arrived just as Philadelphia's own The SlotCars took the stage. Now, I've been to enough shows in my life to know that opening bands are always a gamble, and home-town opening bands can sometimes be double jeopardy. The SlotCars came through, though, with a fine set. All of the expected spaces on the punk band bingo card could be checked off: song about the band itself? Check. Instrumental with vocal interjection from the bass player? Check. Surf-styled tune? Check. Nifty cover? Check. This, however, was not just "punk rock by the numbers." The band had an energy and a personality that took their minimal guitar/bass/drum basement band vibe to another level or two higher, and they score bonus points for having a wicked sense of humor about themselves, the Scene (with a capital S), and their local fans. Follow the link to their MySpace page and listen to "SlotCars Theme" and their cover of "Little Deuce Coupe", and enjoy!

Kitty and the Kowalskis from New York were up next. Following the "chick singer and three guys" band formula and blasting out a melodic-punk sound with more than a little resemblance at times to Tex & the Horseheads (check out "Mr. Wrong" and "I Love You Baby But I Hate Your Friends" on the Kowalski's MySpace page), they played one helluva set. Good to know that I'm not the only one feeling my age: Kitty called herself out for trying to play a punk show in a sweater and declared herself to be a "child of the sixties".

So, two-fer-two on the opening bands - a great start to the 2009 concert year! (Based on what I've heard on their MySpace page, the Trakes would've been right there, too.) But my friends and I - and by self-admission, the opening bands - were really there for only one reason: to see The Dickies!

I'd only seen the Dickies live once before, at Fiend Fest in Asbury Park, NJ in 2003. They put on a great show then, but as part of the packaged tour with several other bands, their set was truncated. Last night, the spotlight was all theirs, and they did not disappoint! Over the course of roughly an hour and a half or so, we got a virtual Dickies' jukebox. They roared out of the gates with "Rosemary," and gave us everything from the early classics ("Give it Back", "You Drive Me Ape (You Big Gorilla)", "Manny, Moe & Jack") to their best known hyper-speed covers ("Nights in White Satin", "Paranoid") to prime examples of their newer material ("My Pop the Cop"). The almost non-existent stage created an environment of band and fans becoming almost one, resulting in Leonard Grave Phillips allowing the crowd to become his call-and-response partners on "I'm OK You're OK" and "Got it at the Store", and we basically sang "Gigantor" for him!

The band did two encores - first encore included a hysterical sing-along on Neil Young's "Rockin' in the Free World", and the second closed the night out as any Dickies show should be closed: with their turbo-fast slam through of the "Banana Splits Theme".

Hung around a bit after the show and got to talk with both Stan Lee and Leonard - and yes, for those who asked, every Dickies record I own is now autographed.

All in all a great night, a lot of fun, and a heck of a way to celebrate my birthday and kick off a new year of shows. Visit my online album of pics I took throughout the night - forgive the quality, I only had my cell-phone camera with me. If any of you were also at the show, please leave a comment with your review.