PATIO: Lua Flora
– ALL AGES- LIMITED PATIO SEATING IS FIRST COME, FIRST SERVEDLUA FLORA Lua Flora is the soundtrack of your favorite daydream. The Asheville, NC-based group’s sun-kissed melodies are rooted in the harmonies of Appalachia, rhythms of the West Indies, and lyricism of American folk. Live, the band allures listeners with gut-punching jams weaved between powerful lyrics. Lua Flora has supported Satsang, Franc Moody, Of Good Nature, Kendall Street Company, and more. Their recent debut album amassed over 150,000 streams in the first week. “The musical embodiment of Asheville’s creative spirit” -Face The Current “…easy and melodic — a light, laidback recluse from the grind.” -Top Shelf Music “Lua Flora shows folk & reggae mix.” -Grateful Web
PATIO: Buck Curran
– ALL AGES- LIMITED PATIO SEATING IS FIRST COME, FIRST SERVEDBUCK CURRAN No Love Is Sorrow is the latest album by guitarist-singer-songwriter Buck Curran. Since 2005, Buck has recorded and performed as one half of the psych-folk duo Arborea. To date, Arborea has released five albums, including 2013’s ESP-Disk’ release Fortress of the Sun (All Music Favorite Folk & Favorite Singer-Songwriter Albums 2013). Buck has also produced several various artists compilations: We Are All One, In the Sun: a tribute to Robbie Basho (2010), Basket Full of Dragons – a Tribute to Robbie Basho Vol II (2016), Ten Years Gone: A Tribute to Jack Rose (Tompkins Square 2019), along with the archival live recording; Robbie Basho Live in Forlì, Italy 1982 (2018).Buck has developed his intense, intimate and mesmerising approach to live concerts through two decades of playing and touring extensively throughout the US, UK, and Europe with Arborea, performing key shows and festivals (Green Man Festival, Moseley Folk Festival, Philadelphia Folk Festival, etc). He also draws inspiration from the deep well of Folk and Rock of the 1960s (Robbie Basho, Bert Jansch, Peter Green, Tim Buckley, etc.)In 2016 Buck released his first solo album Immortal Light, followed in 2018 by Morning Haikus, Afternoon Ragas, listed among the ‘Best Albums of 2018’ according to Folk Radio UK and Aquarium Drunkard.In April of 2020 Curran released his third solo album ‘No Love Is Sorrow’. Later that month he was interviewed by Jason Woodbury for Aquarium Drunkard Transmissions. In May 2020, Premier Guitar Magazine published a feature article and NPR published a Tiny Desk Concert recorded at Buck’s apartment in Bergamo, Italy. No Love is Sorrow was also listed among the ‘Best Albums of 2020’ by Folk Radio UK and Aquarium Drunkard. Curran’s music invokes swarming natural forces, looking for the borderline between the real and the sublime and, maybe, the supernatural ~ Jesse Jarnow/Relix Magazine There’s a burning darkness to these songs, as Curran’s rough-hewn voice and droning psych-folk melodies curl like smoke, but there’s also a desperate hope that cracks the surface ~Lars Gotrich/NPR-Tiny Desk Guitar tones linger and reverberate with a mystical translucence ~ Dusted Mag The elegant tones that neo-folk artist Buck Curran draws from voice and guitar have a capacity to linger in the air long after the notes have faded. Recorded at the American guitarist’s home in northern Italy shortly before the area went into lockdown, ‘No Love Is Sorrow’ is a beautiful piece of work, interspersing space, atmospheric instrumentals with more complete songs like spooky western “Ghost On The Hill’, the ballad “Deep In The Lovin’ Arms of My Babe'” and the title track. Curran sings with the gravelly decorum of Mark Lanegan but the songs remain, bewitchingly, just over the next horizon. – 8/10 Peter Watts/UNCUT Magazine
Sweet Pill
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYSWEET PILLPhiladelphia’s Sweet Pill write eruptive emo songs that embrace the edges of pop and hardcore. The kind of band whose members are fully immersed in their local scene—through a handful of notable side projects and the show-promoting Philly staple 4333 Collective—the quintet’s sound takes wide-spectrum influence from its environment. The result is an amalgam of complex song structures and flourishes of technical acumen, wholly unconcerned with genre, yet evoking the specific styles of touchstones such as Paramore and Circa Survive.On their debut longplayer Where the Heart Is, Sweet Pill’s unbound, raucous energy presents through ten autobiographical tracks that hinge on singer Zayna Youssef’s elastic, enrapturing voice—at times belting and controlled, at others textural and guttural. Supporting Youssef are guitarists Jayce Williams and Sean McCall, bassist Ryan Cullen, and drummer Chris Kearney. Their blistering lead single “Blood” sees Youssef exploring a deteriorated friendship over Williams and McCall’s trudging riffs and tactful counterpoint, with Cullen and Kearney rumbling nimbly in the song’s foundations.Second single “High Hopes” counters with introspective, melodic punk that reshapes anxiety rather than succumb to it. But third single “Diamond Eyes” momentarily slows the pace, with McCall joining Youssef on vocals for a breakup lament laden with acoustic sentimentalism and an emotive flurry from guest flutist Jill Ryan. Such range is the central facet of Where the Heart Is, where Sweet Pill’s penchant for combining punkish tropes enlivened with the vibrance of math-rock and the aggression of post-hardcore sweetened with pop sensibility compound into something stylistically new yet still familiar.Sweet Pill is Zayna, Jayce, Chris, Sean & RyanKEROSENE HEIGHTSKerosene heights is an emo band from Asheville North Carolina and make loud exciting emo punk that carries the torch of earlier emo bands. The energy of a sweaty basement show comes through even in their recordings with distorted twinkly riffs, yelled vocals, and raw production. Their debut LP comes out this summer on No Sleep Records.
BAILEN
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYBAILEN Tired Hearts, the new album from rising indie-pop power trio, BAILEN, delivers a dazzling set of songs that navigates the space between the heart’s expectation and the head’s sober reality. New York based siblings, Daniel, David, and Julia’s second full-length album for Fantasy beats with empathy, vulnerability, and resolve. At times intricate and playful, measured and elaborate, the 12 original songs on Tired Hearts wrestle with an uncertain future where ethics and morality—both communal and personal—seem to be constantly shifting. Locating one’s compass amidst the chaos—a world-wide pandemic, toxic social media culture, economic insecurity and political turbulence—is at the LP’s core. Producer Brad Cook (Bon Iver, Waxahatchee, Snail Mail) who, along with the band, co-produced Tired Hearts, helped to expand BAILEN’s ambition beyond what they initially envisioned. “We’d played the last record live a hundred times before recording it, so we tracked a lot of it live,” Daniel explains. “With Brad, we took a collagist’s approach. It freed us up to explore and be sonically adventurous.” Cook encouraged the trio to experiment with how they sing. “We deliberately used the more vulnerable parts of our voices,” Julia says. “After not being in the studio for years, we were in vulnerable places, and this record reflects the frustration and tenderness of that time.” “We pushed ourselves lyrically, it’s the most exposed, intimate music we’ve written as a result,” David affirms. Indeed, BAILEN’s radiant harmonies, spare, synth-driven tracks, and futuristic, ear-catching arrangements usher in Tired Heart’s exhilarating avant-pop evolution. “Shadows,” affectingly captures “the moment you see someone and realize you can spend the rest of your life with them.” “Nothing Left to Give” echoes of HAIM’s sparkling pop, while “These Bones,” contains a hint of Phoebe Bridgers’ hushed intimacy. On Tired Hearts, their exquisite and thought-provoking new album, BAILEN learns how to dream in the face of life’s uncertainty and in the process, moves forward aware, resilient, and hopeful. “This album is a breakthrough for us,” Daniel says. “It’s been a rocky road, but we’re really grateful that it’s led us here.”ELIZABETH MOEN From her life to the studio, Elizabeth Moen carries with her a certain kind of street-smart wisdom: She knows when you’re on your bullshit and she is also highly sensitive to when her own actions fall short. This perceptive quality is a gift and a burden. The burden is that she is too smart, too tuned into reality to lie to herself and put on a facade that makes it easier to pass for ok. The gift is that instead of giving in, Moen channels life’s turmoil into a constant process of growth–as a songwriter, an arranger, and powerful lyricist.
Little Stranger’s Cool Kids Tour
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYLITTLE STRANGERBorn and raised in Philly, crash landed in Charleston, Kevin and John Shields are breaking into previously uncharted waters with their quirky indie hip-hop group, Little Stranger. Between John’s melodic singer-songwriter magnetism, Kevin’s in-your-face delivery, and an overall undeniable groove, this duo is sure to get any audience up and moving. Stylistically reminiscent of Gorillaz and Odelay-era Beck, Little Stranger delivers a fresh take on melodic hip-hop. Every track brings the uniqueness and strangeness that their name implies.For the past few years, the duo has perfected their live performance by playing over 100 shows per year prior to the coronavirus shutdown. The group also puts a big focus on creating arresting visual experiences through their music videos, their own eccentric television program (LSTV), and in-house graphics. Between their out-of-the-box creative endeavors and an ever-increasing arsenal of new tunes, Little Stranger is poised to make 2023 another slam dunk.JARVPIP THE PANSYPip the Pansy (Erin Burchfield) (fka Wrenn, 25) was born in Syracuse, New York, moving to Woodstock, Georgia when she was 10. She played flute in High School but quit the orchestra, veering to visual arts. She then quit visual arts to do theatre. She quit theatre to sing in the chorus. She attended Art School at the University of Georgia to study photography. After graduating she decided that music was her path and hasn’t looked back since.DAMN SKIPPY Alex Veazey aka Damn Skippy is a hip hop artist based out of Charleston SC. As a member of the Holy City Hip Hop Committee he spends most of his time holding it down like Gravity.
Pedro The Lion
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYPEDRO THE LION Pedro the Lion is the band name Dave Bazan has used off and on since 1995 to release six albums and two eps of his hooky, insightful, and mournful songs. This year, his critically acclaimed and fan favorite, first and third LPs, 1998’s “It’s Hard to Find a Friend” and 2002’s “Control”, turn 25 and 21 years old, respectively. To celebrate, Dave, along with guitar player Erik Walters and drummer Terence Ankeny, will play every song from each album on tour. ERIK WALTERS Erik Walters is an American songwriter and guitarist based in Seattle, Wash. Steeped in the local music community since 2008, he has written songs for several bands and played guitar for artists such as Telekinesis!, Perfume Genius, and is a current member of Pedro The Lion. He released his eponymous solo record in 2021.
DESTROYER (solo)
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYDESTROYER (solo) Dan Bejar initially conceived of Have We Met as a Y2K album. He was already active during the era but not heard overhead in a cafe or salon, which is perhaps what the idea of the Y2K sound evokes nearly two decades later. Bejar assigned frequent producer and bandmate John Collins the role of layering synth and rhythm sections over demos with the period-specific Björk, Air, and Massive Attack in mind, but he soon realized the sonic template was too removed from Destroyer’s own, and the idea of a concept was silly anyway. So he abandoned it and gave Collins the most timeless instruction of all: “Make it sound cool.”Atmosphere and loose approximations of a place or feeling are what we’ve come to expect from any new Destroyer record—certainly not an easily defined and stridently adhered to theme or concept. Have We Met manages to meet somewhere between those disparate Y2K reference points and Destroyer’s own area of expertise, gliding deftly into territory that marries the old strident Destroyer with the new, aged crooning one of late.THE REDS, PINKS, AND PURPLESBefore The Reds, Pinks & Purples started getting noticed by a larger audience, the “I Should Have Helped You” 4 song EP snuck out on Swedish experimental label I Dischi Del Barone and quickly disappeared, becoming a little-heard but often whispered about piece of the RPPs discography. Recorded around the same time as the material that ended up on his breakthrough LP “Uncommon Weather,” it contains some of the best examples of Glenn Donaldson’s melancholy but wry take on indie pop. Needless to say, it’s terrific.The original 7″ is now a white whale for collectors, trading for silly prices on Discogs when it shows up at all. This music *needs* to be heard, so we’ve put together this limited reissue that adds six more tracks to make it a mini-LP length grab bag of hits. It has songs about record shopping, religion, worker’s rights, dysfunctional holidays, and of course heartbreak sung over a maze of shimmering fuzzy guitars and drum machine beats — an essential chapter of the Reds, Pinks & Purples story.
Bill Callahan
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYBILL CALLAHAN“And we’re coming out of dreams / And we’re coming back to dreams” is the first thing you hear Bill say as you remake your acquaintance on YTI⅃AƎЯ. Right out the gate, he’s standing in two places at once: meeting up with old friends behind the scenes and encountering them on the record, finding himself coming round the bend and then again as someone else on down the line. Like the character actor he played on Gold Record, writing stories about other people, telling jokes about everyone, and in singing them, becoming the songs. “You do what you’ve got to do / To see the picture” Bill’s got a full band sound going on this one, with him and Matt Kinsey on guitars, Emmett Kelly on bass and backing vocals, Sarah Ann Phillips on B3, piano and backing vocals and Jim White on drums. Jim and Matt sing on one song, too, and some other singers come in, too. Bill plays some synth here and there, and Carl Smith drifts in and out of the picture with his contra alto clarinet, as do Mike St. Clair and Derek Phelps on brass. Somehow in between them all, you might think you hear the distant sound of a steel guitar. And you might—but you might not, too. In this company, Bill continues his journey, tunneling underneath the weathered exterior of what seems to be and into the more nuanced life everything takes on in the dark. With Bill’s voice making the extraordinary leaps and bounds that measure the lives of the songs, the band follow him through passages that seem to invent themselves; other times playing with deeply soulful grooves and/or desperate intensity, as these moments come and go. There’s nothing they can’t do. “I wrote this song in five and forever / I’m writing it right now” Bill sings on “Natural Information”—an admission of the everyday alchemy he’s forever trafficking in. Time passes, triangulating the encounters that went into any one record with two out of any three others, all of it made flesh, new constitution, in our stereo speakers. If every album is its own life, it stands to reason that they’re invariably passing in the night. Cascading images flowing from the stream of consciousness. Turning like pages from the journal, unspeakably personal, then suddenly become tall tales, like a book pulled off the shelf, completely unbound. Headlines flow through. Mirror images, mirthful ones. Bill’s lyrics strain at the lines on the page, not content to separate the printing of the fact from the myth or be confined to ink on paper. They want to fly free. And they do. “I realize now that dreams are real” On YTI⅃AƎЯ’s inner sleeve, alongside his lyrics, Bill celebrates the “exhilaration and dread” of cover artist Paul Ryan’s paintings. Paul’s another one met up with again down the road, his indelible cover imagery on Apocalypse and Dream River now an axis of meaning in the Callahanian world—and in the bright colors found in these new images, a parallel to Bill’s recognitions here. “A breath of exquisite air as we come up from drowning”, sounds like the desired hope for those hearing the songs of YTI⅃AƎЯ.Pascal Kerong’A
Avey Tare: 7s Tour
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYAVEY TAREYou remember how it was, don’t you, back in the Spring of 2020? Knowing so little about what any of us should do, so many of us crawled inside our quarters to find new obsessions or indulge the familiar ones, unencumbered by anything else we could do. At home in the woods on the eastern edge of Asheville, N.C., Avey Tare took the latter path, sequestering himself in his small home studio to sort the songs he’d written and recorded with friends in the instantly distant before times — Animal Collective’s Time Skiffs, of course, their astonishing document of communal creativity a quarter-century into the enterprise. He often worked there for 12 hours a day, tweaking mixes alone, save the birds and bears and his girlfriend, Madelyn. By Fall, though, it was done, so what next? How else should Avey now occupy himself in his cozy little room? The answer became 7s, his fourth solo album (and first in four years), an enchanting romp through the playground of his head. He wasn’t, however, going to do it alone.During the first week of January 2021, Avey began making regular drives to his friend Adam McDaniel’s Drop of Sun Studios to give guts and flesh and color to the skeletal demos he’d made at home. They turned first to “Hey Bog,” a tune Avey had been tinkering with since he wrote it to have new material for a rare live performance years earlier. The inquisitive electronic meditation — all tiny percussive pops and surrealist textures at first — slowly morphs into a gem about surrendering cynicism and accepting the world a bit more readily, the call buttressed by trunk-rattling bass and spectral guitar. It feels like a lifetime map for new possibilities, encapsulated in nine absorbing minutes. The plot for 7s, then, was set: trusting, intuitive, exploratory collaboration among friends, after a Winter without it. These songs are like overstuffed jelly jars, cracking so that the sweetness oozes out into unexpected shapes. Still, the sweetness — that is, Avey’s compulsory hooks — remains at the center, the joy inside these Rorschach blots.If Animal Collective has forever been defined by its charming inscrutability, Avey surrenders to a new intimacy and candor with 7s. Take “The Musical,” a bouncing ball of rubbery synths and wah-wah guitars that contemplates what draws someone to sound and how turning that calling into a profession can alter the source. “I can hear the mountains singing,” he counters with an audible smile wiped across his face, painting a postcard of his home amid one of the United States’ folk hubs, “and I do believe they could do that forever.” Obligations aside, this is a self-renewing love, he realizes, the source as captivating as it was the first time. “Have you ever felt a thing and known that’s how you felt about it all along?” he ends this guileless love song for everything.SHAMsongs of Shane Justice McCord expanded in collaboration with Mikey Powers, other friends & magnetic tape
Vancouver Sleep Clinic
– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYVANCOUVER SLEEP CLINIC Vancouver Sleep Clinic is the lustful, ambient guise of 26-year-old singer-songwriter and producer Tim Bettinson. Across his catalogue, elements of anthemic indie rock, intimate R&B, and sophisticated folk provide a sweeping film soundtrack for Bettinson’s gentle vocal and expansive storytelling. Emerging from his native Brisbane, Australia on the strength of a series of singles including “Someone To Stay,” “Middle of Nowhere,” “The Wire,” and the bedroom-produced viral cover of “As It Was,” Vancouver Sleep Clinic is poised to shift from under the radar success story to 2023 global headline mainstay.GHOSTLY KISSESMusic has always been around Margaux Sauvé, born in Quebec to a family of musicians; she picked up the violin at the tender age of five. Moving on to the Conservatoire in Quebec, she quit due to“missing the fun part of it” but still loved music so started to play violin in local bands. Singing came a bit later as she thought that “to be a singer you had to have a powerful voice and be loud”, something that doesn’t come naturally to her as a quiet, thoughtful person. Alongside this, the pop music on the radio whilst growing up in Quebec wasn’t connecting with her, so it wasn’t until she started to write music whilst studying psychology at University that the creativity and desire to express revealed itself: “it just opened a completely new path for me”. Writing music as Ghostly Kisses arrived at a moment where Margaux was in “a living situation I was not able to get out of. A toxic relationship where I had a hard time understanding what was happening.” With this knowledge, it is understandable that most of her early music has a sorrowful but exploratory mood; knowing there were things she needed to express, but not understanding quite how instinctively she was writing until years later it became apparent what she was singing about. And now, with ‘Heaven, Wait’, her mesmeric debut album ready for release, her songwriting has developed to the point that this is the first time she has written and felt like she was part of the conversation. Able to view herself with an external eye, the album reflects transitions and rebirth – still talking about difficult situations, but with the ability to cast someone else in the lead role, giving the music a deeply personal yet starkly universal appeal. One which Margaux feels has come from “a more mature, adult way of looking at it.”Identifying key themes of the album, Margaux frames the album artwork within the context of the songs as being “from water towards the air, there’s a lot of dark around me and I’m just going through to the light.” And that feels like the crux of the album, that nothing is perfect – there are always difficult situations, but it is about trusting the process and working hard towards something positive.
