Category Archives: We Love Music

Music Reviews & News

Entertainment, Music, Night Life, The Daily Feed, We Love Music, We Love Weekends
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Hot Ticket: Marissa Nadler @ Red Palace, 7/29/2011

Head over to Red Palace Friday night for an evening of sultry, dreamy indie-folk with Boston chanteuse Marissa Nadler. Her music is melancholic and lovely, at times reminiscent of Mazzy Star.  She has received a good amount of  buzz lately: her self-titled album was featured on NPR’s First Listen, and she was one of SPIN’s 5 best new artists in June. Her single “Baby, I Will Leave You In the Morning” from her latest album was featured on the Pitchfork Playlist. She’s wrapping up her summer tour of US and Canada with fellow Boston indie-folksters Faces on Film.

Marissa Nadler
w/ Faces on Film
@Red Palace
7/29 – 10pm – 18+
$10

Entertainment, Music, Night Life, We Love Music, We Love Weekends
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We Love Music: Hayes Carll @ Rock & Roll Hotel, 7/23/11


courtesy of Hayes Carrl.

Hayes Carll plays country music I can get into. Last Saturday he turned the Rock & Roll Hotel into a honky tonk for the night when he and his band The Poor Choices brought their foot-stompin’ blend of country, bar-room rock & twangy folk to the stage. Texas native Carll and his gang are on US tour right now in support of his fourth studio album “KMAG, YOYO (& Other American Stories) “, released in February of this year on Lost Highway Records.

Hayes Carll packed the house, playing to a sold-out crowd of very enthusiastic Washingtonians. Cowboy boots and even a few cowboy hats were in the house (not onstage), though I wouldn’t say the audience looked particularly “country”. Country or not, they were clearly excited and into the music of the evening. Carll started off his set on a mild note with the quiet, twangy “The Letter,” from his latest album “KMAG, YOYO.” He and the band were just warming up, though. Things sped up a little for “Wild As A Turkey”, from his album “Trouble In Mind.” The song showcased his humorous, sometime self-deprecating lyrics, and warbling vocal style.
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Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Cibo Matto @ Rock & Roll Hotel, 7/19/11


photos by Santiago Gamboa.

New York based duo Cibo Matto  brought girl-powered grooves to a full house at the Rock & Roll Hotel last Tuesday night. After a ten year hiatus Japanese ex-pats Yuka Honda and Miho Hatori reunited earlier this year to play a benefit show alongside Yoko Ono, Sonic Youth and Mike Patton for the victims of the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. Soon after they announced their US reunion tour, “Yeah Basically Cibo Matto”, as well as plans for a new album.

Yuka Honda and Miho Hatori came onstage to a room full of cheering fans and looked happy to be there. They started their set off with the dreamy/funky/jazzy “Beef Jerky,” from their debut album “Viva La Woman”. The duo had the audience jumping and shouting along right away to the quirky chorus “Who cares? I don’t care! A horse’s ass is better than yours!” The mood of fun and funk was set and remained throughout the show.

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Music, Night Life, The Daily Feed, We Love Music, We Love Weekends
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Hot Ticket: Hayes Carll @ Rock & Roll Hotel, 7/23/2011

Texas native Hayes Carll brings his special blend of folk-tinged, quirky, alt-country/rock to the Rock & Roll Hotel this Saturday night. Carll’s laid-back southern drawl pairs well with quick-witted lyrics and an upbeat country sound. His songs range from banjo-pickin’ twangy ballads like “Bottle in My Hand” to the quick-fire lyrical rocking assault of “KMAG YOYO“, which sounds like an updated version of Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues“. 

He is on US tour now in support of his fourth studio album, “KMAG YOYO” which was released by Lost Highway Records in February of this year. 

Hayes Carll
w/Scott Miller
@Rock & Roll Hotel
7/23 – 7pm
$16

Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Soundgarden @ Patriot Center, Fairfax 7/12/11 & Festival Pier (Philadelphia) 7/13/11


photos by Santiago Gamboa.

Last week, in the midst of their US summer tour, Seattle-sound vanguards Soundgarden proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that they still rock…hard. The band reunited last year after a 13-year hiatus and I was super-bummed to miss their first show back together at Lollapalooza in Chicago. But I waited, patiently, hanging on any of the few and far-between missives they sent to their fanclub members for news of a tour. Finally they announced their US summer 2011 tour, along with plans for recording a new album.

First of all, to lay some foundation down, I will disclose that I am a huge Soundgarden fan. I have been a devout follower since I heard their song “Somewhere” (from their 1991 album ‘Badmotorfinger’) on a mix-tape my friend gave me in 7th grade. I was lucky enough to see them three times before they broke up in 1997. Time has only made me appreciate their music more.

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Entertainment, We Love Music
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We Love Music: A Perfect Circle @ DAR Constitution Hall, 7/17/11

A Perfect Circle 1
All photos courtesy of A Perfect Circle

When I heard that A Perfect Circle was coming to DAR Constitution Hall, I had a ton of questions. The band has been on hiatus for seven years; Maynard’s been working with Tool, Billy Howerdel formed Ashes Divide, and the other members ran off with Smashing Pumpkins, Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails. Why reform the band? Do they still have ‘it’? Are they going to ruin my positive memories of the group? I’m pretty much required to go to this, having seen them and Tool every chance I’ve ever gotten, right?

When the songs were right, the show was fantastic. These guys are actually capable of writing beautiful songs, with rich harmonies and epic crescendos that moved the entire audience. But their setlist was tragic. Out of their three studio albums, the setlist was weighted heavily towards 2004’s Emotive, a political album about the Iraq war that they rushed to release in time for the 2004 election. This isn’t just my opinion; it is objectively true that Emotive is no fan’s favorite album. It’s an album of cover songs! That means almost half of the show wasn’t even original A Perfect Circle material! That might be okay for a bar band, but not for a major group that’s selling out DAR. I can’t think of a show I’ve seen that defied fan’s hopes and expectations more than this one.

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Fun & Games, Music, We Love Music
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The Winning Ticket: Eels

Eels

This week we are giving away a pair of tickets to see Eels and The Submarines perform at the 9:30 Club on July 27th at 7pm. This show will be the night following the appearance of Eels on the Late Show with David Letterman. The band has released 11 albums since the early ’90s, in addition to a hand full of live albums and a pile of singles and EPs dealing with mental illness and personal loss, among other subjects.

For your chance to win these tickets simply leave a comment on this post using a valid email address between 9am and 4pm today. One entry per email address, please. If today doesn’t turn out to be your lucky day, check back here each Wednesday for a chance to win tickets to other great concerts. Tickets for this concert are available on Ticketfly.

For the rules of this giveaway…

Comments will be closed at 4pm and a winner will be randomly selected. The winner will be notified by email. The winner must respond to our email in 24 hours or they will forfeit their tickets and we will pick another winner.

Tickets will be available to the winner at the 9:30 Club Guest List window one hour before doors open on the night of the concert. The tickets must be claimed with a valid ID. The winner must be old enough to attend the specific concert or must have a parent’s permission to enter if he/she is under 18 years old.

Interviews, We Love Music
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Live Band Karaoke in DC: The Harikaraoke Band Gong Show!

Harikaraoke Band

I got the opportunity to sit down and chat with Kenny Lewis over at the Wonderland Ballroom’s lovely patio before he stepped onto the stage to play drums for the Harikaraoke Live Band Gong Show! We somehow started talking about Twitter before we got to the interview. We both shared the fact that we do not have accounts; however, after our discussion I’m sure that his band will have one, because they are so awesome! I may activate an account so that I can follow where these guys are playing. Continue reading →

Entertainment, Fun & Games, We Love Music
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The Winning Ticket: The Glitch Mob

Glitch Mob

This week we are giving away a pair of tickets to see The Glitch Mob with Phantogram & Com Truise perform at the 9:30 Club on July 20th at 7pm. This dose of digital goodness invades the District on the heels of releasing their new EP, We Can Make the World Stop. The Glitch Mob blends hip-hop and dance into its own flavor of electronic music which has enticed and enchanted audiences at Coachella and Lollapalooza.

THE GLITCH MOB : BEYOND MONDAY from BEMO | Brandon Hirzel on Vimeo.

For your chance to win these tickets simply leave a comment on this post using a valid email address between 9am and 4pm today. One entry per email address, please. If today doesn’t turn out to be your lucky day, check back here each Wednesday for a chance to win tickets to other great concerts. Tickets for this concert are available on Ticketfly.

For the rules of this giveaway…

Comments will be closed at 4pm and a winner will be randomly selected. The winner will be notified by email. The winner must respond to our email in 24 hours or they will forfeit their tickets and we will pick another winner.

Tickets will be available to the winner at the 9:30 Club Guest List window one hour before doors open on the night of the concert. The tickets must be claimed with a valid ID. The winner must be old enough to attend the specific concert or must have a parent’s permission to enter if he/she is under 18 years old.

We Love Music
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We Love Music: Fucked Up @ Rock and Roll Hotel, 6/27/11

P1020147
All photos by Rachel Rasby

The smell of Cocoa Puffs crushed underfoot. Silhouettes of back-hair illuminated by a spotlight. Clouds of sweat puffing around the stage. Most of my memories of Fucked Up’s performance on Monday night at the Rock and Roll Hotel aren’t particularly pleasant. But who likes their shows ‘pleasant’ anyway? Yeah, it was kind of a sweaty mess at the front of the stage – a crowd five fans deep, jumping relentlessly up and down throughout the set. But Fucked Up supplied an undeniably, infectiously energetic soundtrack for us to go wild to.

Leading by example, Fucked Up’s Damian Abraham rushed on stage and proceeded to rip open a huge bag of store-brand Cocoa Puffs all over the audience. Okay, consider my attention grabbed. Damian was one of those frontmen that’s always doing something to keep your attention, whether he’s spinning his mic around by its cord, leaning into the crowd to yell about the Crusades, or just stomping around on stage. I enjoyed the show from start to finish; I can see why their live shows have gotten them so much buzz. They made the mostly-full Rock and Roll Hotel feel like a summer festival.
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Entertainment, Fun & Games, We Love Music
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The Winning Ticket: Rx Bandits

As a way to say thanks to our loyal readers, We Love DC will be giving away a pair of tickets to a 9:30 Club concert to one lucky reader each week. Check back here every Wednesday morning at 9am to find out what tickets we’re giving away and leave a comment for your chance to be the lucky winner!

This week we are giving away a pair of tickets to see Rx Bandits perform at 9:30 Club on Saturday, July 9th. I haven’t really followed Rx Bandits since they emerged from the ska-punk scene back in the day, but from the tour preview below, it looks and sounds like they have developed into a more sonically daring group with a harder edge. What you’ll also see in the preview below is that this is actually a pretty nice triple-bill with Maps & Atlases and Zechs Marquise (a band who have a great referential name and an awesome sound that I will be tracking down more of ASAP). Also as you can read on the image above, this is Rx Bandits’ final tour, so these free tickets are probably your last chance to catch them until the inevitable reunion tour ten to fifteen years from now.

For your chance to win these tickets simply leave a comment on this post using a valid email address between 9am and 4pm today. One entry per email address, please. If today doesn’t turn out to be your lucky day, check back here each Wednesday for a chance to win tickets to other great concerts. Tickets for this concert are available on Ticketfly.

For the rules of this giveaway…
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Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Jeremy Messersmith @ DC9, 6/19/11


courtesy of J. Messesmith.

It is unusual for me to go to a show of a band I’ve never heard before and be swept off my feet. That happened Sunday night when Jeremy Messersmith and his band played DC9.

From the first song, “Novocain,” off of his first album Alcatraz Kid, it was clear there was something special happening. This song, like much of his music, has a dichotomy of upbeat music paired with melancholic lyrics or morose subject matter. Listening to “Novocain” makes you want to bop your head and maybe even dance, while Messersmith sings of his heartbreak “There ain’t enough Novocain to numb my broken heart.” I love that.

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Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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The Winning Ticket: Grupo Fantasma



As a way to say thanks to our loyal readers, We Love DC will be giving away a pair of tickets to a 9:30 Club concert to one lucky reader each week. Check back here every Wednesday morning at 9am to find out what tickets we’re giving away and leave a comment for your chance to be the lucky winner!

This week we are raffling off a pair of tickets to see Grupo Fantasma perform at the 9:30 Club tomorrow night! This Latin funk super-group has been cranking out quality tunes for ten years and are taking a victory lap tour after winning the Best Latin Rock or Alternative Album Grammy for their album “El Existential” last year. Check out one of their Grammy winning songs in this video and if you like what you hear, enter to win these tix!

For your chance to win these tickets simply leave a comment on this post using a valid email address between 9am and 4pm today. One entry per email address, please. If today doesn’t turn out to be your lucky day, check back here each Wednesday for a chance to win tickets to other great concerts. Tickets for this concert are available on Ticketfly.

For the rules of this giveaway…
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Entertainment, Music, The Features, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Ryan Bingham at the 9:30 Club

Ryan Bingham at the 9:30 Club
Photo by Rachel Levitin

It’s been said countless different ways, but according to folks who’ve lived around these parts, the District is “a northern city with southern charm.” As a daughter of two midwesterner’s, I never knew whether or not the whole “D.C. as a northern city with southern charm thing” was true or not. Then, I saw Texan singer-songwriter Ryan Bingham at the 9:30 Club. In the span of 24 hour hours, I found myself splitting my time between a colossal audience at the Verizon Center for Glee Live and a rock club turned honky tonk show at 9:30 Club for Bingham on June 10. Bingham brought the south with him. Continue reading →

Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Earth @ Ottobar, 6/17/11

IMG_1523
all photos by author.

I almost did not go to this concert. A big deadline at my day job had me completely exhausted and the thought of a round-trip drive to Baltimore weighed heavily on me all afternoon. The tiredness and sense of drive-dread continued into the early evening. In fact at about 8:30, I posted this on twitter: “My day job killed me today. Trying to dig deep to make the drive to B’More for the EARTH concert but…#AllSignsPointToNo”.

Then a response tweet from MetalChris of DC Heavy Metal intervened a few seconds later to gave me the motivation I needed to drag my weary self out to my car. “You can do it man! I’ll be up there too, how often does Earth come around ya know?” Little did I know that my drive up would soon be extended by an extra hour thanks to some single lane action on 295N. By the time I got to Baltimore I was in pretty bad shape and felt like I was about to pass out.

The opening band didn’t help me feel any better. O Paon is a single woman playing guitar loops and singing so quietly that the bouncers were making audience members leave the room if they talked. Normally I would applaud this kind of enforcement, but I soon found myself and MetalChris being chastised for simply saying hello. Did I mention that O Paon’s music did nothing for me? Normally I try to be an enlightened listener, open to just about anything; but the tiredness, the crappy drive, and the fascist bouncer did not put me in a happy receptive place for O Paon’s Quebecoise mewling.

But I wasn’t there for this French-language, musical stage version of Jodie Foster’s film “Nell”; I was there to hear Dylan Carlson’s legendary instrumental metal band EARTH shake some internal organs. So after some conversation in the other room, we all returned to the main room and took up places for one of the best shows of the year.

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Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Yeasayer @ 9:30 Club, 6/16/2011

Yeasayer: 9:30 Club, 6/16/2011 [2]
All photos by author

It’s been a year since Yeasayer last visited the 930 Club, in promotion of their latest album Odd Blood. Since then, word spread about their solid live show, and tickets for Thursday night’s show sold out months in advance. They came to DC as part of a short tour to road-test some new songs for their next album – another batch of funky, 80s-pop-influenced tracks with catchy melodies and weird instrumentation. Also new: their fantastic lighting setup, involving huge LCD displays that illuminated the entire club.

By the end of the show, I realized that only a couple Yeasayer tracks really do it for me – even “Ambling Alps” is wearing thin after hearing it a million times last summer. Yet their show was undeniably professional, and their visual appeal kept me interested even during the less exciting songs. Plus, as an experimental pop band, each song was different enough from the last, and short enough that I never got bored of watching them.

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Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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Hot Ticket: Weekend Edition


courtesy of Iceage.

There are more live music options than you can count on two hands happening around town and beyond this weekend. To help you cut the chaff, we’ve cooked up some concert recommendations that can’t miss. Read on about four upcoming shows that have the We Love DC stamp of approval!

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Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Beirut @ Black Cat, 6/14/11

Photo courtesy of
‘Zach Condon’
courtesy of ‘ElfieTakesPictures’

Zach Condon breezes on stage before the sold-out audience with his shirt-sleeves rolled up and smiles as he takes his spot in the center. To either side of him are the five other musicians who make up the current line-up of Beirut, sharing amongst the six of them about a dozen instruments, but this one-time solo bedroom project remains clearly Condon’s band and he looks comfortable in the starring role.

Beirut’s distinctively lush and exotically-influenced style is recreated beautifully live. One notices early in the set that Condon really, truly sings more than the average male indie vocalist – and when he does it is stunning. Presumably honed by years of projecting out over the massive crowds on the European festival circuit, he fills the Black Cat with his voice. When not singing, he alternates between six-string ukelele and trumpet and, at one point, switched to piano.

There is a sophistication to the whole band’s performance that set it apart. There is a trope in concert reviewing to describe musicians as having “raw energy” or “blistering power.” That is not Beirut. Which is by no means to say they lack emotional intensity or seem unenthusiastic about live performance. Instead, the band simply seems rehearsed – not surprising given the time they have spent with the majority of the night’s songs at this point – and genuinely musically proficient and talented.
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Entertainment, Music, We Love Music
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We Love Music: Dawes/M.Ward/Bright Eyes @ Wolf Trap, 6/11/11

bright_eyes
Bright Eyes photo courtesy of Wolf Trap.

We recruited Alexia Kauffman to hike out to Wolf Trap and cover this show for us.

Saturday night the audience at Wolf Trap heard three unique angles on American indie-folk music. Omaha, Nebraska’s Bright Eyes, currently on an international tour, brought along Portland’s M. Ward and Los Angeles’ Dawes for what was a spirited evening of Americana, indie-folk, rock, and just plain good music.

Up first were rockers Dawes.
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