Archive for the ‘Philadelphia’ Category
James Blake played a sold-out show at the First Unitarian Church last night(videos)
James Blake @ the First Unitarian Church last night – see more photos by Michael James Murray
James Blake played a sold-out First Unitarian Church last night on his first tour of the US. He was originally suppose to play Johnny Brenda’s in Fishtown, but once that show sold out in a few hours, R5 Production promptly moved it to the church.
LA based Active Child opened the show with a stellar set of electronic drums, bass, and keyboards. Leadman/songwriter Pat Grossi actually grew up in the Philly area and even gave his mom, who was in attendance, a Mother’s Day shout out since he missed it the day before. His music reminded me of James Blake‘s in the sense that it was very electo based, yet majestic and gospel like. You can check out a recent Daytrotter session he did HERE.
By the time Blake took the stage, the venue was packed and started to get a pretty hot, which is expected on any given spring/summer night in the basement of the church. With his music, one would wish the crowd could respect it, but a good amount of them didn’t. They were loud and talkative throughout his set(particularly stage left), it was a bummer.
Despite that though, James Blake was still able to captivate the crowd and leave them in joyous state after the show. He played a handful of songs off his debut including “Wilhelms Scream”, “I Never Learnt To Show” and a beautiful rendition of Feist’s “Limit To Your Love”. On a few songs, he and his band stemmed away from the original structure and jammed a bit. At the end of the set, Blake seemed to be completely awestruck by the response he received from the Philly crowd and was at a lost for words as he walked off stage.
Blake claimed he never usually did encores, however, after the crowd gave him such an enormous applause and chanted “Encore! Encore!”, he emerged for one more song. He performed a solo version of Joni Mitchell’s “A Case Of You” and it was the absolute perfect closer to the night. Hopefully this guy comes back around again, perhaps he’ll play upstairs in the Sanctuary of the Church(fingers crossed). Below are a few videos from a few Youtubers that were in attendance as well.
James Blake is playing the First Unitarian Church tonight + 10 more tickets at noon
James Blake is playing his long sold-out show at the First Unitarian Church tonight. It was originally going to be held at Johnny Brenda’s, but it was moved to a bigger venue once the original show sold out in a few hours. If you weren’t lucky enough to get tickets, R5 Productions recently tweeted that they will be releasing 10 more tickets for the show at noon. You will be able to find them HERE. They also announced that doors have been pushed back till 830pm.
In other news, he played Later with… Jools Holland over the weekend and you can check out his performances of “The Wilhelm Scream” and “Limit To Your Love” below via Some Kind Of Awesome.
Sisters 3 celebrating their new record tomorrow night(05/07) at Johnny Brendas + MP3s
These three folky ladies called Sisters 3 come from a town called Glenmoore, an hour drive west of Philly, where they grew up in a house full of eight home-schooled kids. They were surrounded by the arts and listening to everything from The Ramones to Jeff Buckley to French composer Erik Satie and Chopin. All of which can be seen in their music in one way or another.
The trio have a new record, Coruscate at the Meadow Gate, coming out June 7th via Modern Vintage Recordings(check out a few tracks below) and will be celebrating it’s release tomorrow night(05/07) at Johnny Brendas along with Honey Watts, On The Water, DJ Slow Poke (a.k.a. Birdie Busch). Tickets for the show can be found HERE or at the door.
XPoNential Music Festival 2011 Line Up
Alright, so, I’m a little late to this party, but I just had to put up a post about this festival. It’s THAT good and it’s right across the river so there’s no need to drive to Tennessee or fly out to Washington. WXPN will host their annual XPoNential Music Festival the weekend of July 22nd-24th at Wiggins Park on the Camden Waterfront. The line up includes Sun Airway, Ra Ra Riot, Ted Leo & the Pharmacists, Nicos Gun, Ben Folds and more. The complete line-up can be found below as well as videos from a few of the artists. If you live in Philly, there’s really no excuse not to go to this festival. Information about how to get tickets can be found HERE.
Andrew Bird announces tour(show close to Philly in October)
Andrew Bird @ the TLA in January 2009
Andrew Bird puts on one of those live performances that just takes your breathe away and makes you leaving the venue feeling in such high spirits. It’s been a while since he’s done any kind of extensive tour. The last time he was in Philly, he played the Electric Factory with St Vincent. Aside from that tour, he’s just been playing one off shows in various locations. He’s apparently in the midst of writing music for his follow up to 2009′s Noble Beast. No word yet on when that will be out.
The bad news about his recent tour announcement is there was no Philly date; however, the good news is there will be a show in Wilmington, Delaware(which is a 25 minute drive south of the city) on Saturday, October 22nd at the Grand Opera House. Tickets for the show go on sale Friday at 10am and they’ll be found HERE.
Creepoid playing Kung Fu Necktie next week + share new live videos
Philly band Creepoid have a show coming up next week at on Monday, May 9th at Kung Fu Necktie. These guys and gal put one hell of a show so you won’t want to miss out. Also on the bill are The Love Dimension, Ancient Creature, and Quilty. Tickets for the show can be found HERE.
They also recently did a session with the Big Ugly Yellow Couch, where they stripped down their songs and played them acoustically. Creepoid is a band known for their loud, droney guitars so it’s pretty rad to see them play them in a different form. Watch the one for “Emily” below and head over to BUYC to watch the rest. Also below is the band’s video for “Grave Blanket.”
Darwin Deez going on a US tour this summer(Johnny Brendas in July)
Darwin Deez is in the midst of a tour in the land down under and shortly after that ends, he heads to Europe for a string of shows and festivals. About two weeks after the Euro tour ends, he and his band will hit the US for quite an extensive summer tour. How does one person tour so much and not get exhausted? We don’t know.
He just played a sold-out show at Kung Fu Necktie in February and will be back in Philly again Tuesday, July 12th at Johnny Brendas. Tickets for the show can be found HERE.
Bon Iver: new album in June + tour dates(Tower Theatre/tickets on sale soon)
Bon Iver @ Bonnaroo 2009
Bon Iver is back after quite a lengthy hiatus where members, leadman Justin Vernon in particular, collaborated with others as well as working on solo stuff. Most notably, Vernon contributed to Kanye West’s most recent album and even performed with him at Coachella. He/they will release their sophomore album, Bon Iver Bon Iver on June 21st via Jagjaguwar. According to our friend Mark at YVYNYL, the album is “quite good, but challenging for sure.” Hmm…I guess we’ll have to wait and see what he means. Until then, check out a short snippet of a new song below.
So far only a few dates have been announced including a show at the Tower Theatre on Wednesday, August 3rd. Tickets for the show go on sale Friday, May 13th. You’ll be able to find them HERE.
Keren Ann touring in June + playing Johnny Brendas w/ Chris Garneau
French singer Keren Ann was just in town last month when she played with Questlove at the Kimmel Center for their PIFA event. About a month before that, she released a new record, 101, which has a mixture of folk, electro and a few slow jams. The highlight of the album is the upbeat, super catch song “My Name Is Trouble”. Check out the video for it below.
She’s set to take 101 out on the road in June for a month long tour across the states. The tour will make a stop in Philly on Friday, June 10th at Johnny Brenda’s with Chris Garneau opening. Tickets for the show can be found HERE.
Photos of PIFA’s Broad Street Fair
This past Saturday marked the end of the Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts which was celebrated with an enormous street fair on South Broad Street. Everything you could imagine from street performers to live music to Ferris wheels were there. It was a beautiful day that was enjoyed by all and you could tell just from the atmosphere of the event. Everyone there just seemed so happy. Below are bunch of photos from the afternoon.
