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Much like male/female harmonies, musicians currently obsessed with analog synthesizers is another “trend” of sorts that I’m not even close to sick of… LA’s Soft Metals are one of such bands, comprised of vocalist/keyboardist Patricia Hall and multi-instrumentalist Ian Hicks. The two met at a DJ night in 2009...
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The Colourist are an indie pop band from Orange County… They’re into Phil Collins and ghosts… They’ve only recorded two songs, but Interview and FILTER are already fans… Their debut 7″ dropped earlier this month… They’re about to kick off a string of summer dates, starting with a July...
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No one seems to be a bigger fan of Eraserhood’s underground, slightly-creepy, gallery/lounge/cabaret, Underground Arts, than NYC’s Lily and the Parlour Tricks, who have graced its stage four times in the past year and a half… And I suspect Lily and the Parlour Tricks have few fans bigger than...
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Possibly you’re the kind of person who went to school for something practical and now pays their bills with the skills they learned earning a degree… but you really want to be able to impress the cute tattooed guy you see at the dive bar you go to every...
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Like any fan of Morrissey, I’m quite charmed by those bluntly self-deprecating existential realists. I recently got a chance to chat with Portland folk singer/songstress Alela Diane, whose fourth LP, About Farewell, was released this past Tuesday digitally (It will be out physically July 30th.) and she quite charmed...
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Of all of the great Americana artists to grace the subcultural (and sometimes, even popular) airwaves of recent years, Sean Rowe might be the most “authentic.” He comprised his debut album, Magic, based on the inspiration he got as a naturalist, after spending 24 days in the wilderness, left to...
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Disclosure is a UK duo consisting of brothers Guy and Howard Lawrence. Their debut LP “Settle” despite the talk of dub step, house, disco and other musical categories… I can say that this album is just a brilliant pop album. “Settle” is full of bright danceable euro-synth pop that is...
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Eleanor Friedberger released her sophomore LP “Personal Record” , a follow to her critically acclaimed and much heralded debut “Last Summer” in 2010. This is a tremendously ambitious follow-up to a imaginative debut record but not one that could be bested. Eleanor is the second half of the sister/...
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So there are a handful of legitimately good acts who will be performing at the Firefly Music Festival in Dover, Delaware this weekend. But, if you’re looking for something a little bit more intimate and a little less taking-place-in-Delaware, Austin’s Mother Falcon will be taking the stage upstairs at World...
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My favorite thing about Her Royal Harness is the existentialism in their craft. Songwriter Helene Jaeger explains that the inspiration behind the project’s moniker is the notion of individuals being forced to fit into pre-existing identities: “From the time you are born, people around you continually attempt to define...
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While I’m, personally, not a big fan of leaving the apartment, much less Center City, much less the state, I have to admit that the Firefly Music Festival, taking place this weekend in Dover, Delaware, boasts quite an impressive lineup, from recently profiled acts like He’s My Brother She’s...
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If you’ve been monitoring Philthy recently, you’ll know that we really appreciate the “blood harmony” provided by a good sister act (The Staves, Haim, First Aid Kit). Well, there’s a new group of sisters we’re currently getting excited about, the Jurkiewicz’s, AKA Lily & Madeleine. The teenage sisters, who made...
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Indeed, I do “live in a heartbeat city,” “ in love every minute on the street,” but Kim Boekbinder takes the cake for my #1 crush of 2013. Boekbinder is a Canada-born, NYC-based electro singer/songwriter and visual artist, who has made a name for herself collaborating with the likes...
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Unlike acts like U2 and The Rolling Stones, whose live performance media spectacles are only enhanced and further caricaturized by the cuts, pans, and excess lighting of cinema, no piece of cinema has managed to come close to capturing the beautiful raw chaos of The Stooges/Iggy & The Stooges’...
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New York City’s Gold Lake have been making waves in the music industry for the past several years now, at festivals like NXNE, CMJ, and Brooklyn’s Northside Festival, touring with Peter and the Wolf and Nada Surf, and even having their debut LP produced by Phil Ek (best known...
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Suburban Reverb is not only the most poetically and postmodernly cool album title I’ve heard of 2013, but the sounds it contains are also some of the year’s best. The album, which drops next Tuesday, June 18th, is the product of Bay-Area-based, retro-electronic, husband-wife duo Ryan and Rebecca Coseboom,...
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Hearing neo-Americana acts doing ‘90s R&B covers is cool and all, but it’s getting a bit cliché… So I have to give Mississippi septet Rosco Bandana props for their brilliant take on “Tender,” by alpha Brit-Poppers Blur, on their debut album, Time to Begin, released last December… And their...
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If you regularly frequent Ortlieb’s Lounge in Northern Liberties, there’s a decent chance you’ve already seen Kendra Morris, who has made two stops the jazz venue this year. The Florida-born chanteuse has spent the past decade in NYC playing live, releasing EPs, and crafting her brand of soul-fusion that...
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In my notes taken during my recent interview with Los Angeles-based synth-poppers Touché, I see an underlined phrase I seem to have scrawled mid-chat: “Talk about how fucking nice and playful they are.” Touché are Alex Lilly and Bram Inscore (with additional help from Aaron Redfield), who seem to...
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For the past several years Portland, OR’s Radiation City has been making a name for themselves, putting out charmingly quirky, folky dream pop. However, their sophomore LP, Animals in the Median (released this May on Tender Loving Empire), is more along the lines of a whimsically funky postmodern brand...
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Want to be my new favorite band? Be a retro-leaning girl-group who writes badass surfy doo-wop, and send me your latest release on a cassette tape… Seattle’s La Luz did just that… and they are my new favorite band. The quartet seems to enjoy dragging their lovely four-part harmonies...
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Generally when I ask touring musicians if they have any favorite memories of Philadelphia, they tell me about a particular sandwich that they enjoyed… or a venue with a weird balcony… Jessie Stein is the first person to tell me a story about running around a church sanctuary. Jessie...
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Naomi Greenwald is very much my kind of a person. Ms. Greenwald is a heavy-hearted singer/songwriter and PhD student of the humanities, with a penchant for 90s alt rock. The LA-based songstress released Composite, an ineffably entrancing five-song EP, this March and, since then, a cover of Rihanna’s “Stay.” ...
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Burnt Ones have recently given me hope… in a hopeless time… It’s been years since “Rock’N’Roll” has evoked thoughts of anything aside from chunky, post-frat boys kicking it for people in cargo shorts in front of a banner for some drink that makes you hyper… or people your parents’...
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Like most things worth consuming, Sao Paulo’s Mixhell are a bizarre amalgamation of aesthetics and backgrounds whose union you can’t quite fathom… But then it all just comes together as brilliant postmodern chaos. I realize the whole “Dance-Party-at-the-End-of-the-World” thing has gotten to be a bit of a cliché, but...
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In my early years as a music journalist I was a bit uncomfortable admitting my fandom of artists younger than myself… I had to get over it… Well, not only is Tessa Rose Jackson younger than me, she’s younger than the legal age for drinking in America… Yet, I...
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Emma Louise has been a YouTube sensation, has self-released an award-winning EP, has traveled much of the globe with a nearly awe-inspiring live experience but, it wasn’t until earlier this month that she finally has a proper LP, which was released stateside on Frenchkiss Records. Emma Louise is originally...
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Like many of Philthy’s favorite acts, Lauren Balthrop, aka Dear Georgiana, has a quirkily clever indie pop take on the Americana chanteuse. Balthrop grew up in Alabama, although she’s spent her recent years in NYC. Prior to being a solo artist she made a name for herself in Balthrop,...
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This afternoon Garbage’s One Mile High… Live DVD showed up in my mailbox, courtesy of Eagle Rock Entertainment… I was pretty sure it had been more than a decade since I’d actually heard Shirley Manson and the boys play their electro-trip-hop alt rock… live or on CD. Before watching...
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Eureka the Butcher may not be quite as magical and violent as you would be led to believe… but they’re still pretty fucking awesome. Eureka the Butcher is the latest project of Marcel Rodriguez-Lopez of Zechz Marquise and The Mars Volta. The project reflects the more funky and electronic...
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… I like any band that doesn’t take themselves seriously… That’s not true… But I don’t like any band that does take themselves seriously… And I quite like Blank Realm. Blank Realm are a band of three siblings and one friend from Brisbane who, somehow, manage to blend the...
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Sam Shelton may not exactly be a household name, but I’m guessing you’ve come across some of her work at some point. She’s appeared in films such as Sorority Boys, White Oleander, and Shopgirl; TV series’ such as Judging Amy, Gilmore Girls, and House (She’s currently part of the...
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This Friday, May 24th, Johnny Brenda’s is hosting a night of really fucking weird avant-pop from Melbourne. Headlining the evening are Total Control, a collective of Aussie musicians indebted to the most brilliant forward-thinking crazies of recent musical history, who manage to hone the spirit of punk with postmodern...
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Concrete Knives are likely 2013’s most exciting band that you’ve never heard of. Concrete Knives are a five-piece from Caen, France, who appreciate all of the most joyously fun ways of being abrasive. They’re either the toughest and most morose power poppers in the world, or the most playful...
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Folk rock sister trio The Staves have become one of Philthy’s favorite musical acts. We were there last year for their first Philadelphia performance, a sold-out showcase at World Café Live. And earlier this year we caught up with eldest sister, Emily Staveley-Taylor, to preview the release of their...
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Crossfire Hurricane, Brett Morgan’s recent doc chronicling the legacy of the Rolling Stones, very much wishes it were D.A. Pennebaker’s Dont Look Back… which it’s not… But it’s far closer than I would have imagined. It’s the best film on the Rolling Stones in more than four decades and...
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For some reason, I actually really enjoy the fact that all the best and most authentic contemporary Americana artists seem to be from Europe… Helping to make my case more than any other act in 2013 is Brighton’s The Leisure Society, who are set to release their third LP,...
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Pinkunoizu are a band from Copenhagen. According to their Facebook, “ play cocktail music for you.” Earlier this month they released their sophomore EP (and follow-up to their debut LP), Second Amendment, on Full Time Hobby. It does sound a bit like cocktail music… but for cocktails at the...
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I generally pride myself on valuing “authenticity.” However, considering that as Bauhaus’ 35th anniversary has come around this year and “Ziggy” (Peter Murphy) and “The Spiders” (Daniel Ash, Kevin Haskins, and David J) don’t seem to be seeing eye-to-eye, I was willing to settle for Murphy, the godfather of...
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Until this past Wednesday, I’m not sure Philthy (or Philly, for that matter) was aware that HAERTS had more than one song… In fact, that sentiment was included in the press release for their recent area appearance… But, indeed, they do… at least enough to fill up a support...
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I vividly remember the release of Spacehog’s debut album, Resident Alien. I was just in fifth grade, but had already spent the better part of my life familiarizing myself with the more abrasive side of popular music. I enjoyed the “alt rock” scene/epidemic… but it was all kind of...
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Philthy Mag, myself, and Philadelphia, itself, have always been quite the fans of San Antonio’s Southernly soulful power pop trio, Girl in a Coma, who have released four brilliant LPs in the past half-a-dozen years and are rightfully proud to be signed to Joan Jett’s Blackheart Records. I have...
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Although she may be a Seattle girl, Tess Henley she has quite a fondness for the City of Brotherly Love and Sisterly Affection. “I love Philly. I really mean that. I really do love it and just the whole vibe. It has a cool vibe. It has its own...
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Without a doubt, my favorite release of 2013 is Deap Vally’s debut EP, Get Deap! (Recently-profiled Blood Red Shoes may agree, whose Steven Ansell name-dropped the band as being one of his favorites of recent years.) And unless Iggy and the Stooges’ new album proves to be their best...
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I can’t express how distraught I am that Morrissey’s first Philadelphia appearance in three years, scheduled for April 6th at the Tower Theater, was cancelled. However, that distress is at least a bit tempered by the fact that who-I-would-like-to-consider-Steven-Patrick’s “life partner,” (existentially, at least) Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr, is...
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Norway’s Highasakite are quite an interesting amalgamation… often leaving you feeling like you’re, well… high as a kite… but I mean that in the best way possible. They use postmodern synthetics to channel the spirit of both folk and classical music, but with the bravado of a rock outfit...
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For the past half a decade or so LA’s The Airborne Toxic Event has been making a name for themselves with a brand of Rock’N’Roll that is equal parts punk angst and infectious pop (In addition to a well-honed literary background… hence the Don DeLillo-inspired moniker.) and a live...
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For the past five years or so North Carolina’s Lost in the Trees have been garnering critical acclaim for a sound that blends folk, classical, and chamber pop… So I did more than a bit of a double take when I recently chatted with LITT main man, Ari Picker,...
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Since their inception, about half a decade ago, I’ve always considered Wales’ The Joy Formidable to be the rebelliously hip offspring of arena rock… They know how to write brilliantly poignant pop tunes that appeal to fans of Pixies and The Smiths (and gain critical acclaim from the likes...
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I’m pretty sure The Casket Girls are the most existentially cool band of 2013… The Casket Girls are a Savannah trio, comprised of Phaedra and Elsa Greene, along with Ryan Graveface of Black Moth Super Rainbow, The Marshmallow Ghosts, Dreamend, and the mastermind behind Graveface Records. The three came...
Much like male/female harmonies, musicians currently obsessed with analog synthesizers is another “trend” of sorts that I’m not even close to sick of… LA’s Soft Metals are one of such bands, comprised of vocalist/keyboardist Patricia Hall and multi-instrumentalist Ian Hicks. The two met at a DJ night in 2009...
The Colourist are an indie pop band from Orange County… They’re into Phil Collins and ghosts… They’ve only recorded two songs, but Interview and FILTER are already fans… Their debut 7″ dropped earlier this month… They’re about to kick off a string of summer dates, starting with a July...
