Featured Shows of the Week! July 28
Monday July 28 2014
Mates of State @ U Street Music Hall
Mates of State have made a new album called “Mountaintops.” You already love Jason and Kori’s unmistakable music, or perhaps you’ve managed to miss out or have simply misunderstood just how great — and yes, influential — they and their sound and their songs are. You throw the record on the stereo and the first thing you notice is the energy and force of it: You could use the girl-group bounce of ‘Total Serendipity’ to help you do some sort of running-and-jumping-up-and-down exercise (that song even comes complete with a couple of cool-down sections). The first response you might have to ‘Maracas’ is to do the robot dance as the portamento Laser Cats intro kicks in, and that might be the correct response.
Go slightly deeper and you find the song-craft. You find that Kori is one of the best female singers in modern music (and Jason is also no slouch). You notice the effortless way their voices harmonize and volley back and forth, the movements within the song, the way they move from upbeat to pastoral so fluidly that you don’t perceive it happening. Their instruments and voices all move as one piece, inseparable. Through the years, the textures have become more intricate, deeper. They’ve begun throwing in the occasional trumpet or guitar, but it is still stunning how much they can do with just keyboards and drums. They move so far within the limitations of the two-piece format that you can’t even call it a limitation. It feels as natural as the standard rock-and-roll four-piece.
Songs like ‘Unless I’m Led’ or ‘Mistakes’ are like a conversation between the two of them as they are going to sleep, when words suddenly come to them, and it is all teetering on the edge of sense. Much has been written about Mates Of State that gloms on to the fact that Jason and Kori are beautiful people in love, with two beautiful daughters. I, too, was once bewitched by their good looks but then I stopped looking at the pin-ups on my wall and started listening to their records. All of the big ideas come to the surface: hope, grief, regret, gratitude, fate, the inevitability of change, the redemption of change, not carrying around the garbage of the past. There is a melancholy to much of their music that is sometimes ignored, and that often marks some of their best moments, like ‘Mistakes’ and ‘Desire’.
Switching between the melancholy and buoyantly hopeful is another specialty of theirs, one that they really nail on “Mountaintops” — the perfect family reminding us it is always a struggle to be happy, no matter where you are in life. The album title comes from an old Zen tale where a monk’s philosophical advice is to always aim for Cold Mountain, the eye always staying on the mountaintop, reaching it just to see the next mountaintop. You hear that throughout these songs: Kori and Jason traveling hopefully, knowing that the struggle and striving are probably the point of the whole thing. Sometimes it is as clear as the titles, with the three-song punch of ‘Desire’,’Change’ and ‘Mistakes’ that ends the album. The whole thing is so focused that it unfolds like one long piece, like an album should.
I know I have to be careful of what I write here, because it may be repeated to Jason and Kori a few hundred times, but I hear a lot of ABBA in their songs. Like ABBA, they write sophisticated boy-girl pop performed so flawlessly that you think it must be easy (but it’s not easy). I hear some of the early work of Giorgio Moroder, and I hear some of the more timeless 80s pop, like ‘This Is The Day’ by The The. I hear some classic Kirsty MacColl in ‘Sway’. I hear some of Nick Lowe’s effortless appropriation of classic pop forms. Sometimes I hear the Valley Girl soundtrack, one of my all-time favorites, in a song like ‘Basement Money.’ ‘Desire’ could have been a big hit for The Carpenters. They touch on so much of what has been great in the last 50 years of pop music, all viewed through the Mates of State filter. Most of all, they have actually built their own sound. They sound like themselves. I hear ‘Palomino’ and it sounds like quintessential Mates of State. Sometimes I hear a new band and think ‘What a Mates Of State rip-off!’ They have been carving out their place in the indie rock world since the late 90s, as two people playing complex songs that sound like five people playing a simple song. That is what the great ones can do.
AC Newman
June, 2011
Tuesday July 29 2014
Us and Us Only @ Metro Gallery
The variety of styles in Us and Us Only’s back catalogue, as well as the versatility of “Dark Cloud Past” itself makes it difficult to pigeonhole the band to a limited genre or style. Apocalyptic horns make foreboding tracks like “Dark House” seem that much darker next to more buoyant tunes “Seed” and “You Were a Writer.” Above it all, vocalist Kinsey Matthews’ unmistakable voice and the vivid pictures painted by his deeply personal lyrics make every song instantly recognizable as the work of Us and Us Only.
The latest and core reincarnation of Us and Us Only: Kinsey Matthews, Sean Mercer, Jake Foster, and Mike Suica have been playing and touring extensively from Gainesville, Florida to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; spreading the dark gospel, but you probably already know that. Lofty arrangements, tight almost-trip-hop drums, booming bass, walls of feedback, sweeping violin, and lyrics about everything between comic books and retiring to the woods combine to form a dark folk/indie vibe.
Thursday July 31 2014
Rodrigo y Gabriela @ Wolf Trap
“I can’t think of a better way to describe their music than with 3 words: ‘heavy metal flamenco.’ And yet the duo doesn’t play heavy metal—its members perform instrumentals on nylon-string guitars—nor does it play Spanish dance music. But the term fits because the pair’s fierce guitar riffs feel powerfully electric, and because Rodrigo y Gabriela’s rhythmic style showcases a frenetic strum that conjures the energy of flamenco.”—NPR
Friday August 1 2014
Taking Back Sunday @ Power Plant Live
Taking Back Sunday are a band who truly need no introduction. Since forming in Long Island in 1999, the group have sold millions of albums, evolved from a scrappy punk act into seasoned songwriters and continued to forge a successful career. That spirit of resilience and innovation is dripping all over the band’s sixth full-length “Happiness Is” (which is also their first release for Hopeless Records). As you can guess from the title the album addresses some heady concepts, but it simultaneously showcases a new musical and conceptual leap for this band of mainstream misfits that’s certain to endear them to fans both new and old.
The group’s second album since reviving the classic lineup of vocalist Adam Lazzara, guitarist/vocalist John Nolan, guitarist Eddie Reyes, bassist Shaun Cooper and drummer Mark O’Connell was written over a two year period with no involvement from a record label for the first time since their legendary 2002 debut “Tell All Your Friends.” “The last record [2011's 'Taking Back Sunday'] was us feeling each other out and learning how to work together again and on this one everybody was a little more comfortable and free to express themselves,” Lazzara explains. “At this point in the game we all know each other’s strengths and weaknesses so well that it has made writing music together a bit easier,” O’Connell confirms. “Don’t get me wrong, there are still arguments but we are older and wiser and with that comes less fighting.”
Co-produced by longtime collaborators Mike Sapone in Long Island and Marc Jacob Hudson in Michigan, and mixed by Claudius Mittendorfer, the album sees the band expanding their musical palette and stretching out sonically in ways they’ve never done before by utilizing each producer’s strengths. “Recording with Marc was great because we’ve been working together for a decade on the road so we are so relaxed around him,” Lazzara says, adding that the fact the studio was located in a remote wooded area in the Midwest helped free the band from external distractions during the recording process. “When it comes to Mike that’s like our second home and it helped make those sessions feel so familiar since we actually recorded our very first demos there.”
“We had a month off between the two recording sessions which I think was really important because we’d never had that before and it helped us take a step back and reassess things once we were halfway through,” Nolan explains. In that spirit the soaring choruses and tender verses of the opening salvo “Flicker, Fade” is a perfect illustration of how that fresh perspective helped these songs achieve their full potential. “I’m very proud of that song in particular because in some ways it’s exactly what you would expect from Taking Back Sunday but it also manages to incorporate all of these completely new elements in it such as the orchestral flourishes,” Nolan explains. “I’m also extremely proud of the last song ‘Nothing At All’ because we’ve had acoustic songs before but we’ve never had anything acoustic that builds into such a gigantic climax and I think fans are going to be pleasantly surprised with that.”
“I tried to be a little more loose; I was more focused on being myself than trying to sound perfect or anything,” Lazzara responds when asked how he approached “Happiness Is.” “We also played around a lot with arranging the harmonies and playing with layers and I think that makes these songs a lot more rich.” Correspondingly “Stood A Chance” alternates between melodic moments and moody breakdowns in a way that’s so seamless that you’ll hardly notice it’s happening until it’s all over while “Better Homes And Gardens” is catharsis set to a driving drumbeat. The band also clearly weren’t afraid to let these songs truly take on their own spirit as evidenced by the ambient ballad “It Takes More,” which started out as an upbeat rocker before organically becoming into the atmospheric masterpiece that it evolved into.
Fans of Taking Back Sunday will also rejoice at the fact that “Happiness Is” sees the band’s enigmatic frontman at his most personal. “Through the years I’ve tried to stay pretty cryptic because often times it’s easier not to have to explain yourself but on this record I was very direct in the sense I tried to use the simplest way to get an idea across,” Lazzara explains. “In the past I don’t think I ever would have let a song like ‘Like You Do’ go on an album because it’s so heartfelt in a simple way and I also think it’s actually one of the first love songs we’ve ever written.” The band also agree that performing in the Middle East at places like Kuwait were the inspiration for “We Were Younger Then” — and lines like, “I remember when comfort was not an option” illustrate how far these five guys have come along from playing basements in Long Island in the late nineties.
Ultimately this search for meaning and pursuit of progress lies at the core of why the band have managed to retain a fervent fanbase over the years and survive numerous passing trends. But it’s also important to note that none of the band members take any part of this experience for granted. “In the past when we were on a major label there would be A&R people giving us suggestions but with this album it was just us pushing ourselves,” Lazzara summarizes, sounding even more hopeful than he did over a decade ago. “There is no question to me that “Happiness Is” is the best unfiltered representation of what happens when the five of us get in a room together and that makes me really happy. Nolan confirms this sentiment by adding, “this album really is a testament to each of the members talents because it’s just us.”
In other words, prepare yourself because it’s time to fall in love with Taking Back Sunday all over again.
Saturday August 2 2014
Summer Spirit Festival @ Merriweather Post Pavilion
2014 Summer Spirit Festival
Ms. Lauryn Hill, Janelle Monáe, Meshell Ndegeocello, Raheem DeVaughn, Talib Kweli, Junkyard Band, Backyard Band, RDGLDGRN, George Tandy Jr, Roman GianArthur, DJ Quicksilva
