indie band Archives - musings from boston

Band Profile: Naked Alien (Minnesota)

On July 13, 2009

Frat party meets Flaming Lips. Dive bars with sticky floors and inebriated overweight jocks with bad pick-up lines. Eagles, Charlie Daniels, and Lynard Skynard on the jukebox (or maybe I’m just having a bad flashback to when I lived in Florida in the late ’70s). Songs about drinking, overweight strippers, burritos, beer, chicks, more drinking, and yes – bad pick-up lines. Do I see a theme emerging? Naked Alien are just four guys having a good time, finding a suitable outlet for the frustrations of day jobs, and inviting people along for the ride.

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Band Profile: The Henry Clay People

By julie

On July 3, 2009

In Band Profiles, Indie Music

The Bowery Ballroom, photo by Marcela Cussolin

Man, I love these guys. I first discovered them via The Airborne Toxic Event, when I went absolutely batshit nuts over the first three Silverlake bands I heard – TATE, Castledoor, and The Deadly Syndrome (that now legendary final Spaceland residency show in January 2008). From there I started researching all the bands that played around Silverlake and Echo Park, and it was a revelation. Not unlike the one I had in the early 00’s when I discovered – 10 years after everyone else in America – the whole New Zealand Flying Nun thing. And not unlike the NZ stuff, there’s this lyrical sophistication and slightly off-kilter quality running through many of these bands that greatly appeals to me. The Henry Clay People has this intelligence and quirkiness in vast overflowing abundance. Mix that with classic and punk rock sounds, a bit of country-flavoring and indie rock sensibility, and you’ve got something pretty damned irresistible.

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Band Profile: Red Cortez

By julie

On June 29, 2009

In Band Profiles, Indie Music

Originally known as The Weather Underground, the group formed mid-2004 with singer/guitarist Harley Prechtel-Cortez, bassist Ryan Kirkpatrick, drummer Diego Guerrero and guitarist Sho Bagley. Sho left around the middle of last year, and was replaced by Edmonton native Calvin J. Love. Adding a Canadian to the mix made the band even more diverse, as they already have Guatemalan, Mexican, and Irish ancestry, which comes out at times in beautiful ways, in their sound and subject matter. The new band member, new songs, and inevitable linking to the ’60’s/’70’s leftist group (often as important to journalists as their songs) inspired them to change their name to Red Cortez. Their first show was Nov. 11, for the debut of Indie 103.1’s “Check One Tuesdays” night at the Echoplex, opening for Earlimart and Afternoons (good heavens, what a lineup).

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Band Profile: Radars To The Sky

By julie

On May 2, 2009

In Band Profiles, Indie Music, Reviews

photo by Callie Schneider, February 2009

Another of the great, great bands on the Silverlake scene, Radars To The Sky has that wonderful sophisticated folk/pop indie sound with really smart lyrics that I was immediately attracted to when virtually exploring those bands regularly performing at places like Spaceland and The Echo. The husband and wife due of Andrew and Kate Spitser (guitar and keyboards) compliment each other beautifully, especially when also sharing the vocal duties, such as on the lovely “I Might”.

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Tag: indie band

Band Profile: Naked Alien (Minnesota)

Band Profile: The Henry Clay People

Band Profile: Red Cortez

Band Profile: Radars To The Sky