Monday 12/10

XIII Arrows, The Push, and Shamble Town Rebels – TICKETS

XIII Arrows have been staking their claim in the local Minneapolis music scene. Their latest video releases ‘Call The Boys’ and ‘Broken Record’ reflect the character and appeal the band displays on and off the stage. They are bringing rock and roll back to its raw, unbound, and authentic roots.

Wednesday 12/12

Harry Hudson  and JD Saxe at the Amsterdam – TICKETS

Harry Hudson is an American singer-songwriter of folk-rock and pop music. His debut album is Yesterday’s Tomorrow Night, released on Jay-Z’s Roc Nation record label. The single “Yellow Lights” went Top 10 on Spotify’s US Viral chart, and Hudson was named one of Pandora’s Artist to Watch 2018 on the music streaming service.

 

JP Saxe is an R&B leaning, lyric obsessed singer/ songwriter from Toronto. Subtle yet deliberate,Saxe’s music is all about detailed momentsthat bring you intimately close to his emotional perspective. His grandfather, Janos Starker, often regarded as the greatest cellist of the 20th century, pushed him to explore creating beauty through his own expressions: lyricism and songwriting. JP’s debut single “Changed,” a deeply affecting alt- R&B song with trance-like piano, synth and vocal layering, takes us through a journey of how our past relationships, communities, and past selves inform the way in which we move forward and grow. “Changed” is the first of many from a collection of songs that live between two different worlds – the hazy production of artists like Frank Ocean, and the lyricism of those like Jason Isbell. “Anybody Else” shows us his carnal side with sensual lyrics and a kaleidoscope of blurry synth lines and cascading guitar tones. With his latest single “The Few Things,” Saxe guide listeners through the subtle intimacies that makeup a relationship. On the accompanying music video, Saxe shares, “It’s the first video I’ve directed (along with Dina Shihabi) and it is so biographical, it made the process of creating it, at points, kind of uncomfortable… but if it’s not real, what’s the point? Even if it’s a little too real sometimes.”

Thursday 12/13

Larkin Poe at the Entry – TICKETS

Larkin Poe have found their voice. In a genre as storied as American roots and soul, the sister duo are poised to make a mark all their own with the release of their fourth album Venom & Faith, out November 9. Rather than concede to the history of the canon they hold dear or rest on their laurels, Larkin Poe persist and emerge rattling, stomping, and sliding into a modern-day depiction of what roots rock should sound like. Another chapter in an everlasting story. “It’s a celebration of roots American music,” Rebecca says, “as translated by two sisters who are playing the blues in a modern age.

Friday 12/14

Bird Streets at the Entry – TICKETS

Bird Streets is the alias of Brooklyn-based songwriter and musician John Brodeur. Comprising the touring band for the December dates are guitarist Lisa Bianco (Hunter Valentine, It Was Romance), bassist Mark Connor (SOON A.D., S.E. Ward, John Howie Jr.), and drummer Tim Kuhl (Margaret Glaspy, The Ghost of a Saber-Toothed Tiger). The band will play a live Daytrotter video session on Wed. Dec. 12.

It’s been a busy fall for Brodeur and company since the August release of the self-titled Bird Streets album on Los Angeles record label Omnivore Recordings. Produced by power-pop cult hero Jason Falkner (Beck, Jellyfish, Daniel Johnston), the 11-song collection has garnered outstanding reviews from AllMusic, Albumism, Blurt and PopMatters, among others. The lead single, “Betting On The Sun,” has been added to rotation at AAA/non-commercial radio stations nationwide, including spins from tastemakers KCRW, WFUV and WXPN; its corresponding, surreal music video is online now. And the album’s first video, “Direction,” has racked up more than 10k combined views.

“I used to write about finding ways out of the darkness,” says Brodeur. “Now I’m more interested in exploring and creating a map of that place. In some ways, adopting the Bird Streets name allowed me to write more openly about myself.”

In need of a creative rebirth after years on the music-industry margins, Brodeur reached out to producer and multi-instrumentalist Falkner to suggest a collaboration. The album yielded by this pairing is both fresh and familiar–a dynamic collection of introspective indie-rock and power-pop that draws liberally on the music of decades past without being bluntly nostalgic, with Brodeur’s voice like an old friend you’re meeting for the first time.

Over a career that’s spanned nearly 20 years, Brodeur has independently produced and released several solo albums, including 2013’s Little Hopes; fronted rock trios the Suggestions and Maggie Mayday; and worked as a touring and studio musician for scores of acts, including the Morning After Girls, Freedy Johnston, and White Hills. This is his first recording under the Bird Streets name.

The name Bird Streets springs from a tony real-estate enclave in the Hollywood Hills, which Brodeur first discovered when the recording sessions were first getting underway — but also references Brodeur’s one-time hometown of Albany, N.Y., which provided the characters and inspiration for some of the album’s 11 songs.

Recorded at Falkner’s Los Angeles studio between 2014 and 2016, Bird Streets is the product of equal measures tenacity and patience. After a series of setbacks derailed touring plans for his last solo album, Brodeur decamped to L.A, waiting for a hole to open in Falkner’s schedule. Once they were in the studio, the kindred creative spirits hit it off immediately. Working during the short gaps between Falkner’s touring and production commitments, with Brodeur shuffling between coasts for studio dates, the pair moved quickly, arranging and tracking entire songs in a day or two, sharing instrumental duties throughout.

Lyrically, these songs draw heavily on internal conflict with an overarching feeling of wistful resignation rather than blind optimism. Periodically difficult themes are delivered via unshakable melodies, a dichotomy that recalls the tightrope walked by artists like Elliott Smith and David Bazan. In album opener “Carry Me,” Brodeur celebrates “new beginnings and bitter ends” over a bright, bristling bed of electric guitars, then laments a relationship that was once “tighter than Steely Dan” in the eminently catchy “Betting on the Sun.” Musically, the album jumps from epic power-ballads (“Stop to Breathe”) to British Invasion-flavored power-pop (“Thanks for Calling”), the George Harrison-via-Radiohead melancholy of “Heal” to the grungy jangle of “Until the Crown.”

Now, after years in the making — and decades on the outside looking in — Bird Streets is giving Brodeur a renewed creative energy, and a shot at reaching a larger audience.

Sunday 12/16

Valley Maker at the Entry – TICKETS

On Valley Maker’s second full-length album, Rhododendron, songwriter Austin Crane sings about movement – from one kind of belief to another, from place to place, through time. This new record from Crane, a Seattle-based musician and PhD student in Human Geography, reflects both the rootedness and rootlessness that shapes his songwriting on the precipice of his third decade. Like his noted inspirations Jason Molina, Bill Fay, and Gillian Welch before him, he speaks to the strange and transitory ways we mark time through our lives. Years pass and fold in his cosmic American songs.

Eyedress at the Loring – TICKETS

Eyedress is the alias of Filipino artist Idris Vicuña, formerly lead guitarist of Manila based psychedelic indie/noise pop band Bee Eyes. Born in 1990 in the city of Makati, Philippines, Vicuña relocated to the US with his family at the age of 6. He was raised in Phoenix, Arizona before moving to San Clemente, California at the age of 13, where he started playing bass in a Crass-influenced crust punk band.

In 2005, Vicuña moved back to Manila where he formed Bee Eyes with friends Julius Valledor and Diego Abad. Valledor taught Vicuña the art of sampling and making loops. During downtime from the band Vicuña pursued his own solo project, which would eventually become Eyedress.

He released his first solo record entitled Hearing Colors in 2013. Well received by music blogs, it led to him signing his first record deal with XL Recordings imprint Abeano. Later that year they released his EP Supernatural which saw praise from publications such as The Guardian and NME.

He followed up in 2016 with his second full length, Shapeshifter, on his own label Babe Slayer. The title track featured King Krule under his Edgar The Breathtaker alias, as well as several underground artists including London rapper Oscar #Worldpeace and LA rapper Pyramid Vritra.