Tag: Memphis TN

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

With the release of 2014’s We Are Nots, the Memphis, TN-based punk rock quartet Nots, currently comprised of founding member Natalie Hoffman, along with Charlotte Watson (drums), Madison Farmer (bass) and Alexandra Eastburn (synths), quickly rose to national prominence for a sound that possessed elements of 60s garage rock, punk, thrash punk, No Wave and New Wave. And since 2014, the Memphis-based punk quartet has been rather prolific, realizing a handle of singles that revealed a band that had expanded upon their sound while lyrically focusing on deeper, sociopolitical concerns; in fact, Cosmetic, Nots’ sophomore effort thematically focused on the rough and complicated edges of desire, deceit and distortions — and how they impact both appearances and your sense of reality. And in many ways, the album seemed to capture a narrator struggling to find some kind of footing in a vicious, perverse and fucked up world.

Now, a little bit of time has passed since I’ve written about the JOVM mainstays but they’ve been busy writing and recording new material — including their forthcoming 7 inch single “Violence”/”Cruel Friend,” which is slated for a June 30, 2017 release through Goner Records. And from the single’s “A side, “Violence,” the band has further experimented with their sound, pushing their sound in new, weird directions — all while still remaining a wild, feral rock band; in fact, the band replaces most of the guitar work for layers of buzzing and forceful synths, and as a result, it gives the song a razor sharp sense of menace and irony.

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Over the past couple of years, the world renowned soul label, Daptone Records. the label home of the late (and great) Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, has released a series of albums documenting and preserving the spirituals, gospel and church-based music from the Mississippi River Delta region — in particular, the small rural town of Como, MS located in the northern Hill Country, about 50 miles south of Memphis, TN. Historically speaking, the small Northern Mississippi, rural town has long struggled with the legacy of slavery, segregation, discrimination, agricultural decline; however, Como has simultaneously been known as a creative hotbed of sorts, as Fred McDowell, Jessie Mae Hemphill, Napoleon Strickland, Othar Turner, Luther Perkins (best known as Johnny Cash’s guitarist), Joe Henderson and a lengthy list of others have claimed roots in Como, MS.

Now, earlier this year, you may recall that I wrote about The Walker Family Singers’ “Jesus Gave Me Water,” off the familial unit’s debut effort, Panola County Spirit. Comprised of Raymond and Joella Walker, three of their four daughters, Alberta, Patricia and Delouse and their two sons Robert and Booby, the well-regarded gospel quintet not only have a long-held history of preaching and singing the gospel that goes back several generations, the patriarch of the family, Raymond at one point was so well-regarded as a vocalist, that he was once recruited by both Fred McDowell and the legendary Sam Cooke to back them on tour for what would have been a rather significant amount of money. And although seemingly apocryphal, as the story goes, Raymond Walker refused unless McDowell and Cooke gave up singing the blues and took up gospel. McDowell refused and the rest is history. . .

Daptone Records gospel music series continues with Move Upstairs, the forthcoming  effort from the Como, MS-based gospel trio The Como Mamas, slated for a May 19, 2017 release. Comprised of Ester Mae Smith and siblings Angelia Taylor and Della Daniels, the trio have been singing together in church since they were children. Much like Como’s other renowned musicians and vocalists, Della and Angelia come from a distinguished line of musicians themselves — their grandfather would frequently play music on their porch with a group of musicians that included the aforementioned Fred McDowell. In fact, the sisters remember when the famed folklorist and writer Alan Lomax, best known for his Land Where The Blues Was Born, stopped by their home in 1959 to record some of these jam sessions.  Now, interestingly enough with their appearance on The Voices of Panola County: Como Now! and their Get an Understanding, the trio quickly established themselves as an up-and-coming, powerhouse act in contemporary gospel. Interestingly enough, I actually caught the trio play their first show outside of their hometown at the legendary Apollo Theater as part of the Daptone Super Soul Revue back in 2015, an incredible showcase that featured many of the labels top names including Charles Bradley, the aforementioned Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, Antibalas and others.

Naturally, taking advantage of the ladies time in New York, the folks at Daptone invited them to the House of Soul Studios to record with a backing band featuring some of the best musicians in their immense stable of musicians — including Jimmy Hill, Thomas Brenneck, Homer Steinweiss and Bosco Mann, who came together as The Glorifiers Band for the Move Upstairs session.

Album title track and first single “Move Upstairs” possesses a raw, dusty, classic blues and R&B-leaning sound — and by that think of Bo Diddley “and Muddy Waters’ Muddy Waters Folk Singer and others — that’s so incredibly period specific, that it sounds as though it were written and recorded sometime in 1947-1954 or so and was somehow surreptitiously discovered by an obsessive record collector. As as the actual song, a churning and propulsive arrangement consisting of guitar, drums and organ that’s comfortable and roomy enough for the Como Mamas using call and response vocals, to belt and shout with joy about how God’s love set them free from life’s drudgery and suffering.  And it’s a song that shuffles and struts as it does so.

Of course, unsurprisingly, much like the Walker Family Singers’ “Jesus Gave Me Water,” the Como Mamas’ makes an obvious yet forceful suggestion — that the the Blues, Rock ‘N’ Roll, R&B and hip-hop can trace their origins in some fashion to the gospels, spirituals and folk music of the Mississippi Delta while actively preserving some of America’s musical traditions.

 

 

New Audio by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Emily Robb (guitar, vocals), arguably best known for her stint in Lantern; Leslie Burnette (organ, vocals); Emily K. Eichelberger (bass, vocals); and Emily’s sister Jenna Robb (drums, vocals), the Philadelphia, PA-based quartet Louie Louie specializes in a sound that meshes 60s rock, 60s Motown-era soul, pop and R&B with post-punk — while clearly nodding at Phil Spector‘s Wall of Sound-like production. And while being a decided change in sonic departure from her work with Lantern, the project is also Emily Robb’s first in which she has full artistic and creative control.

At the end of last year, I wrote about “After Me,” a song that possessed a lovelorn vulnerability and ache while nodding heavily towards the sounds of The Ronnettes, Roy Orbison, Patsy Cline and others, complete with a swooning sincerity — but with a subtle modern touch. The Philadelphia-based quartet’s latest single “Do It (In Your Mind)” is a jangling guitar pop track that nods at surfer rock, psych rock and The B52s while possessing a subtle punk rock sensibility, thanks to punchily delivered lyrics paired with jangling guitar chords, ethereal organ chords, a propulsive backbeat and a bratty hook — and to my ears, the song reminds me a bit of Memphis‘ renowned punk act Nots but with a more playful, almost coquettish air.

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstays Nots Captures Our Current Dread and Unease

Cosmetic’s third and latest single “Inherently Low” is presciently and strangely fitting for our increasingly surreal times while continuing with the album’s overall theme. Sonically, the band pairs angular guitar and bass chords, propulsive drumming and shouted lyrics — and the end result is a song that evokes creeping dread and unease and while boldly and furiously calling out hypocritical bullshit. Simply put it’s a song with a narrator that simply has stopped giving a fuck.

The recently released video was created and edited by the band’s Natalie Hoffman and was influenced by the results of last week’s Presidential Election. And as Hoffman explains in press notes “the tension and fear that came with the results certainly played a part in the visual outcome of the video. America has elected someone who has openly campaigned to keep us low. To keep us completely divided. To keep us at war. I don’t think that I (or anyone) can fully process the weight of what is to come, but this video is an attempt to translate both what the song is about, and how I’ve felt since the election results – a new awareness, anger, and fear about being kept inherently low.”

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Over the past couple years, Memphis, TN-based punk band Ex-Cult emerged into the national scene and became a JOVM mainstay with the release of their sophomore effort 2014’s Midnight Passenger and its follow-up, 2015’s Cigarette Machine EP, two efforts which cemented the act’s reputation for a furious, bruising sound — and an equally intense, bruising live show. 2016 may arguably be the biggest years to date in the band’s history as Famous Class Records released the “Summer of Fear”/”1906” 7 inch last month and the band’s highly-anticipated third full-length Negative Growth is slated for a September 23, 2016 release through  In The Red Records.

As the band’s frontman Chris Shaw explains in press notes, “In the year of the snitch, there are forces beyond your control that keep you up at night. Ghost notions that swirl around your room while you sleep. Your own pillow laughing right in your face while you fight for an hour of rest. There are voices that whisper from the corner, telling you everything you never wanted to hear. Negative Growth, our third album , is dedicated to fear and deception.

“This collection of songs were conceived in Memphis and finalized in Los Angeles with the help of our family doctor, Ty Segall. It was created in February 2016, when we traded Memphis misery for a week of California sunshine. Negative Growth is a nine-track nightmare, a death trip in the crystal ship.” Now, if you were frequenting this site last month you may recall that I wrote about Negative Growth‘s first single “Attention Ritual,” a tense, bilious and abrasively paranoid song that evokes the narrator’s desperate, self-flagellating, self-doubting and fucked up psyche, and the inner voices that fuel one’s anxious nightmares — and on another level, it evokes the absolutely mad times we live in.  The album’s second and latest single “Let You In” is a urgent, desperate howl into an unceasing, cold and uncaring void with all the fury and anger within every sinew and figure of your body.

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms


Certainly, if you’ve been frequenting this site for some time, you may be familiar with Memphis, TN-based punk band Ex-Cult, a band that emerged into the national scene with the 2014 release of their sophomore effort Midnight Passenger and its follow-up, 2015’s Cigarette Machine EP — and simultaneously, the band became a JOVM mainstay for a raw, angry, bruising sound and live show. Interestingly, 2016 may arguably be one of the biggest years to date in the band’s history as Famous Class Records will be releasing the “Summer of Fear”/”1906” 7 inch on August 12, 2016 and September 23, 2016 will mark the highly-anticipated release of the Memphis, TN-based punk band’s third, full-length album Negative Growth through In The Red Records.

As the band’s frontman Chris Shaw explains in press notes,  “In the year of the snitch, there are forces beyond your control that keep you up at night. Ghost notions that swirl around your room while you sleep. Your own pillow laughing right in your face while you fight for an hour of rest. There are voices that whisper from the corner, telling you everything you never wanted to hear. Negative Growth, our third album , is dedicated to fear and deception.

“This collection of songs were conceived in Memphis and finalized in Los Angeles with the help of our family doctor, Ty Segall. It was created in February 2016, when we traded Memphis misery for a week of California sunshine. Negative Growth is a nine-track nightmare, a death trip in the crystal ship.” And as a result, the album’s first single “Attention Ritual” is a tense, bilious, caustic and paranoid song that evokes the narrator’s desperate, fucked up, self-doubting and self-flagellating inner voices that keeps him up at night, fraught with worry and hatred — and the tense, nightmarish times we live currently live in, in which everything seems  to have gone absolutely mad.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Beginning his music career as a part-time musician in various underground bands in and around the San Francisco Bay Area, the insanely prolific multi-instrumentalist Ty Segall started his solo career back in 2008 with the release of the Horn The Unicorn through Wizard Mountain — and was later re-released by HBSP-2X on vinyl. After befriending Thee Oh Sees frontman and creative mastermind, and co-founder of Castle Face Records, John Dwyer, Segall signed to the renowned, garage rock label, which released his self-titled debut, also in 2008. Since then, Segall has released albums through Memphis, TN-based label Goner Records, frequent collaborations with renowned indie artist Mikal Cronin and for being a member of a number of bands including Fuzz, Broken Bat and GØGGS, and as a former member of The Traditional Fools, Epsilons, Party Fowl, Sic Alps, and The Perverts.

Now, as I mentioned in a post earlier today, as a native New Yorker, who has been covering music for over a decade, I’ve seen countless venues come and go — and soon as a well-regarded or beloved venue closes, another one pops up a few months later in another part of town; however, as both a passionate music fan and journalist, there are a handful of venues that hold a special part of your heart. And for me, Death By Audio held a very special place in my heart. Unlike most venues I’ve seen and covered shows in, there was always a  palpable sense of anything going and happening and in fact, I saw some of the most memorable shows I’ve ever seen; shows that transformed how I saw and wore about live music. Much like Metz, Segall has a connection to Death by Audio as he got his NYC area start at the now defunct DIY venue.

And as I mentioned in a post earlier today, as the venue was closing up shop back in 2014, its owners and bookers curated what turned out to be an epic final month featuring a number of currently renowned acts, who had gotten their start or had some kind of connection to the South Williamsburg, Brooklyn venue including A Place to Bury Strangers, Thee Oh Sees, Protomartyr, Ty Segall, Future Islands, Lightning Bolt, Metz and many others. What people most likely didn’t know was that the venue recorded the last month of shows at the venue and the end result is the compilation Start Your Own Fucking Show Space, which features highlights of the past month in chronological order, slated for release next week through Famous Class Records — and the compilation is meant not as bittersweet nostalgia but as a forceful call to go out and do something fucking awesome, like start a show space and have your friends and others play there.

The second and latest single off the compilation features Ty Segall and his backing band playing a somewhat bittersweet yet forceful and sludgy live version of “Wave Goodbye,” a song that structurally and sonically sounds as though it owes a debt to 90s alt rock as it consists of alternating, rousing and thunderous, power chord-based hooks and a quiet second around the verse. And as soon as you hear it, it should make you want to raise your beers up high and shout along — or mosh the fuck out.

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

 

Fronted by its creative mastermind Seth Sutton, San Francisco-based (by way of Memphis, TN) punk act Useless Eaters forthcoming effort Relaxing Death is slated for a June 3, 2016 release through John Dwyer and Matt Jones’ renowned indie label Castle Face Records, and from the album’s latest single “Electrical Outlet,” the Bay Area-based punk act will further cement their reputation for crafting tense tightly wound, anxious, hallucinatory synth punk — in this case layers of buzzing and angular synth chords and razor sharp drum machine loops are paired with shouted vocals in a bilious and frenetic song that evokes the inner workings the mind of a paranoid insomniac.

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Over the past year or so, Memphis, TN-based  quartet Nots and their Stateside label home Goner Records have become JOVM mainstays as I’ve written quite a bit about both the band and their label; in fact, Goner Records have quickly established themselves as the label home to some of the country’s best hardcore punk and hard rock bands, as they have been the label home to the likes of Ex Cult, whose Midnight Passenger and Cigarette Machine EP have been two of the best (and angriest) punk albums I’ve heard in about 5 years, OBN IIIs who have released several albums of swaggering power chord party rock in the vein of early AC/DC, the late Jay Reatard and several others. And with the release of their debut effort, We Are Nots, the Memphis-based quartet comprised of Natalie Hoffman (guitar) and Charlotte Watson (drums), Madison Farmer (bass) and Alexandra Eastburn (synths) started to receive national attention for material that sounds as though it owes a debt to the 60s era garage rock, punk and new wave – but with a frenetic, unhinged and very visceral feel.  Personally, I think the Memphis-based quartet’s debut effort should have received much more attention as their sound and aesthetic can be compared favorably to The Fall, Bikini Kill, Protomartyr, The B52s and others.

Renowned British indie label Heavenly Records licensed Nots’ We Are Nots and are releasing the effort across the UK on the 20th. The quartet will touring across the UK and the Ehe European Union to support the British/EU release of their debut effort — and to further celebrate the British/EU release of We Are Nots, the band in concert with Heavenly Records released a 7 inch of non-album material featuring “Shelf Life” as a B side to their latest single “Virgin Mary.”

“Shelf Life” is a messy, murky, lo-fi garage psych rock song comprised of relentless, chugging guitar chords, propulsive drumming, layers of distortion and feedback and shouted vocals that rushes in and out in a breakneck 1:43. And although the song kick ass, it manages to reveal a band that’s subtly and playfully expanding their sound while remaining familiar.

 

 

 

 

New Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Check Out the Dark, Unsettling and Psychedelic Video for Nots’ “Reactor”

Naturally, when most people think of Memphis, TN and of its vibrant music scene, they would probably name-check a number of that city’s soul, funk, hip-hop and country acts that have called Memphis home. However, over the […]

New Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Dead Weather’s Bluesy, Ass-Kicking New Single “I Feel Love (Every Million Miles)”

Comprised of Allison Mossheart of The Kills and Discount (vocals), Jack White formerly of The White Stripes and The Raconteurs (drums, guitar and vocals), Dean Fertita of Queens of the Stone Age (guitar, keyboards, organs), […]

Uncategorized by William Ruben Helms

Memphis, TN-based label Goner Records has put a city best known to the rest of the world as the home of soul, funk and hip-hop on the map for having a vital punk rock that […]

Uncategorized by William Ruben Helms

With the release of Memphis, TN-based Ex-Cult’s raw, desperately urgent and bruising album Midnight Passenger, last year the city primarily known as the home of classic soul suddenly emerged as the home of an impressive […]

Uncategorized by William Ruben Helms

Live Music Photography: Take Me to the River Live at Brooklyn Bowl 2/11/15 feat. William Bell, Bobby Rush, Otis Clay, Frayser Boy, Al Kapone, Jerry Harrison, The Staxx Records Band and The Staxx Music Academy All-Star Broomfield Band

Live Music Photography: Take Me to the River Live at Brooklyn Bowl featuring William Bell, Bobby Rush, Otis Clay, Frayser Boy, Al Kapone, Jerry Harrison, The Staxx Records Band and The Staxx Music Academy All-Star […]