Lately Brooklyn's the Antlers have been the topic of more (and more) conversations. Yesterday we posted a track from the icily anthemic trio's self-released and emotionally drained/draining Hospice, which is about to be re-released via Frenchkiss. (If you haven't heard it, as mentioned previously, it's currently streaming at Spinner.) The band's here today because frontman Peter Silberman works as a graphic designer at (Le) Poisson Rouge, drummer Michael Lerner's part of the family real estate business, and multi-instrumentalist Darby Cicci has experience as a freelance art handler, installer and gallery assistant.
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: The Antlers...
Posted at 5:40 PM by brandon in
Tags: The Antlers
latest by aki
So far the group-chanting Brooklyn BTW Suckers are best known for their outfits, a self-titled EP produced by Yeasayer's Anand Wilder and Chris Moore (TV On The Radio, Yeah Yeah Yeahs), and a lineup featuring fellow BTW Quinn Walker. That, and a "2080"-style, occasionally dub-y sound constructed from joyful synth-and-percussion combos. Now maybe they'll be known, too, for their various (and varied) day jobs. Multi-instrumental songwriter Quinn does double time as a doorman at Glasslands and a bartender at Arrow Bar (and, maybe, a male escort). Drummer/keyboardist Brian Aiken is an ex-Ross Stores Data enterer currently onto bigger and better things. Multi-instrumentalist Austin Fisher works in the New Media production team at the Metropolitan Museum Of Art and fellow multi-tasker Pan's a designer for the clothing company Mishka. After these four work-related discussions, take a listen to their most cathartic free-time track, "It Gets Your Body Movin'."
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: Suckers...
Posted at 5:08 PM by brandon in
Tags: Quinn Walker | Suckers | Yeasayer
Despite the comparisons (blame the one sheet), Olympia's Gun Outfit sound much more like Some Velvet Sidewalk (or, really, King Kong) than Dinosaur: Their straight-ahead, bass-free punk-inflected rock is definitely old-school in spirit, which is maybe why folks are fond of referencing SST, but the fit's not quite right. The trio's debut, out now on Dean Spunt's PPM label, is a batch of 11 spare, intense compositions that immediately conjure the Pacific Northwest. When not digging into their streamlined hooks -- live, the guitar interplay comes off especially intricate, and even catchier -- the band members hold down day jobs: Drummer Reuben Storey is employed at a record store, guitarist/vocalist Dylan Sharp teaches English in Turkey, and guitarist/vocalist Caroline Keith holds down a government job, but one she can't really talk about in print, so we decided to instead focus on the job she had prior to it at a horse farm, where she fed and led stallions from the barn to the pasture. As she put it, "I had to quit the horse farm because I was afraid for my life but it was the best job I ever did have. Like heaven on earth but with a fear that intensified exponentially. Horses sense those feelings and that put me at a disadvantage. They aren't forgiving animals. They're herd and prey animals." So, in this shitty economy, a day job daydream.
We already posted Dim Light's "In The Dark." To keep with today's theme, you'll find the collection's "Work Experience" after the conversations about just that.
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: Gun Outfit...
Posted at 1:47 PM by brandon in ,
Tags: Gun Outfit
latest by C
San Diego BTW Crocodiles evoke Jesus & Mary Chain, VU, and the Spacemen 3 with their stripped-down, dark noise-pop, but the duo is one of our favorite new bands because they write super songs, not because I'm obsessed with Darklands: It's one thing to own a good set of influences, another thing entirely turning them into a kick-ass collection like Summer Of Hate. Vocalist/programmer Brandon Welchez and guitarist/synthesizer player Charles Rowell are here today because Welchez works as a substitute teacher at a Special-Ed school and Rowell works in a bakery. After our discussion, take another listen to them working together on "I Wanna Kill."
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: Crocodiles...
Posted at 2:14 PM by brandon in
Tags: Crocodiles
latest by uwmryan
The Boston trio Pretty & Nice construct pop spectacles with guitars, drums, and various electronics. You could mention of Montreal in passing on "Piranha" or "Peekaboo," etc., but more interestingly, think of bands they themselves list as influences like Braniac (a sunnier take on them, but the structural shifts are there), Ex Models, Q & Not U and to go elsewhere: Squeeze, the Jam, the English Beat, etc. Get Young, their second full-length and Hardly Art debut, came out this fall. The guys are here today because vocalist/guitarist/etc Holden Lewis walks dogs and vocalist/guitarist/etc Jeremy Mendicino works at a UPS store. No word on drummer Bobby Landry, but drummers can be mysterious like that. After the discussion, take a listen to all three working together on "Tora Tora Tora."
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: Pretty & Nice...
Posted at 1:43 PM by brandon in ,
Tags: Pretty And Nice
latest by Cal
A ways back I did a post about the Welcome Wagon's cover of the Smiths' "Half A Person" from their debut album Welcome To The Welcome Wagon. The band's essentially the betrothed duo of Reverend Thomas Vito and Monique Aiuto, but Sufjan Stevens produced and helped arrange the very Sufjan-esque collection and there are additional voices and sounds (horn, string, piano, etc). As mentioned in that "Half A Person" post, the album's accompanying press materials note:
A self-described agnostic, Vito experienced a spiritual conversion at the age of 20 and soon after enrolled at Princeton Theological Seminary to study theology and prepare for ordained ministry. Currently he is the senior pastor of Resurrection Presbyterian Church, a church he planted in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY, in 2005.
I'm not religious at all, so I approached Vito out of a kind of outsider's curiosity. I wanted to know what it was like to run a church, how that task overlaps with his band, and how it feels to be outwardly religious in a time when the Religious Right's gone a long way to making this seem less than desirable. He answered everything intelligently and with care, and for that I thank him. After our discussion, take a listen to "But For You Who Fear My Name," a song written by Lenny Smith (aka Daniel Smith's father and head of the Famile).
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: The Welcome Wagon...
Posted at 12:54 PM by brandon in ,
Tags: The Welcome Wagon
latest by Leah
Brooklyn BTW Olga Bell has a new single out in March via twosyllable (7"/digital) and a number of shows at SXSW, but between band activities, she also has piano lessons to teach. A bunch of them. Her students range in age from three to somewhere in the 60s. She's all over the place, noting that she teaches one student in Park Slope, the rest on the Upper East and West sides, and that "a lot of the lessons happen at a private school near Columbia." Learn what a standard lessons entails as well as Bell's thoughts on pianists from Liberace to Glenn Gould after the jump. After our discussion, you can listen to "New Bridge," which she wrote as part of a campaign fundraiser for Obama.
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: Bell...
Posted at 5:01 PM by brandon in ,
Tags: Bell
In February, New York BTW the Pains Of Being Pure At Heart are releasing their self-titled full-length collection of jangly, noisy indie pop on the most fitting of labels, Slumberland. We recently posted the video for album track "Everything For You," which might have reminded you of Black Tambourine or other bands Slumberland was releasing in the '80s/early '90s.
The quartet's at Quit Your Day Job today because they also work outside of the band: Peggy's an editor at BuzzFeed, Kurt teaches music at a day camp in the summer and at a "rock workshop" during the school year, Alex is the editor of eMusic's Canadian site, and at the time of this interview Kip did marketing at Drillteam, but he just lost his job (yes, the economy even sucks for indie pop bands). After you read their tales of the best and worst viral videos and learn how kids find out about Franz Ferdinand make sure to stick around and listen to "Come Saturday." (Because it's all about the weekend.)
Continue reading Quit Your Day Job: The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart...
Posted at 1:00 PM in , ,
Tags: The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart
latest by Zwan
