Posts Tagged ‘ Rick Maguire ’

[screenshot from video by Niko Matses]

Thursday was my first day of SXSW this year and it was a very long day. I awoke at the crack of dawn in NYC and flew to Austin arriving around 1pm local time. The afternoon was filled with errands, a few beers, some local cuisine and then it was time to get to the Impose Magazine “Imposition” show at the Longbranch Inn on East 11th. The roster for this night was filled with fake names — bands that due to silly contractual games couldn’t be named until after playing the “official” shows on the west side of town. It was not long after we arrived that the actual bill for the night was announced and it was as we expected from these Impose shows, a fine list of current up and comers. The anchor for the night was Boston’s Pile, a band that’s not exactly new but who are finally getting the attention they deserve. By the time the band took the stage it was after 1:30 am and I was pushing 24 straight hours awake — but these guys gave me a much needed jolt of energy.

Pile began in 2009 began as Rick Maguire’s solo project before he recruited a band to tour. The band’s shows have become legendary in the Boston DIY scene, as Pile has become what’s been described as “your favorite band’s favorite band”. The band’s new album You’re Better Than This (Exploding In Sound Records) was released earlier this month. The album has its ferocious and gentle sides, a loud-soft-loud dynamic that exhibits influences that include post-punk, noise rock, and even anti-folk. I hear everything from the Minutemen through Built To Spill and of course their hometown predecessors Mission of Burma. For this short SXSW set, this live version of Pile was less about the “soft” and more about the straight ahead punk which was fine with us. The set began with three straight songs from You’re Better, and we’re streaming “The World is Your Motel” which absolutely raged. Pile is now on an extensive tour (dates here), which comes to NYC for an April 28 show at Baby’s All Right. This is a much recommended show from our viewpoint.

I recorded this set with the Sennheiser cards mounted on a stand directly in front of the soundboard and mixed with a board feed. The sound quality is quite excellent. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream “The World is Your Motel”:

Pile
2015-03-19
Long Branch Inn – Impose SXSW
Austin, TX USA

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Sennheiser MKH-8040 Cardioids > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced
by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 23:17]
01 Tin Foil Hat
02 Hot Breath
03 The World is Your Motel
04 [banter – last call]
05 Number 2 Hit Single
06 [banter – good time]
07 The Browns
08 Rock and Roll Forever with the Customer in Mind

If you download this recording from NYCTaper, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Pile, visit their Facebook page, and purchase You’re Better Than This from the band’s Bandcamp page [HERE].