nyctaper Recordings

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Ryley Walker: September 6, 2014 Hopscotch Music Festival, Fletcher Opera Theater, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Full Set Streaming)

October 15, 2014

[Screen capture by Dan Schram]

Maybe that whole “old soul” saw is lame. Does a man need to have aged many decades to have lived hard, or to have seen the world through enough other people’s eyes? Does a man need to have suffered the physical indignities of age for his voice to be mournful? Is twenty-four too young to really know evil, to make heartbreak sound believable? Ryley Walker is that age. Define it by whatever trope you must, but Ryley Walker performs with a rugged grace and gut-wrenching, soul-searching level of realness that don’t come to men his age all that often. He sat down, at the rightmost end of a semicircle on Fletcher Opera Theater’s broad stage, as the final act to play there during this Hopscotch Music Festival. By the time he got up I felt a way that I hadn’t quite since seeing Hiss Golden Messenger take that same stage with a large band two years before. I don’t put any artist in the company of HGM lightly, but there I believe Ryley sits. He’s that good, the real deal, all of the great things it’s even possible to be when you’re sitting on just one album of “this kind” of material (Ryley’s previous work fell more to the experimental/noise end of the spectrum).

That LP, All Kinds of You, just arrived on Tompkins Square this April, but that material has new company in the incredibly strong output which dominated this set. Walker led off with a new song, followed by his first single, “The West Wind”, before heading into the gorgeous “Primrose Green”. Walker has already earned comparisons to Bert Jansch and Tim Buckley, and his current sound has a classicism to it that makes that fair. Walker huddled in his chair like an older man, taking long breaks between songs to get his tuning right, maybe set his head straight for the next song. Walker sings with depth, in a way that makes each song seem like it takes its own reserve of him. Away from the mic, he’s as amiable as a person comes; faced with his songs he’s transformed. These are songs that operate at some remove from even updated versions of traditional sounds; they seem almost unconcerned with modern flourishes. Kudos belong to Walker’s band, too, which includes a killer roster of players who give these songs not only shape but a live fluidity that makes them all the more special.

But don’t take our word for it. Walker will be appearing at CMJ on Friday, October 24 at an Aquarium Drunkard-sponsored showcase at Rough Trade. Don’t miss it, as the lineup contains many veterans of this site as well as special new bands.

We owe a large dose of gratitude to North Carolina-based taper Larry Tucker for recording and contributing this outstanding capture, made with Peluso American-made cardiod microphones and a soundboard feed. The quality is outstanding. Enjoy!

Download this show at the Live Music Archive: [FLAC] | [MP3]

Stream the full set

Ryley Walker
2014-09-06
Hopscotch Music Festival
Fletcher Opera Theater
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by Larry Tucker

Peluso CEMC6-CK4 (Room center hung from balcony rail)>Fostex FR2-LE @ 24/48 + Soundboard> Edirol R09-HR @ 24/24>Adobe Audition (Mixing)>Izotope Ozone 5 (multi-band compression>lower sample rate> CD Wave>Flac

Tracks
01 Summer Dress
02 The West Wind
03 Primrose Green
04 Hide In the Roses
05 Love Can Be Cruel
06 On the Banks of the Old Kishwaukee
07 Same Minds
08 Sweet Satisfaction

Band:
Ryley Walker – vocals, guitar
Ben Boye – keys
Anton Hatwich – bass
Brian Sulpizio – electric guitar
Frank Rosaly – drums
Jeb Bishop – trombone on final song

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Ryley Walker, like him on Facebook, and buy his records here.

Steve Gunn: October 12, 2014 Rough Trade NYC – FLAC/MP3/Streaming Full Set

October 14, 2014

By acidjack

Follow @acidjacknyc

Steve Gunn‘s tenacity and prolific output have paid off. When I saw the man mentioned in Rolling Stone in conjunction with his latest, Way Out Weather, which also received favorable notice in all the right places, I felt that sense of vindication that sometimes the mainstream gets it right. Properly hailed in that magazine as a “six-string legend”, what is perhaps more notable about Gunn’s recent turns is his growth as a vocalist. More than a few guitarists’ careers have foundered when the man stepped to the microphone, but Gunn’s vocal turns, particularly on his last two records, have only broadened his appeal. You’d be mistaken if you ignored instrumental triumphs like Boerum Palace and Ocean Parkway (or his Golden Gunn effort with Hiss Golden Messenger), but Gunn has established himself now as a capable traditional frontman as well as one of the most exciting guitarists of his generation.

This show celebrated the release of Way Out Weather in Gunn’s hometown, and he and the band arrived exhausted but loose from a too-long stint on the parking lot of I-95. The show began almost informally, with the band’s soundcheck seguing into a jam that became “Water Wheel” from Time Off, followed by “Old Strange” from that album in a similar, extra-extended mode. Gunn took his time between tracks to chat about the meanings of songs (“Wildwood” came from a lot of time on the Jersey shore as a kid; “Milly’s Garden” arose out of conflict with a nosy neighbor) and joke with the crowd. The vibe was both homecoming and celebration, as it should have been. The title track and “Tommy’s Congo” already feel like live show standards, offering Gunn ample opportunities to shred on guitar. Likewise, he and the band didn’t hold back on the encore number, “Lurker”, a song celebrated for a while now as one of the best examples of Gunn’s vintage blues. Gunn’s exposure to the world has been a bit like his music, unfolding without hurry, at his own pace. Here’s to more people spreading the word.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK41 supercardiod microphones and a soundboard feed from Rough Trade engineer in our usual location in the venue. The sound quality is excellent. Enjoy!

Download the full set: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the full set (minus banter tracks):

Note: All of the material on this site is offered with artist permission, free to fans, at our expense. The only thing we ask is that you download the material directly from this site, rather than re-posting the direct links or the files on other sites without our permission. Please respect our request, and feel free to repost the Soundcloud links.

Steve Gunn
2014-10-12
Rough Trade NYC
Brooklyn, NY USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Schoeps MK41 (DFC, PAS, at SBD)>KCY>Z-PFA>Sound Devices USBPre2 + Soundboard (engineer: Nick)>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, effects)>Audacity 2.0.3 (tracking, amplify, balance, downsample, dither)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time 1:15:25]
01 intro jam>Water Wheel
02 [banter1]
03 Old Strange
04 [banter2]
05 Wildwood
06 [banter3]
07 Shadow Bros
08 [banter4]
09 Milly’s Garden
10 Way Out Weather
11 [banter5]
12 Tommy’s Congo
13 [encore break]
14 Lurker

Band
Steve Gunn – Vocals, guitar
Nathan Bowles – Banjo, drums
Jim Elkington – Guitar
Jason Meagher – Drums, bass

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Steve Gunn, visit his website, and buy his releases from Paradise of Bachelors and Three Lobed Recordings.

The Gradients: September 5, 2014 Shea Stadium Interview/FLAC/MP3/Streaming

October 14, 2014

By acidjack

[Photo from the Studio at Webster Hall show by Stephen Balser, as featured on the band’s facebook page]

The night of their self-titled and debut record release at Shea Stadium, Emilio Herce sat down with The Gradients, comprised of Charlie DY, Sammy Weissberg, Luca Ba, and J Boxer, to talk to us about their song writing process, touring down to SXSW, and the DIY ethic they bring to their live shows. Featured with this interview is a full live set for streaming and download. You can catch The Gradients’ next show at Palisades this Thursday.

NYCTaper: All of you play in different bands. Do you ever had a moment when you’re writing a song, but you decided, ‘hey, maybe I want to save it for this other band’”?

Sammy: Not for me, this is the only band I write music in. I also play in Bluffing and Le Rug. But Bluffing’s all John.

J. Boxer (John): Nah, I definitely know. There’s definitely stuff that I write where I’m like ‘this would be really weird for Gradients.’

NYCT: The Gradients have four songwriters, most bands have only one or two, so how does the song writing process work? Does everyone have equal input, or does someone bring in a skeleton and then lead in the process of building it?

Luca Ba: I mean, usually one or two people will have an individual thing that they bring in.

NYCT: Like a riff? Do you ever bring in a complete song?

Luca: Some people have.

Charlie: A lot of times it’s a song that gets changed, like as a band we’ll work on it. Also it’s funny that you say that cause like, we have a lot of trouble naming our songs, and a lot of the time they wind up being labeled as whoever brought it in, like ‘Sammy New,’ or ‘Charlie New,’ or ‘Luca New,’ ‘John New,’ but I wouldn’t say that any of those songs truly belong to that person.

Sammy: I think in this band you can’t really bring in a song, and like anything is subject to change. Every song I’ve brought in has basically just ended up different.

NYCT: You guys are releasing a four track EP, each of you writing one song. Are those songs written yet, are you still working on them?

Sammy: We’re playing two of them tonight. One is pretty close to being done. I guess the fourth one we haven’t even started yet.

Charlie: Mine is in the lab.

NYCT: At what point do you feel comfortable performing a song. When it’s fleshed out entirely?

Luca: I think often it’s not.

NYCT: So the writing process happens on stage too.

J Boxer: We know we’re not playing it the way it’s going to be, the finished product or whatever, and there’s kind fear or nervousness about it, but that’s what you have to do.

Sammy: Just play it over and over again, that’s kind of how I write songs anyway. Usually when I write something, I play it every day, like multiple times a day and over a long period of time things start to develop. I think that repetition is a good way to develop ideas, if you just have it in your ear.

J Boxer: I feel good about the two new ones that we have.

Charlie: The first show that we ever played as a band, way before John was in the band, we got offered a show and we weren’t ready, but we just played it. We were just like ‘why not, we were going to open the show.’ It came together on stage, and I feel like that vibe carried out into our band in general. You know a lot of times, like honestly, we’ll play a song, and the lyrics aren’t completely finished, but they’ll even grow from what we come up with, when we play it.

NYCT: Was this years South By your first tour experience as a band? How was that?

Luca: We became a family with the other members of Bluffing, Heeney and Slonk Donkerson. I’d say that those four bands are joined forever.

Charlie: It was a pretty magical time in Austin. I mean it was a great experience, and we played a lot of great shows, but it really almost felt like a musical vacation.

Sammy: It wasn’t the most organized show.

Charlie: The last tour we went on was like totally just you know play, go to the next place. Austin, we played a bunch of shows getting down there, and we got to Austin an we kind of went nuts. A lot of bonding and hanging out.

NYCT: Are you going to do anything differently in the studio this time around? Did you learn anything last time, that you’re not going to do this time, or is there anything that you’re going to bring over from the last record?

Luca: Ideally it won’t take as long to come out, I would say.

Sammy: I think I learned a lot about overdubs, like what sounds good, and what doesn’t and I couldn’t really explain it any more than that, but there are things on the record that obviously bug me, so you’re not going to be totally satisfied.

Download the complete show: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the complete show:

The Gradients
2014-09-05
Shea Stadium
Brooklyn, NY USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded by Emilio Herce and Shea Stadium
Produced by acidjack

Multitrack digital soundboard>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mix down)>Izotope Ozone 5 (effects on individual tracks, compression, imaging, exciter)>Audacity 2.0.3 (fades, tracking, amplify, balance, downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 Growing Pile>
02 Boxed In
03 [new song 1]
04 Gradients
05 [new song 2]
06 I’ll Find Your Grave
07 In Perspective
08 Charlie 182
09 Shelf
10 Something to Blame

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT The Gradients by visiting their bandcamp page, where you can buy their debut album release.

Wussy: October 10, 2014 Knitting Factory – Flac/MP3/Streaming

October 12, 2014

By nyctaper

[photo courtesy of Johannes Andersen – Soundcloud photo by nyctaper]

Wussy’s first NYC show in six months was perhaps their most important East coast show thus far — a headlining gig on the Friday night of the CBGB Festival at Knitting Factory. Back in the Spring, a high profile gig like this would have been not likely for Wussy, but since the release of their latest album Attica and the universal praise it received, there has been a groundswell of support for the band and a higher national profile. To be fair, Wussy has had a modest but fervent and faithful fanbase for the entirety of their existence. Back when they played Cake Shop back in 2010, we noted that fans had come from as far as Canada to see the show. Those fans are still supporting the band — at the Knit there were travelers from Seattle and from Peru — but there are just more of them. And that’s a good thing. This is a band with a unique male/female dichotomy and truly superb supporting instrumentalists with solid songwriting, an authentic take of mid-Americana rock and a healthy dose of humor. If any band deserves a greater audience, its Wussy. At the Knit on Friday, we saw a band operating on all cylinders. In particular, Lisa Walker continues to impress with her growth as a performer. As a request, the band performed a rarely heard Lisa song “Motorcycle”, which on the album (2012’s Funeral Dress) is a sweet but sad ode, while Lisa’s vocal performance on Friday gave depth to the song with a world-weariness and longing in her voice. A truly remarkable performance that encapsulates what is special about this band. My other favorite part of this show was during the encore segment when the band jammed on a theme from their own “Yellow Cotton Dress” before breaking into a tremendous cover of the Joy Division/New Order classic “Ceremony”. That performance earned the band a second encore call and its streaming below. Wussy returns to NYC in January and we’ll certainly be there then too.

I recorded this set with the Schoeps positioned on a high stand at the soundboard booth and mixed with an excellent feed from the band’s local FOH David. The sound quality is quite outstanding. Enjoy!

After this show, I was invited to a private house concert by Wussy on Saturday night. That recording will require some extra mixing, but should be posted on the site by the end of the week.

Stream “Ceremony” (New Order cover):

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Wussy
2014-10-10
Knitting Factory
Brooklyn NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard [Engineer David Fine] + Schoeps CCM4u Cardioids > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wavs > Soundforge (level adjustments, mixdown, EQ, set fades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:21:32]
01 Teenage Wasteland
02 Pulverized
03 Bug
04 Death By Misadventure
05 Pizza King
06 Mountain of Tires
07 Rigor Mortis
08 Gene I Dream
09 To The Lightning
10 Rainbows and Butterflies
11 Airborne
12 Motorcycle
13 Beautiful
14 [encore break]
15 Maglite
16 Ceremony [New Order]
17 [second encore break]
18 Don’t Leave Just Now

If you download this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Wussy, visit their website, and purchase their official releases from the Music link at their site [HERE] or from the Shake It Records website [HERE].

Mr Twin Sister: October 4, 2014 Babys All Right – Flac/MP3/Streaming

October 8, 2014

By nyctaper

[photo by John Harrison – courtesy of Neat Beet]

The simple fact that Mr Twin Sister still exists as a band is in itself quite remarkable. The vast majority of groups that go through the buzz cycle do not come out the back end intact. In 2010 when the band was simply “Twin Sister”, we were among the earliest media outlets to sing the band’s praises — and rightfully so. “All Around and Away We Go” was their first major breakthrough song and it was a clever earworm and interesting dance-rock mix, akin to influences as wide at Tom Tom Club and Sade. But there was always something more than just a pop band to Twin Sister — something a little offbeat and perhaps dark — and when they signed to Domino Records, the relationship only produced one record before an amicable parting. This would be where most bands call it quits. But Twin Sister consists of a bunch of friends from Suffolk County of all places, and they perserved through this period (which also included a nasty tour bus crash) and have come out stronger. With a new-ish band name and an outstanding new self-titled self-released album, Mr Twin Sister 2014 is a band poised to take the path for which they were originally intended. The coming out party took place this past week at Baby’s All Right where the band played two very sold out shows — indicating that the fanbase has remained and that the album is generating excitement. We caught the second of the two nights on Saturday and from the outset of their set, it was clear that Mr Twin Sister is truly back. Lead singer Andrea Estella is in good voice and exhibited confidence and a little playfulness, but the multifaceted (two keys, guitars, sax, effects) band also impressed. And there were guests, in particular a string section played on the final two tracks of the main set, and we are streaming below the strong version of “Blush” with strings. If the strength of the album and of these Baby’s sets are an indication of things to come for Mr Twin Sister, vindication will soon be theirs. And it will be hard earned and well deserved. There are no local dates currently scheduled for Mr. Twin Sister, but they begin a brief tour next week opening for Julian Casablancas in Philadelphia, Washington DC and dates further south.

This set was expertly mixed by the band’s touring FOH Jonathan Low and recorded by house FOH Jeff Swart from the venue’s multitrack system. I have matrixed the house mix with the two room mics and the result is superb. Enjoy!

Stream “Blush”:

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Mr Twin Sister
2014-10-04
Babys All Right
Brooklyn, NY USA

Digital Soundboard Multitrack Recording

Multitrack Soundboard (engineered and recorded by Jeff Swart) > Jeff mix Wavs + Room mic wavs > Soundforge (level adjustments, setfades) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and Tagging via Foobar)

Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:11:24]
01 Part of Two
02 Bad Street
03 Rude Boy
04 Set Me Free
05 The Blue
06 Fantasy
07 Sensitive
08 Poor Relations
09 Out of the Dark
10 Crime Scene
11 [banter – strings intro]
12 Blush
13 [banter – thanks]
14 In The House of Yes
15 [encore break]
16 All Around and Away We Go
17 [outro]

If you download this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Mr Twin Sister, visit their website, and purchase Mr Twin Sister from Bandcamp [HERE].

MV & EE: September 5, 2014 Three Lobed / WXDU Day Show, Hopscotch Music Festival, King’s, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Full Set Streaming)

October 7, 2014

By acidjack

[photos by PJ Sykes]

MV & EE are an underground band in the purest sense, the kind of band who self-releases an LP after scads of others have come out on (admittedly obscure) labels and still presses tasty CD-Rs of their best-loved live sets. They exist on exactly that plane you might expect for a Vermont band, doing things their way, happy to earn the love the slow way, through swapped tapes and late-night listening sessions on porches and in basements. Their sound, a sort of far-out experimental folk, is homegrown and not easily replicated. Having seen the band twice this year already, I noticed now more than ever that no two MV & EE sets ever seem quite alike, and Matt Valentine and Erika Elder seem so in tune with one another that no song needs to hew to a single version, either.

This set at the Three Lobed / WXDU Day Show at King’s during Hopscotch Music Festival was the only one by an outfit that had actually played a night-time festival set (the night before at The Hive), but that didn’t mean MV & EE were willing to dish out the same thing twice. In keeping with the vibe of this show, this set went to the more noisy end of the spectrum, especially on the delicious combo of “Roll On>Mayan Feedback” from this year’s self-released record Alpha Lyrae. Valentine and Elder have been on a bit of a roll lately tour-wise, so they may be off the road for a bit, but check back at their website for all the band’s latest info and releases, including their new seven-inch split with Woods with both bands performing Pink Floyd’s “Green is the Colour”.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK4V microphones on stage coupled with a soundboard feed from the King’s staff. The sound quality is outstanding. Enjoy!

Direct download of full set: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the full set:

MV & EE
2014-09-05
Three Lobed Recordings / WXDU Day Show
King’s
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Soundboard + Schoeps MK4V (on stage pair)>KC5>CMC6>>Edirol R-44 [OCM]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (effects, EQ)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, fade, amplify, balance)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 [intro – Cory Rayborn and Matt Valentine]
02 Green Is the Colour [Pink Floyd]>
03 Jam>
04 Freedom and Unity Rap
05 [tuning]
06 Roll On>
07 Mayan Feedback

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT MV & EE, like them on Facebook and buy their latest record, Alpha Lyrae, directly from the band HERE.

Landlady: September 6, 2014 Hometapes / Trekky Records Day Show, Pour House, Hopscotch Music Festival, Raleigh, NC – FLAC/MP3/Streaming

October 6, 2014

By acidjack

[photos by acidjack]

Brooklyn’s Landlady is a really good live band, and they’re good in a way that flatters their musical skill as well as drawing a crowd. Where most music has to make a choice between being interesting or mass-appealing, they seem able to do both, to hang in a narrow band that includes acts like Vampire Weekend, TV On the Radio, and The Dirty Projectors. That I pulled those references from the prior decade isn’t unintentional; Landlady feels like the pleasing synthesis of a few different strands of late-aughts rock, created and executed by Adam Schatz and his bandmates since 2010. Schatz has called Landlady’s songs his “big songs”, and the veteran brings a certain big-tent gusto to the songs that makes them distinct from other projects in which he has been involved, like Man Man or Father Figures. It’s as if Schatz — a multi-instrumentalist himself, including saxophone — distilled some of his other project’s textural complexity and general weirdness into something still-complex but more ready and willing to be liked.

That was all in evidence on the final day of the Hopscotch Music Festival, as Raleigh’s Pour House packed in for the Hometapes / Trekky Records day show. Landlady were representing the former, an outfit recently moved to Durham, North Carolina, and made their label proud. It’d be easy not to care about a day show crowd on a festival’s last day, just near the end of a month-long tour. The band had played Hopscotch Thursday, traveled to Richmond, VA on Friday, then back to Raleigh on Saturday because, as Schatz put it, “we like you”. The band treated us like a special crowd, too, giving us a brisk but powerful set that awakened even the most jaded and hungover festivalgoers. Landlady’s music has an at-times tribal quality to it, abetted in part by the use of two drummers, and that gives the music a festive air. Songs rarely stand still, shifting textures and ideas more often in the space of a single number than many bands achieve in entire albums. True to Schatz’s reputation as a showman, the band saved probably the two biggest standout tracks — “Maria” and “Above My Ground” for the end, though “The Globe” would come in a close third. That final number “Above My Ground” gave Schatz a chance to give a mini-speech mid-song in which he ruminated on the impermanence of things before exhorting the audience to sing the song’s one-word refrain — “always”. As Schatz said, the song is about having lost something, and you got the sense that Landlady would genuinely miss us. They are, after all, a band that stands out the most when they have a packed crowd to watch.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK41 microphones and a soundboard feed from the Pour House engineer Jack. The sound quality is excellent. Enjoy!

Download the full set: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the full set:

Landlady
2014-9-06
Hometapes / Trekky Records Day Show
Hopscotch Music Festival
Pour House
Raleigh, NC USA

Hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Schoeps MK41>KCY>Z-PFA + Soundboard (engineer: Jack)>>Roland R-26>x24bit/48kHz WAV> Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (effects, EQ)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, amplify, balance, downsample, dither)>FLAC ( level 8 )

01 Under the Yard
02 Girl
03 Washington State is Important
04 [banter]
05 Dying Day
06 The Globe
07 [banter2]
08 Maria>
09 Above My Ground (extended version)

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Landlady, like them on Facebook, and buy Upright Behavior from Hometapes.

So Cow: September 20, 2014 Cake Shop – Flac/MP3/Streaming

October 3, 2014

By nyctaper

[photo by nyctaper]

So Cow released their excellent new album The Long Con on September 16, a date that fell square in the middle of a rare US tour. The tour was scheduled to coincide with the excellent Gonerfest thrown by their record label Goner. The tour also included two NYC shows, and we caught the second one at Cake Shop last week. This was the first time we’ve seen So Cow in over four years since a great set at the now long-departed Monster Island Basement in early 2010. At that point, Brian Kelly was playing with a tour band and recording alone, but now So Cow is a proper working band and The Long Con is the first full length album with the trio. The result is that the album sounds more like the live show we encountered in 2010 and again last week, and less like a Kelly bedroom recording. At Cake Shop, the band worked through a nice mix of material old and new, including the first single from the album “Barry Richardson” that we are streaming below. The album has received some excellent reviews, including a fine piece in PopMatters this week. We expect that the positive attention will propel this excellent band and that it won’t be four-plus years before we see them live again. At least I hope it won’t be.

I recorded this set with the Sennheiser cards mounted to the short ceiling in front of the stage and mixed with DPA omnis positioned in front of the stacks. The stage-mount provides a clear capture of the instruments while the stack tape is vocal heavy. The mix is adjusted to accentuate the positives of both sources and the result is a superb recording. Enjoy!

Stream “Barry Richardson”:

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

So Cow
2014-09-20
Cake Shop
New York NY

Digital Master Recording

Sennheiser MKH-8040s + DPA 4061s > Edirol R-44 (Oade Concert Mod) > 24bit 48kHz wav file > Soundforge (level adjustments, set fades, downsample) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and Tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced
by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 41:10]
01 [intro]
02 Sugar Factory
03 Get Down Off that Thing
04 To Be Confirmed
05 League of Impressionable Teens
06 [banter – fly]
07 Operating at a Loss
08 Waltzer
09 Ruane vs The A Bomb
10 High Standards
11 I Hardly Know You
12 [banter – far right]
13 Barry Richardson
14 [banter – thanks]
15 Nutbush City Limits [Ike Tina Turner]
16 Casablanca
17 [banter – Scottish Independence]
18 To Do List

If you download this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT So Cow, visit their artist page at the Goner Records site, and purchase The Long Con from the Goner Records website [HERE].

Wormburner: September 26, 2014 Mercury Lounge – FLAC/MP3/Streaming

October 2, 2014

By acidjack

Follow @acidjacknyc

[Photos courtesy of Patrick J. Eves]

Wormburner have been kicking around the New York scene here for a few years, making their first appearance on this site back in 2010, where they were rightly compared to a cross between the Hold Steady and Camper Van Beethoven, owing in no small part to frontman Hank Henry’s talking-style vocals. For my part, this record release show at Mercury Lounge for the band’s excellent third LP, Pleasant Living in Planned Communities, was my first with the band. In addition to those references, I caught a pretty strong whiff of some of the better post-grunge bands, especially the mostly-forgotten Harvey Danger. No surprise, then, than by the first chorus of the leadoff track “Drinks At the Plaza Hotel”, I was nodding my head.

This is a very easy band to like, a group of obviously nice people who deploy big hooks and choruses, but don’t skimp on the lyrical concepts just because they know they probably could. To wit, you end up with songs about such things as, per the band’s website, “a downed airman in WWII Europe, a 21st Century soldier returning home from battle, and a transient gay hustler whose youthful looks are weathering with age”. The band’s delivery reflects the professionalism of eight years together as a going concern, and even as they played brand-new material for presumably the first time, Wormburner remained dialed in. The new album material comes across as some of the band’s strongest yet, in particular “Plaza Hotel”, “Catherine”, that WWII song “Hopscotch Gunner”, and “Somewhere Else to Be”. Sean Eden of Luna guested on Pleasant Living and was also on hand for the night’s proceedings, joining the band for two songs including Donovan’s “Seasons of the Witch”. The Cult’s “She Sells Sanctuary” was the perfect big-rock way to end the show, setting the tone for the Wormburner shows to come in the next months.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK41 microphones and head Mercury engineer Dave Lefcourt’s soundboard mix. The sound quality is excellent. Enjoy!

Catch Wormburner in New York again at the Tijuana Gift Shop showcase during CMJ on Wednesday, October 22 at Bowery Electric, and again at Mercury Lounge on December 18 for their annual Christmas show.

Stream “Hopscotch Gunner”

Stream “Season of the Witch” [Donovan]

Direct download of full set: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Wormburner
2014-09-26
Mercury Lounge
New York, NY USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Schoeps MK41>KCY>Z-PFA + Soundboard (engineer: Dave Lefcourt)>>Roland R-26>x24bit/48kHz WAV> Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (effects, EQ)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, amplify, balance, downsample, dither)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time: 1:07:14]
01 Drinks at the Plaza Hotel
02 Today Might be Our Day
03 Catherine
04 Peekskill
05 Little Things
06 Made-for-TV Movie
07 [tuning1]
08 A Standing Invitation
09 [banter2]
10 Somewhere Else To Be
11 Hopscotch Gunner
12 Pike City Proper
13 The Interstate
14 [banter3]
15 Parliaments on Sundays*
16 Season of the Witch* [Donovan]
17 [banter4]
18 She Sells Sanctuary [The Cult]

* Featuring Sean Eden of Luna

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Wormburner, visit their website, and buy their releases directly from Dive Records.

Circuit des Yeux: September 5, 2014 Hopscotch Music Festival, Tir na Nog, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Streaming)

October 1, 2014

By acidjack

Follow @acidjacknyc

[rather bad photo by acidjack]

Circuit des Yeux makes lacerating, personal music that belongs in a certain kind of place, both spiritually and physically. Haley Fohr is four records in now at age twenty-five, and her latest album, Overdue, was hailed by the ever-reliable Marc Masters of Pitchfork, along with several others, as her best yet. Fohr’s music is somber and dark, delicate at times, unafraid to be dissonant when it needs to be. The Chicago-based musician has played in and around New York several times, but I had missed my chances. As happened a few times this year, Hopscotch Music Festival let me correct that mistake.

Over time, especially on Overdue, Circuit des Yeux’s compositions have taken on a grander scale, and we saw that in action right off the bat, as Fohr led with a brand new, as-yet-untitled song. Along with another new song and two more Overdue tracks, the set was bookended by “Acarina”, one of three Overdue tracks played. In this setting, it became a slashing, sprawling explosion of distortion that made the original seem almost polite — a gem of a live version. I might venture that the added fury packed into it paired well with Fohr’s mood, as I’ll discuss below.

The truth is that somebody could not have picked a worse venue for Circuit des Yeux, seated alone on a low stage in an Irish bar best suited to party music or cover bands. Despite that I knew several people who came to the venue specifically to see Circuit des Yeux, that couldn’t overcome the fact that this was difficult music being played in a loud bar to a crowd much more indifferent than they ought to have been. This is the kind of scheduling mishap that also led, in part, to the festival’s well-publicized artist blowup across town this same night. To her credit, Fohr didn’t call names or lash out. She leaned into her guitar, hair obscuring the louder side of the room, and sang with an intensity that fought its way through. For me as a fan, what is most striking about this set is just how good it is in recorded form — that is, with the advantage of being able to remove most of the audience from the equation.

That’s all well and good, but to read Circuit des Yeux’s take on this set is to be reminded that a concert is not a one-way event. Granted, unlike an artist’s own show, a festival audience may not have paid to be there specifically to see that artist. But that doesn’t mean that the crowd doesn’t have a responsibility to the performer they are seeing. To be in an audience is to be an active participant in the artist’s experience of the show. An audience can elevate, and an audience can also hurt. Before you bother to finish the rest of this, or click play on the streaming tracks, or do anything else, I would urge you to read Fohr’s piece. No musician — be it one you like, one you dislike, or one you’re indifferent to — deserves to be treated like a performing monkey. An artist owes us to do their part, and we owe them as an audience to do ours. A concert isn’t church, sure, but it is a shared space with a single focal point — the artist. Anything that takes away from that is doing damage: to the artist, to the other fans who paid to be there, and to the whole enterprise of what live music is supposed to be about.

For my part, I found Fohr’s performance compelling and look forward to her next steps. Circuit des Yeux isn’t easy or conventional, and that is part of what has made it a favorite of both critics and the other forward-thinking artists such as Xiu Xiu who have toured with her. This music deserves our continued attention and respect. For those that don’t “get it”, whether that’s the case with this artist or with somebody else, please stay away or shut up. The rest of us are trying to hear.

I recorded this set with a soundboard feed provided by Brandon, the night’s engineer, plus Audio Technica 3031 microphones, which were turned way down in this mix. It ended up sounding quite good. I hope you enjoy it.

Download the complete show [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream the full show:

Note: All of the material on this site is offered with artist permission, free to fans, at our expense. The only thing we ask is that you download the material directly from this site, rather than re-posting the direct links or the files on other sites without our permission. Please respect our request.

Circuit des Yeux
2014-09-05
Hopscotch Music Festival
Tir na Nog
Raleigh, NC USA

Exclusive download hosted at nyctaper.com
recorded and produced by acidjack

Soundboard (engineer: Brandon)+ Audio Technica 3031 (at SBD, ROC)>Roland R-26>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (align, levels, mix down, compression)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, effects)>Audacity 2.0.3 (track, amplify, balance, fades, dither and downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time 39:34]
01 Untitled 1
02 Untitled 2
03 [tuning]
04 Nova 88
05 [tuning2]
06 Lithonia
07 [tuning3]
08 Acarina

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Circuit des Yeux, visit her website, and buy Overdue and her other records directly from her.

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Ryley Walker: September 6, 2014 Hopscotch Music Festival, Fletcher Opera Theater, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Full Set Streaming)

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So Cow: September 20, 2014 Cake Shop – Flac/MP3/Streaming

Wormburner: September 26, 2014 Mercury Lounge – FLAC/MP3/Streaming

Circuit des Yeux: September 5, 2014 Hopscotch Music Festival, Tir na Nog, Raleigh, NC (FLAC/MP3/Streaming)

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