Prairie Empire: June 10, 2012 Mercury Lounge – FLAC and MP3 Downloads + Streaming Songs

June 26, 2012
By


[Photos by Dominick Mastrangelo]

When I first head singer-songwriter Brittain Ashford, I knew right away that she was something special. With a voice that is sweet, delicate and whimsical, Ashford draws you in and keeps you in her headspace, with clear, confessional lyrics that give you that proverbial window into her soul. Prairie Empire is Ashford’s first full-band project, and musically, it is a successful one.  With a full complement of talented players with a range of instruments at their disposal that includes strings, cello, violin, viola, drums, sleigh bells, dulcimer and trumpet, the sum of Prairie Empire is far greater than its parts, and Ashford’s judicious arrangements give grace and power to her songs without cluttering them.

This show at Mercury Lounge celebrated the release of the band’s debut LP on Trailer Fire Records, and found Ashford and her bandmates delivering beautifully-realized live renditions of the majority of the record. The band’s LP is one of the most well-mixed and recorded albums I have heard in some time (the vinyl pressing is of exceptionally high quality), with a dry, dynamic mix, and I was thrilled to hear how well the band brought the material across live.  Along with “Give,” the studio version of which has been streaming on the band’s website for awhile, I was particularly partial to “Under Hum” and “Where You Are”, with its plaintive, emotionally wrenching chorus. We are thrilled to have had part of presenting this show, and wish the band the best of luck on their current tour.  If you are in one of the areas of the Midwest or East Coast where the band is touring, you owe it to yourself to go and see them.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK5 microphones from the center of the room by the board, along with a stereo soundboard feed. Other than the occasional sound of the door between the show area and the bar  opening and closing, and some very light DI distortion on a couple of songs, the recording is flawless, and an outstanding representation of the band’s live sound. Enjoy!

Special thanks to Brittain Ashford and Prairie Empire for their invitation to us to present this show and to record it.

Stream “Under Hum”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/P6001PrairieEmpire2012/05 Under Hum.mp3]

Stream “Where You Are”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/P6001PrairieEmpire2012/08 Where You Are.mp3]

Direct download of MP3 files [HERE] | Direct Download of the FLAC files [HERE]

Follow acidjack on twitter

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.

Prairie Empire
2012-06-10
Mercury Lounge
New York, NY USA

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

Schoeps MK5(cardiod, DFC, POS, 7.5ft)>CMC6>Sound Devices USBPre2 + Soundboard >> Edirol R-44 [Oade Concert Mod]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mixdown)>Izotope Ozone 5 (light EQ)>Audacity (set fades, tracking, amplify and balance)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 [intro]
02 Tenfold
03 Snow
04 Winter Came
05 Under Hum
06 Give
07 [banter]
08 Where You Are
09 Pieces, Parts

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Prairie Empire, visit their website, and purchase their record from Trailer Fire Records [HERE] or on iTunes.

Pontiak: June 14, 2012 NYCTaper Northside Festival Showcase at 285 Kent – FLAC and MP3 Downloads + Streaming Songs

June 25, 2012
By


[Photos by Jill Harrison at For the Love of Brooklyn]

The way that the brothers Jennings, Van and Lain Carney – aka Pontiak – are able to live their lives as musicians is about as far from the New York experience as you can get. Where our musicians live in cramped apartments, borrow or rent practice space, and live near the places where they play, the Carneys record and practice their music on their own farm/studio in rural Virginia, where they decamped to after a five year stint in the Baltimore scene, where they played with compatriots like Arbouretum. The brothers’ rural location has given them flexibility to record how and what they want that their urban counterparts would surely envy. But it does mean a very long drive when you want to do a one-off show for the Northside Festival.

Given the distance involved, and the fact that the band tours much more regularly in Europe, I was honored that Pontiak agreed to co-headline our second annual Northside Festival showcase at 285 Kent. For me, Pontiak was not just a band that I liked and hoped would play a showcase; to me, it is a band that distills to its essence what is right and good about live music. Their sets are unpredictable, drawing from a deep catalog of nine releases, and they take fearless and surprising turns stylistically, even from song to song. Yes, Pontiak are unquestionably a “heavy” band, but that simple tag belies a huge range of influences you can hear in their material. They can evoke Sabbath-style riff-driven metal, stoner rock, psych rock, indie rock, southern rock and math rock, and they can even showcase a quieter, more acoustic side. The band’s most recent EP, Comecrudos, which predated this year’s excellent full-length LP Echo Ono, was a five-part piece inspired by the drive from Marathon, Texas to Phoenix, and featured guest musicians on horns and deep, penetrating psychedelic guitar musings. Echo Ono, on the other hand, “cuts out all the bullshit” (as Van Carney put it to the A.V. Club) and is a much more straight-ahead psychedelic rock album than some of their earlier work.

As a live band, it’s also fair to say the Carneys cut out all the bullshit. Up on the stage with their stripped-down selection of vintage gear cranked to ear-blistering levels, the brothers tore through this 40-minute set with few pauses or breaks. As always, the interplay between the brothers was deft and natural, and their material showed the full range of their catalog.  Although several tracks from Echo Ono were played for the first time (for me), my personal highlight was when the band slowed things down a bit to play Part III of Comecrudos. We could not have been more honored to have them on stage on our behalf.

nyctaper and I recorded this set in the same manner as the other sets of the night, with Sennheiser MKH-8040 microphones, Audio Technica microphones split wide at the stage lip, and a soundboard feed. The sound is excellent. Enjoy!

Special thanks to Pontiak, White Hills, Rhyton and EULA for playing this show and to ToddP for helping to host the event.  You can download While Hills’ set [HERE], Rhyton [HERE] and EULA [HERE].

Stream “Part III [Comecrudos]”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/P2011Pontiak2010/05 Part III.mp3]

Stream “Across the Steppe”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/P2011Pontiak2010/01 Across the Steppe.mp3]

Direct download of MP3 files [HERE] | Direct download of FLAC files [HERE]
email nyctaper for the location of the FLAC files

Follow acidjack on twitter

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.

Pontiak
2012-06-14
NYCTaper Northside Festival Showcase
285 Kent
Brooklyn, NY USA

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

Sennheiser MKH-8040 (ROC, 8ft, PAS) + Soundboard + Audio Technica 3031 (stage lip, NOS)>Sound Devices USBPre2 >> Edirol R-44 [Oade Concert Mod]>3x24bit/48kHz WAV>Audacity (mixdown)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, gentle tube)>Audacity (set fades, tracking, amplify, balance, downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time 40:03]
01 Across the Steppe
02 Laywayed
03 The North Coast
04 Left With Lights
05 Part III
06 Shell Skull
07 The Expanding Sky
08 Royal Colors
09 Panoptica [short version]
10 Lions of Least

If you download this recording from NYCTaper, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT Pontiak, visit their website, and purchase their official releases, including Echo Ono from Thrill Jockey directly [here].

Olivia Tremor Control: June 16, 2012 Music Hall of Williamsburg [Northside Festival] – FLAC and MP3 Downloads + Streaming Songs

June 22, 2012
By


[photos by acidjack]

After catching an exclusive acoustic warmup set the day before, we could not wait for Olivia Tremor Control‘s main Northside Festival set at Music Hall of Williamsburg. After short sets by the newly revamped Dinosaur Feathers and Laura Stevenson & the Cans, OTC took the stage and immediately tore into “The Opera House”, one of their most rocking numbers. Despite being on one of the festival’s bigger stages, OTC made the show feel like our own private window onto a living room jam session. The members chatted easily among each other, helped each other tweak their gear and evidently were still debating the setlist at points. While that freewheeling style could be a frustration with some bands, that is the charm of Olivia Tremor Control, who have always taken the “collective” concept of music-making to its fullest extreme (see, for example, the Elephant 6 Holiday Surprise Show I recorded earlier this year). An always-quirky band with a penchant for multi-part songs, sound collages, strange instrumentation,and acid-trip lyrics, OTC have always kept things weird, though they also have a penchant for pure pop songwriting that most bands would envy. Close your eyes at certain points in this set, and you might have thought you were hearing the Rubber Soul-era Beatles playing unreleased b-sides.

This 75-minute set featured many gems from the Athens, GA band’s landmark 1996 debut LP, Music From The Unrealized Film Script “Dusk At Cubist Castle”, including two of my favorites, “Can You Come Down With Us” and “Memories of Jacqueline 1906”, both streaming below. Of course, the band didn’t ignore the 1999 record Black Foliage, or some of their non-album material, including “Shaving Spiders” from the Giant Day 7″ EP. Although they have been back together for a bit now, fans are still anxiously awaiting a full record of new material from OTC, with onlyThe Game You Play Is In Your Head Pts. 1, 2 and 3 EP from last year to dig into until then. If this set was any indication, this is a group of players with plenty of musical vitality left – let’s hope they keep the project going.

I recorded this set from the center of the venue balcony with Schoeps MK41 microphones and an Aerco custom preamp to create a warm, vintage sound. While we generally are huge fans of Bowery Presents and their fine venues, Music Hall has always been a challenge for us.  On this night, I was not permitted to use the equipment we have used for the past two years to hang mics safely and securely from the balcony, making the placement less-than-optimal. Further, the house mix on this night left much to be desired, with the bass levels seemingly left at the settings from the GZA show two nights before. The recording was cleaned up in post-production considerably, and now is a solid if not spectacular recording by this site’s standards. Listen to the samples, and enjoy!

Special thanks to the Northside Festival.

Stream “Can You Come Down With Us”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/O6150OTC0212/03 Can You Come Down With Us.mp3]

Stream “Memories of Jacqueline 1906”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/O6150OTC0212/10 Memories of Jacqueline 1906.mp3]

Download the MP3 and FLAC files, and stream the entire show, on the Live Music Archive [HERE]

Follow acidjack on twitter

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.

The Olivia Tremor Control
2012-06-16
Music Hall of Williamsburg
Brooklyn, NY USA

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

Schoeps MK41 (balcony, PAS)>KCY>Z-PFA>Aerco MP-2>Sony PCM-M10 (24/44.1)>24bit/44.1kHz WAV>Audacity (set fades, EQ, tracking, amplify, balance, downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time: 1:14:18]
01 The Opera House
02 A Place We Have Been To
03 Can You Come Down With Us?
04 [tuning]
05 Courtyard>
06 Spinning Continuous
07 Black Foliage (Itself)
08 [tuning]
09 A Sunshine Fix
10 Memories of Jacqueline 1906
11 California Demise
12 Dusk at Cubist Castle>
13 The Gravity Car
14 Spring Succeeds
15 [tuning]
16 A Sleepy Company
17 I Have Been Floated
18 A New Day
19 Grass Canons>
20 Hideaway
21 Holiday Surprise 1, 2, 3
22 [encore break]
23 Jumping Fences
24 [tuning]
25 Shaving Spiders

If you enjoyed this recording, please support Olivia Tremor Control by visiting their website and purchasingThe Game You Play is in Your Head Pts 1, 2 and 3 from Secretly Canadian [HERE]

Field Mouse: June 16, 2012 Spike Hill [Northside Festival] – FLAC and MP3 Downloads + Streaming Songs

June 22, 2012
By


[Photos by acidjack]

With a sound rooted firmly in 90s acts like My Bloody Valentine, Lush, the Breeders and Sonic Youth, Field Mouse is a very easy band for me to like. Apparently the L Magazine agreed, listing the band as one of the “8 Bands You Need to Hear” recently, which was also the organizing theme for this daytime Northside Festival showcase at lovely little Spike Hill.  Singer-guitarist Rachel Browne is an engaging frontwoman, with sweetly-scarred vocals and a great gift for awkward-but-hilarious stage banter (her reaction to an audience member who bizarrely tried to compliment her by calling her a “black hole” is a priceless moment). Co-songwriter and fellow guitarist Andrew Futral, along with bassist (and band recording engineer) Danielle DePalma and Geoff Lewitt, create a blissed-out sea of noise for Browne’s vocals, as on songs like “You Guys Are Gonna Wake Up My Mom” (which was the band’s first 7″) and “How Do You Know”. The band just funded their first release, You Are Here via a Kickstarter campaign, and we hope to see the record out there on shelves and in digital-land soon.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK5 microphones and a soundboard feed from the Spike Hill engineer.  The sound is excellent. Enjoy!

Stream “You Guys Are Gonna Wake Up My Mom”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/F0616FieldMouse0212/01 You Guys Are Gonna Wake Up My Mom.mp3]

Stream “How Do You Know”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/F0616FieldMouse0212/06 How Do You Know.mp3]

Direct download of MP3 files [HERE] | Direct Download of the FLAC files [HERE]

Follow acidjack on twitter

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.

Field Mouse
2012-06-16
Spike Hill
Brooklyn, NY USA

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

Schoeps MK5 (cardiod, slightly LOC, PAS)>KC5>CMC6>Sound Devices USBPre2 + Soundboard >> Edirol R-44 [Oade Concert Mod]>2x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mixdown)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, tape effects)>Audacity (set fades, tracking, amplify and balance)>FLAC (level 8 )

Tracks
01 You Guys Are Gonna Wake Up My Mom
02 Happy
03 [banter]
04 Asteroid
05 [banter]
06 How Do You Know
07 Awful Year
08 Glass
09 [banter]
10 Everyone But You

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Field Mouse, visit their website, and purchase their official releases from the links on their bandcamp page or on iTunes.

Jo Schornikow: June 10, 2012 Mercury Lounge – FLAC and MP3 Downloads + Streaming Songs

June 21, 2012
By


[Photos by Dominick Mastrangelo]

The Australian singer-songwriter Jo Schornikow is the best-known as the pianist and keyboardist of The Shivers, but she is a lovely singer and performer in her own right (as well as, her website humorously notes, an “internationalist” and  a “nice person”). Schornikow opened this NYCTaper-sponsored show at Mercury Lounge to a crowd that included many of her own fans, who watched reverently as Schornikow performed material from her album First Time, Long Time.  Her songs have an ageless quality to them, made all the better by Schornikow’s easygoing, friendly stage persona. A trained pianist since early childhood, Schornikow is relatively new to the singer-songwriter-guitarist thing, but you wouldn’t know it from this polished, engaging performance. This was Schornikow’s last U.S. performance for a bit as she will be touring the UK for a bit, and she leaves us eager for her return.

I recorded this set with Schoeps MK5 cardioid microphones in the center of the room by the soundboard, along with a soundboard feed. Other than occasionally hearing the door to the bar open and close, it is a flawless recording. Enjoy!

Stream “Will You Miss Me”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/J1006JoSchornikow0212/05 Will You Miss Me.mp3]

Stream “What Could Have Been”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/J1006JoSchornikow0212/10 What Could Have Been.mp3]

Direct download of MP3 files [HERE] | Direct Download of the FLAC files [HERE]
[Note: MP3 link has been fixed] 

Follow acidjack on twitter

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.

 

Jo Schornikow
2012-06-10
Mercury Lounge
New York, NY USA

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

Schoeps MK5 (cardiod, DFC, 7.5ft, PAS)>CMC6>Sound Devices USBPre2 + Soundboard >> Edirol R-44 [Oade Concert Mod]>2x24bit/48kHz FLAC>Izotope Ozone 5 (various edits to soundboard and audience sources separately)>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (adjust levels, mix down)>Audacity (tracking, amplify and balance, downsample)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 I Always Come Back
02 Joseph
03 Bird’s Nest
04 Simple Love
05 Will You Miss Me?
06 When You Come Around
07 Serve Love
08 Plaster
09 [banter]
10 What Could Have Been

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT Jo Schornikow, visit her website, and purchase First Time, Long Time directly from her bandcamp page or on CDBaby.

White Hills: June 14, 2012 NYCTaper Northside Showcase at 285 Kent – FLAC and MP3 Downloads + Streaming Songs

June 20, 2012
By


[Photos by Jill at For the Love of Brooklyn]

it seemed that the NYCTaper 2012 Northside Festival showcase provided an ideal time for bands to try out different sets and arrangements and be a bit more adventurous with their setlists and performance. White Hills, who I had seen more recently than the other bands who played, gave a set that focused on some of their classic, most exploration-friendly numbers, and duly impressed both first-timers and White Hills vets. We knew we were in for something special when “Song of Everything” from the band’s latest LP, Frying on this Rock, was the second song in the set, flowing straight into “You Dream You See” from that same record. But the track that followed, “Let the Right One In” from the band’s 2010 record, White Hills, was what sealed it for me as my favorite White Hills set yet, with its slow build to its cosmic climax. The closer, “Polvere  de Stelle”, also from White Hills, was equally a highlight. The Hills are the type of band that always keeps things interesting, and even in this festival-length format, they were able to give us that and more.

nyctaper and I recorded this set with Sennheiser MKH-8040 mics in our usual spot in the venue, plus Audio Technica 3031 mics at the stage lip and a soundboard feed.  The resulting wall of sound is an outstanding representation of the night. Enjoy!

Special thanks to Thrill Jockey Records and White Hills for playing the show. You can download other sets from the NYCTaper Showcase as well, including EULA and Rhyton.  

Stream “Let the Right One In”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/W0049WhiteHills2012/04 Let the Right One In.mp3]

Stream “The Condition of Nothing”
[audio:https://www.nyctaper.com/W0049WhiteHills2012/05 The Condition of Nothing.mp3]

Direct download of MP3 files [HERE] | Direct Download of the FLAC files [HERE]

Follow acidjack on twitter

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.

White Hills
2012-06-14
NYCTaper Northside Festival Showcase
285 Kent
Brooklyn, NY USA

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

Audio Technica 3031 (stage lip, NOS)>Sound Devices USBPre2 + Sennheiser MKH-8040 (ROC, 8ft, PAS) + Soundboard >> Edirol R-44 [Oade Concert Mod]>3x24bit/48kHz WAV>Adobe Audition CS 5.5 (mixdown, adjust levels, EQ and compression on SBD)>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, tube effect)>Audacity (set fades, tracking, amplify and balance)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks [Total Time 32:35]
01 Pads of Light
02 Song of Everything
03 You Dream You See
04 Let the Right One In
05 The Condition of Nothing
06 Polvere de Stelle

If you enjoyed this recording, PLEASE SUPPORT White Hills, like them on Facebook, and purchase their records including Frying On This Rock directly from Thrill Jockey [HERE]

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