Free the Music is a guide to new albums, EPs and songs that are available for free online. Today’s drop is: Signals/Supple Youth Tour Mixtape. I was crushed when I found out The Mae Shi broke up last summer. Or should I say, split in twain. Whatever the case may be, a number of the … [Read more…]
Free the Music is a guide to new albums, EPs and songs that are available for free online. Today’s drop is: Everyone Everywhere – A Lot Of Weird People Standing Around. I first heard of Philadelphia’s Everyone Everywhere close to a year ago, when Fistfight At The Arthouse featured a write up of their EP, … [Read more…]
I recently wrote a piece on all-ages shows and DIY venues in Chicago for Medill. The article went online Tuesday, and comes with a (brief) sister piece about the history of all-ages and DIY shows in America, a video and slideshow of a couple of venues and a handful of graphs and photos of these shows. … [Read more…]
Max Bemis took to Twitter just a little while ago with one long, oft-rambling ode to the pangs of posting things on… Twitter. Part of Bemis’ cathartic, well-intentioned rant included a curious take on the future of Say Anything, the excellent band Bemis fronts: To let you guys in on some stuff that’s semi personal, … [Read more…]
View Davey von Bohlen’s Chicago shows in a larger map Milwaukee musician Davey von Bohlen has led the kind of musical career that must leave other artists teeming with jealousy. Since the early ’90s, Davey has performed in a variety of bands: Ten Boy Summer, Cap’n Jazz, The Promise Ring, Vermont and Maritime. Nearly all … [Read more…]
When Philadelphia’s Algernon Cadwallader played Strangelight – a new Chicago DIY venue – on Friday, Feb. 5, singer/bassist Peter Helmis took some time to discuss the process of creating and selling merchandise.
The new year is almost here, and with it comes a maelstrom of “End of the Year Lists.†Here on Ex-Spectator, I’ll be rolling out a few “End of the Yearâ€/â€End of the Decade†lists. Today’s list: The Best Albums of 2009. As I’ve mentioned previously, there are a lot of pitfalls for “best of†… [Read more…]
Overlooked in the Aughts is an ongoing feature focusing on some of the best albums from the 2000s that haven’t quite received the attention they deserved. Today’s post: Beauty Pill’s The Unsustainable Lifestyle. Dischord in the Aughts was something many of the label’s ardent fans never saw coming. The beloved DIY label seemed to be going through … [Read more…]
When little kids get their first haircut, there’s usually crying involved. When Pete Wentz gets his hair cut (or shaven?), the crying apparently stops: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FM6-BE5XZIQ] Take to the messageboards, Facebook feeds, and Twitter tweets, you FOB fanatics out there! Wentz has proven to be something of an intelligent individual in music: his lyrics have the … [Read more…]
Saw the above t-shirt at Warped on Tuesday. It may just be a shirt, but nowadays fashion is oft as important – if not the important – as the music that a band chooses to define itself. In My So Called Punk, Matt Diehl notes the clashes between “emo” kids and traditional “punk” kids at Warped … [Read more…]