We All Want Someone To Shout For

Last night was one of my rare appearances in Brooklyn. I don’t usually venture down there, as I normally find everything that I need in Manhattan. Occasionally a good show suffices in Brooklyn, and I will decide to make the trek. The Morning Benders are one of my favorite young bands (like you needed me to spell out the obvious). I made the drive from Binghamton to come home this weekend just to make sure I caught this special show. The Benders were a last minute addition for the Surfer Blood headliner show that also included Beach Fossils , Turbo Fruits, and Grooms. I went with a few of my friends and had a great time overall. We had trouble finding the place at first because there is no big sign or anything leading one to believe that this run down white building is actually a music venue. The place was pretty old and a little grimy, but it was a decent place for a indie rock gig.

The hipsters were in full force and the PBR’s were being crushed at a pretty rapid rate. The Benders were first up and had some trouble getting started because of annoying feedback problems that the market hotel audio team couldn’t get straight for 15 minutes. Finally things got started and the band kicked into a short, but sweet set. They played a few cuts from Big Echo including the first free song that they gave away, Promises. They also played an excellent cover of a Neil Young song called “Bad Fog Of Loneliness” I posted the video at the end of this paragraph. It was wonderful to hear some of the fresh cuts of Big Echo live, but I was a little bummed that the venue gave the benders so little time. They were the best band there in my opinion, and got little time. I was disappointed like many fans that the band didn’t play “Excuses” but there was reason behind that.

I talked to Chris Chu, the guitarist and lead singer of the band for a bit and he was very approachable and genuine. He apologized for not playing “Excuses” and told me that they would have to play it for me another time, probably when they play Mercury Lounge. Unfortunately I had to tell him I’m still a baby at 19 years old, and can’t go to that show. (How strict are the Mercury Lunge with that rule? I also chatted with bassist Tim Or for a bit about seeing them open for the kooks in 2008, and how that seemed like so forever ago for them. They were both super cool guys, and it made my night just to get a chance to talk to them! Chris was baller enough to let me grab a photo with him, even after the first try was unsuccessful! Thanks again Chris!

I didn’t catch much of Grooms set because that was when I was conversing with the benders. They seemed alright from what I heard. Beach Fossils were a very fun band to watch live, putting tons of energy and delighting the crowd with delicious reverb heavy songs. The band hails from Brooklyn so all the locals were out showing Beach Fossils their support. I really enjoyed their set overall. Turbo Fruits were up next and they got the crowd pretty crazy with their heavy garage rock. They were stave diving, taking off their shirts, bringing crowd members on stage and playing a badass cover of CCR’s Bad Moon Rising. They impressed me a lot, and I had a good time jamming out with the former BYOP boys. The CCR cover is posted below:

Last but not least, Surfer Blood was out and the crowd went nuts. I really like Surfer Blood, and think that Astrocoast is a damn fine album. I wasn’t sure how well the song’s would translate live, so if I am being honest, I didn’t expect too much from Surfer Blood live. The band swept all of my doubts about their live abilities under the rug. They came out and had the crowd eating out of their hand. They were calm, collected, and having fun. Not too surprisingly songs like “Take It Easy”, “Floating Vibes”, and “Swim” got the biggest crowd reaction, and they sounded great. I knew that Surfer Blood were a pretty young group of guys, but they really looked young on stage. They played a great live set that made me an even bigger fan of the band. That is a job well done by any concert goer standards. Here is a video of Take It Easy that I recorded:

Oh, did I mention this show was only 10 bucks total? After the show I found $10 on the subway floor, so I walked away with free music, a photo with Chris Chu, and a good time with my friends. I had a very good night. Now for the getting back home part, that is another story for another day.

Gonna do a separate post with photos soon!

If you missed The Soft Packs excellent debut album, you better listen now because it’s a great album. It is a really fun and exciting record that shouldn’t be missed. The band’s bassist David Lantzman took some time out of his busy schedule to do an interview with me. A big thank you goes out to him and FTW! for setting this bad boy up. Read how it went down below:

Will: I know this question is probably overkill for you but tell me about your decision to change your name from The Muslims to The Soft Pack. What was the moment where you decided that you couldn’t go on as The Muslims anymore?

David: The Muslims name didn’t turn into a nuisance until we started getting more press on blogs and whatnot. We wanted to change the name for months before we actually did because it became apparent that people were interpreting the name in ignorant and even racist ways that we didn’t want to be associated with. Also, we were never trying to make some political statement or anything, contrary to some notions. It was disappointing that it offended some. We just thought it was a catchy name and not a bad word or offensive. With all that negative baggage we decided to move on from it.

W: Tell me about the history of the band. How exactly did you guys meet, and become the 4 guys known as “The Muslims/The Soft Pack?

D: Matty and Matt started the band after college around the late fall of 2006 and wrote and recorded the first Muslims ep. They played they’re first show in January 07′, which I attended. It was really great, honest rock and I remember feeling very proud and fired up. For the rest of that year the band struggled with a rotating cast of drummers and bassists filling in for shows and not fully committing. I joined in November of 07′ after finishing school myself and Brian joined shortly after that before the first west coast tour in January of 2008. Matt and I have been close friends since age 12 and I knew Matty in high school as did Matt. We were friends with Brian through the San Diego music scene.

W: What was the recording process like for your first album? How exactly do your songs usually come together?

D: The first record Matt and Matty wrote and recorded in a friends garage. This current record that just came out was written musically by the four of us as a collaboration. Matt wrote all the lyrics. Usually songs come from jamming or someone having an idea and we all build it from there. We try to keep an open mind and switch instruments at times as well for writing. We try to keep it open, raw and honest.

W: If you had to describe your music to a new fan, how would you do so?

D: This record is energetic, aggressive, honest and kinda like post-punk meeting alternative rock.

W: I saw that you guys played 10 shows in one day! What was that like? Where the hell did you get all the energy from?

D: The ten show day was an amazing experience as well as pretty tiring. We were all zombies by the last show but we pulled it off thanks to the supreme organizational prowess of Sean Carlson and the FYF crew, who promoted the event. It was a proper tour of the greater Los Angeles area, traveling in a vegetable powered school bus. I think pizza, coffee and paced beer drinking gave us the big strength! That and we like to play.

W: How has the 2010 tour been treating you? What has been the best part of this tour, or any before it?

D: So far this tour has been great. Right now we’re in Glasgow which is a treat. Last time we played here people were chanting and shit. Even though there was only about 20 people it felt like arena rock. Scotland is a big highlight for us. It’s just no bullshit up here.

W: What bands would you say influenced you?

D: R.E.M, Pavement, The Fall, The Replacements, and James Brown are some influences.

W: I’m dying to know your opinion on bloggers and posting mp3′s. Do you think it helps a band, or do you think it’s hurting bands?

D: I think the internet has helped new bands get noticed much faster than days before internet and downloading. For that I think blogs’ postings of mp3s are great. I can’t really knock downloading and I don’t think it will go away anytime soon. I think it actually helped us a lot in the beginning and even today. Hopefully, people can get a good taste of the album and like it enough to go out and buy it.

W: What would you guys be doing if you weren’t in a band?

D: I don’t really know, probably work in stocks and bonds or something.

W: What have you guys been listening to in 2010?

D: Lots of jam. At the moment Warren Zevon is playing. We’ve also been enjoying Funkadelic, Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti, Steely Dan, REM, Felt, The Beaters, Nodzzz, Abe Vigoda, Dunes, Pearl Harbor, Darker My Love, Tijuana Panthers, Grey Goods and Graham Forest to name a handful.

W: Whats your “Almost Famous” moment. If you’ve never seen the movie (watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Qn3tel9FWU ), What is that one “defining” moment that you will always remember during your time as The Soft Pack/The Muslims?

D:  We just played on David Letterman’s Late Show, that was pretty psycho.

W: Favorite Beer?

D: Modelo Especial

W: A hot new band that I should post about that no one knows?

14. The Beaters from San Diego. Mind melting rock. Check this video out

Once again, I’d like to thank David for taking the time to do this for us!

Watch Natasha Khan deliver a very powerful and worthy cover of Radiohead’s “All I Need” during her show at De la Warr Pavillion Bexhill. She gave a great effort and delivered a very good cover. Posted below:

It’s 8:28 here in New York. I am at home eating breakfeast & playing some NBA Live 2K10 with my little brother. We are rebuilding the Knicks franchise. We got Boozer and Vince Carter. I dig it. Donnie Walsh would be proud.

Born Ruffians are a band I first saw not too long ago opening for Vampire Weekend at the free Central Park Summerstage show. I have been a fan of theirs ever since. They are back with a sophomore album titled Say It. The band are back with a new song that called “Sole Brother”

It still sounds very much like the band that we heard on Red, Yellow & Blue, but here they sound a tad bit more precise. They still have that jangly sound, it just sounds more….controlled. It was a bit more reserved that I expected but the songs good. What a welcoming guitar line. Delish! I’m hoping that Say It rocks just as hard as Red, Yellow & Blue did. ‘Cause it rocked hard.

Listen to “Sole Brother” plus a few of my favorite cuts from their debut album, all below:

[mp3] : Born Ruffians – Sole Brother
[mp3] : Born Ruffians – Barnacle Goose
[mp3] : Born Ruffians – I Need A Life

Does anyone still buy music anymore? I feel like no one does. Well plenty of people are still buying music from iTunes as it crossed the mark for 10 Billion downloads, the company decided to give away a $10,000 gift certificate to the user who downloaded the 10 billionth song. The winner turned out to be Louie Sulcer, a 71 year old grandfather who purchased Johnny Cash’s 1958 song, “Guess Things Happen That Way”. Steve Jobs himself called Louie to congratulate him! This is a really nice story.

Watch the clip below:

Been a bad Arctic Monkey fan, forgot to post the wonderful artwork for their My Propeller single. You can preorder it now from the band right here. I got mine, did you get yours?

We all know my love for Local Natives, that ain’t a secret. No need to venture into that territory. The rest of the world is also falling in love with the boys. There music has spread all over the world to countries like France where the wonderful La Blogotheque video’s take place.

These video’s are just unbelieveable. They are experts at capturing great moments such as the band playing ‘Wide Eyes” on a merry-go round. Or recording the band playing “Airplanes” as the sun sets. Then last but not least they grab them delivering the harmony filled “Stranger Things” while in a small club.

Local Native makes organic songs that connect to the listener with ease. They are a perfect band for la blogotheque and I hope we get some more of these videos from Local Natives in the future.

Watch it below:

Thats right. Two contests in one day. Once again thanks to the people at Transmission we got three signed copies of Band Of Skulls awesome debut album Baby Darling Doll Face Honey. I have 3 copies to give away of this album as well, and they are all personally hand signed. This is a great album, I just gave it my first listen. It is full of soulful guitar rock that would make Jack White proud.

All you gotta do to win a copy of the album is email me at weallwantsomeone@gmail.com with the subject of Band Of Skulls CD Contest. In the email tell me the best band that you discovered via a blog. It could be through my blog, or someone else’s. Don’t matter to me. Just tell me the band, and a little story. I will hand select three winners for the prize! So the cooler the story, the better chance that you have of snagging one of the albums. Good luck!

If you need some convincing, here is the music video for Band Of Skulls excellent single “Death By Diamonds and Pearls”.

So what are you waiting for? Enter the contest right now. NOW.

Thanks to the people at Transmission, we are able to bring this great contest to you guys. This should be only the first of many cool giveaway’s!They gave me three copies of One EskimO‘s debut album All Baloons to give away for free. The best part is that all are hand signed from the band! I took that photo above with photobooth to show you what it looks like. Please ignore how it is backwards. This is a pretty sweet deal isn’t it?

Here is the music video for their current single “Kandi” to help give you an idea about what they sound like:

So you want a copy? Good, because we have 3 signed copies of the album to give away. All you gotta do is email me at weallwantsomeone@gmail.com with the Subject as One EskimO CD Giveaway. How can you win? Tell me your favorite song of 2010 so far. I’ll randomly choose 3 winners by next Friday, March 5th. Good luck!

The new Drive-By Trucks drove by via early promo on some strangers computer and that stranger decided to supply the world with an early listen of their new album, The Big To-Do.

Yeah thats right, I am a fan of Drive By Truckers. People are often surprised that I have a soft spot for good southern rock bands that have alternative-country roots. Ok, maybe that isn’t entirely true, but I do love the alt-country sound of the Drive-By Truckers. I used to have a lot of their albums on my old desktop, but I lost them when I transferred my music over to my laptop. A lot has happened since then with the band rotation, and now only two original members are there. However, the band still sounds the same for the most part, and is still rocking it.

I gave their new album a quick run through, and am enjoying it. The band sounds really tight on the record. One of the songs that really stood out from the rest is “The Wig He Made Her Wear”. It was vastly different from anything else on the album. While the album is guitar heavy southern rock, “The Wig” sounded like the band was recently inspired by Modest Mouse. Hell even the beginning laugh is reminiscent of Issac Brock! The song has a Moon & Antarctica like rhythm going on. Hell Patterson Hood sounds like he is practically channeling Brock’s vocals here. This song sounds really out there, and to me it is one of the most exciting things that I have ever heard from Drive-By Truckers. Something about it just stands out to the ear. Passionate rock and roll always will at the end of the day, won’t it?

Listen below, leave a comment below with your thoughts on it!

They gave away “This Fucking Job”, another song from the album for free a while back. I included that as well:

[mp3] : Drive-By Truckers – The Wig He Made Her Wear

[mp3] : Drive-By Truckers – This Fucking Job

If you like it enough, pre-order the album from insound on Vinyl or CD.