V-Day Is Almost Here! Kill The Anxiety With Madam West.

It's been awhile since the last legit interview we've done. HELL, it's been a bit since we've posted anything at all. There's some new tunes on the horizon which we'll check on next week, Steve's B'day is this Saturday at Legion, AND we will be booking every Friday (almost) at Matchless, starting in spring. For now though, we're going to focus on the (drum roll) Second Annual Hearts Bleed Radio Valentine's Day Show! (trumpets blare). Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Sophie Chernin of the wonderful Madam West!


Hearts Bleed Radio: For starters, give me a little history of Madam West.

Sophie: Well, Todd and I met in early 2011. We found out quickly that we had the same musical tastes - we both had named our dogs Elliott Smith, for example - and so we started covering our favorite indie tunes every week in his basement room in Bushwick. We started out as a duo, writing solely electronically (on Logic), but once we decided we wanted a live sound, it was natural that we recruited Todd's long-term friend Mike from AZ (where they went to school). So he was on drums, and I recruited Christine and Will, who both played with me in our college folk band, Feste. Now the band has a few different combinations - as a duo, I play drum machine and Todd plays synths, and as the onstage group changes we shift a few of the instruments around. And that brings us to today!

HBR: Do you have a favorite lineup? When you're all together?

Sophie: I change my mind all the time! If you had asked me last summer, when Todd and I had played as a duo in montreal, I would have said the full band. I got really horrible stage fright and a case of sticky fingers with the drum sequencer. I almost cried onstage. I just wanted Mike there, drumming and pumping us up! But now that I'm more comfortable with the electronics, I don't really have a preference. It's nice to have the flexibility to say yes to a show on the spot, without making sure everyone's available that date.

HBR: Is that the most embarrassed you've ever been onstage?

Sophie: Probably. Montreal, to me, is like the holy mecca of indie bands. All of my favorite bands were from there growing up. It was insane that we got to play there, so I really built it up in my head before I got onstage. I think I was most embarrassed afterwards, when I was crying so hard I forgot to man the door (all of the bands were switching off door duty).

HBR: But you survived? The show went on?

Sophie: Of course! And then when I listened back to the recording, most of my mistakes were barely noticeable, of course.

HBR: Yeah, that's how it goes

Sophie: But in my head, it was total chaos.

Sophie ponders the cultural significance of V-day

HBR: Where does the name "Madam West" come from?

Sophie: Todd and I have a bad portmanteau habit. We love wordplay. It's probably infuriating to be around us most of the time. So Madam West is Mae West+Adam West... I forgot that "Madam" means "chick who runs a house of prostitutes," but oh well.

HBR: Haha, I was wondering if it was a play on Adam West.

Sophie: Yep! Most people think we spell it "Madame," which would be great if I didn't have to worry about them ever finding us on the internet.

Heavy Birds to kickoff HBR CMJ Madness! (interview + video)

Happy weekend, dear readers. We're lucky to have Heavy Birds, kicking off Hearts Bleed Radio CMJ Showcase #1 at Legion Bar on 10/17/13. Heavy Birds are a slow, spacey, pretty-but-ragged, rock band from Brooklyn (by way of Boston). I had a brief chat with vocalist/guitarist Ryan Drag (with multi-instrumentalist Lia Mooney somewhere off in the ether, yet nearby). Here's the transcript:


Hearts Bleed Radio: So for starters, give me a brief history of the band.

Ryan: Lia and I met in Boston and I asked her to be in my not so punk band, and she refused. I then moved in with her, and we decided to find our "own sound" together. We both love playing, so it was a natural progression. Plus, we both are into the same style of music. New York City also changed our ears, and we feel that Heavy Birds, as it is now, is finally what we originally wanted.

HBR: What are you guys into? Without name dropping, how would you describe you influences and the resulting sound?

Ryan: Rawness, minimalism, drones. We are listening to Spacemen 3, the Stooges, Velvets, Miles Davis- on the corner. We call ourselves space punk. Our drummer is into Tony Conrad & Faust.

HBR: Ryan's parts seem to be more song-form, while Lia's are textural. How important is the texture of your sound, compared to more traditional aspects of music, like melody/harmony/etc?

Ryan: Both aspects are equally as important. There is a lot of melody happening within Lias playing, and I lay a movement to form a base (sometimes) for my words. We prefer speaking vocals with what we do. The layers make us different, we think the "traditional" song-form is not for us at the moment. Plus, we started as a two piece and had to thicken the sound...

The Brooklyn What: Genre Hopping Goodness.

Greetings Internetz! The CMJ Music Marathon is only a few weeks away, and we're happy to be bringing you two showcases this year! Our second showcase of the festival at Matchless on Saturday 10/19 features The Brooklyn What, a hard drinking, hard rocking, high energy crowd pleasing, just downright fun band. I had the privilege to sit down with Jamie Frey, the group's lead singer. Here's the transcript:


Hearts Bleed Radio: For starters, can you give me a little background on The Brooklyn What, who were the founding members? How did you meet?

Jamie: The Brooklyn What was founded by myself, Evan O'Donnell, John-Severin Napolillo, Billy Cohen, Douglas Carey and our friend Z-Pac who was briefly our drummer. Pac was my friend from Junior High School, but the rest of the band met at Edward R. Murrow High School, where the lot of us played music together. I played with a few of the guys in my first band, The Jesus Fish Evolution, who were kind of a whacked out version of 90's alternative rock band, but we all were jamming and collaborating by the end of high school. John, Evan and Billy all went away to school, whereas I stayed in Brooklyn, and was writing songs for what I thought was would be a solo record, but when I got a group together to play the tunes over a break from school, simply for want of playing a gig again, we decided to become a band. By our second gig (outside of my parent's basement), Jesse Katz had joined, a schoolmate of Billy's, and we haven't had another drummer since.

HBR: What's it like growing up in Brooklyn, and seeing all these kids move here to play music and be in bands?

Jamie: It has definitely been a confusing experience, and I've had all kinds of feelings about it. Upon starting The Brooklyn What, we played our first gig as the only band on the bill... we did not know any other bands. Our early material, specifically, has a great deal of reaction and bile towards gentrification, and gentrifiers. The initial Williamsburg scene was something we felt entirely left out of, the first song on our first record is "I Don't Wanna Go To Williamsburg." Since then, we've discovered many like minded bands, musicians and audience members, some native of Brooklyn and some not. However, even today, I can't entirely shake that weirdness, of being unusual in my home borough for growing up here. It's still weird to hear the attachment of "Brooklyn band" to people I know are profoundly not from here. I still feel like there's this other scene, in the rest of Brooklyn, someday waiting to burst, from spots most people have not even seen, because they're "too far out."

Roof band fears no one!

HBR: There must be some satisfaction in the fact that people see Brooklyn as like, something other than a dingy little offshoot of Manhattan, right? Despite how annoying the "Brooklyn-Chic" crowd can be, at least people are acknowledging this place.

12 things tiny unsigned NYC indie bands hate

Hey everyone, my band, The Planes, is playing at Matchless tonight, and I'm spending the afternoon doing laundry, fetching guitars, and nervously thinking of all the things that can go wrong (I know I'm gonna break a string tonight). Anyhow, since I'm sitting here waiting for my laundry to dry, I thought I'd make a quick list for you all to read, and hopefully argue about.

We rocked Ft. Useless into a painting dreamscape/nightmarescape.

12 things tiny unsigned Brooklyn bands hate (in no particular order):

#1. Carrying heavy shit. It's literally 30% of being in a band.

#2. Transporting the above mentioned heavy shit on public transportation. That rickety hand truck with a 40 lb. amp, pedal board, and kick pedal strapped on isn't going to carry itself up to the J train. "I coulda swore this station had an elevator..." Nope, it doesn't.

#3. Getting ditched by everyone while you bring your stuff back to the practice space. "We'll be back in 45 mins, and meet you at the bar/diner/party..." Nope, no one is gonna be there, especially those three cute girls/guys who, "Really dug your set."

#4. Getting paid next to nothing. "Hey good crowd, the bar did really well! Here's a free beer and $80 from the door for the five of you to split." I know the small clubs aren't racking in the dough, BUT, an extra beer, maybe some food if the joint has it... It goes a long way. Also, bands should get paid a percentage of the bar. Wouldn't we all rather have 50 people show up, stay all night and drink all night, then have each band bring 20 people who show up for their friends, have one beer, and go somewhere else?

#5. Big rooms that book small bands. "Yeah, we need you to bring 100... on a weeknight... in February." I ACTUALLY HAD A PLACE SAY THIS TO ME. Like the motherf'ing Planes could bring 100 out on a Saturday during warm weather... even if there was nothing else in NYC going on that night, even if there was free hand jobs and whiskey. If you have a room that holds 200 and you want it full 7 days a week, you need to hire a booker, and you need to be guaranteeing some money to the headliner. Don't book tiny local bands and expect them to work miracles, then get all pissy that the place was only half full.

Shooting the shit with Sunset Guns

  Greetings dear readers! Sunset Guns are an incredibly fun Brooklyn based four piece, and we're proud to have them playing for us at Fort Useless on July 13th. I sat down with Jon Mann (guitar/vox) and Derek Hawkins (also guitar/vox), and chatted about the usual band nonsense. Derek starts this one out with a brief history of the band. Here's the transcript:

Derek: I guess the whole thing technically started a couple winters ago. Jon and Chuck had their own bands but they'd linked up and started writing some songs together. I was somewhat new to the city and Jon, who I knew through some mutual friends, brought me into a practice with them and George Garcia, who was on drums. We had a good session, banged out a big stupid rock n roll song, and it was just a matter of time before we started playing shows. The idea at first was to write big, scrappy, simple rock n' roll, but after about a year of that we parted ways with George, found Sam on Craigslist and started working on new, tighter, slightly more serious material.

Jon: Sounds about right. Sam was a huge Craigslist find. I do like to think we still have the big and scrappy elements, but yeah, we've tightened things up.

Hearts Bleed Radio: You guys have really good guitar interplay, (and vocal interplay too), how do your songs come together?

Jon: That's nice to hear, man, thanks. Early on, it was more common for us to come in with relatively complete songs and sort of throw them around, but increasingly - and I think this leads to some of that back-and-forth interplay - we're coming into practice with ideas or pieces of songs with the desire to get everyone's input in order to complete them.

HBR: Do you feel like one of you has the job of the lead guitarist? It seems pretty split.

Jon: It's pretty split. The other thing that leads to that interplay is that Derek and I are both riffy as hell.

HBR: And vocally, the same applies?

Derek: It's pretty even overall, but I think Jon's got a tad more noodle in him and I lean a little more on the vocal duties. I like driving the guitar a lot but I get a lot of energy by pushing my voice, stretching into my upper range, doing back to back songs that get me a little raspy.

HBR: The old tag team!

Jon: Yeah, I've never really thought of it, but we've never had a moment of 'No, I think I should sing this one,' or anything like that. It's always just fallen in place. 'I've got some lyrics for this.' "Do it."

Derek (left) and Jon (right) get down to business

HBR: Do you write lyrics together? Or at least talk about the meaning of the song? Y'know, to make sure it makes sense? DOES IT MAKE SENSE?

Jon: Yeah sure, sometimes. 'Haymaker,' for instance, was about a 50/50 collaboration. 'Thunderclap' and '25th Hour' were also situations where I had incomplete lyrics and asked Derek to give me a chorus or a bridge or whatever.

Practice makes OK: The Planes, HBR, and Beatalic Cats.

Greetings dear readers! For this interview, we're talking to Stephen Perry from The Planes. "Wait!" you might say, "isn't that your band?" Well, it is... I tried interviewing myself, but it was coming off more like a cross between Mao's little red book and the Unabomber manifesto, so I decided it would be best to get a hand from Marisha, formerly of the band Corita. I must apologize for the goddamn novels I wrote for some of the answers, but I've been tapping into the writing part of my brain lately, and it's a well that is not easily capped. Marisha was a good sport though, here's the transcript:

Hearts Bleed Radio (Marisha): So, you have a fantastic showcase coming up on Friday. Tell me about the Northside Festival showcase for HBR.

Stephen: Well, it's mostly a bunch of friends bands that I wanted to get together on the same bill. Mostly catchy indie bands, all of whom are excellent performers. The Planes played a super fun showcase with Crazy Pills last year, so I wanted to get them again. Quiet Loudly is a blast to see live, really dynamically good set, poppy, but you can also get a chance to zone out with them. Mount Sharp has a kinda songwriter plus loud dissonant guitar thing, that a sonic youth like myself really digs. pow wow! might be one of the best bands in the city when they really nail it, like, any fan of rock would like them. And lastly, we were fortunate to get Queens natives, The Beets, to round out the bill. They haven't been playing to much recently, and they are kinda getting back into things, so we're super excited.

HBR: Crazy Pills are amazing! It's a really strong line up you've got on a Friday night. You guys are creating a supportive community of bands that tend to curate a lot of interesting shows in Brooklyn on a pretty regular basis. What are some of your favorite venues to play?

Stephen: Venue wise, there are three who have been very friendly to HBR and The Planes... For starters, Matchless, where we're throwing the show. Nice, tight, small room, bar in the band room (key), good food, outdoor area, good location. Cake Shop, has been very kind also, probably the last spot in Manhattan that small bands love to play (not to diss Bowery Electric, but I've never played there). And lastly Grand Vic, where we're doing a showcase on 8/1. Jeremy is a super nice guy and I recommend everyone stops by on a slow night and has a beer with him. Also, we haven't played Fort Useless yet, but we will on 7/13, and we're pumped, 'cause we've been going to shows there forever and what they do is so true to the DIY spirit and the community spirit of indie.

HBR: Fort Useless, Matchless and Grand Victory are great places for live music in an intimate space. I am a major fan of Cake Shop for all of Andy Bodes's ideals, high standards and good taste, all around a great place.

Stephen: I'd take a full room over a big room any day, haha. Legion has been good to us too, and they are super tiny.

I lost those aviators after this shoot. If anyone finds a pair on Meserole Street, hit me up.

holy cow! pow wow!

Hey you awesome people out there, reading this, probably getting stoked for Northside next weekend... We'd love to see you at our showcase, AND we know you'd love to see pow wow!, one of the most fun live shows this side of anywhere. pow wow! is a local five-piece, consisting of Eddie (guitar/vox), Jeff (keys/vox), John-Paul (bass/vox), Amanda (guitar/vox, from Crazy Pills), and Sal (drums, from Quiet Loudly). Between you and me, they are the band I'm looking most forward to seeing. I sat down via Gchat with Eddie the other day. Here's what he had to say:


Hearts Bleed Radio: So how did pow wow! get started?

Eddie: pow wow! got started way back in the fall of 2005 between myself and long time friends from high school Blake Zarsky & Chris Connell. We had been jamming together as several bedroom type bands post high-school and pow wow! was the first project where we actually focused and aimed to released material and play shows. The problem was, we needed a full band to really be able to play out, as our formula of two guitars and a drummer, wasn't exactly working out for our live set. After a few jams, Jeff was invited to join the band to play keys in 2006 when he turned 17, along with our first bass player, Corey Mcnaught who I had met during my short stay at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. I forgot to add it was formed in New Jersey (IMPORTANT!)

HBR: Totally important. How do you feel about Maxwell's closing?

Eddie: Maxwell's closing is truly a bummer, especially for us Jersey blooded folks. Before really hanging out in New York, the early 2000's was spent in Hoboken. We saw a bunch of shows at Maxwell's and were lucky enough to even play one back in 2009. They were such a hospitable establishment. I can't think of another venue that fed us an entire meal on the house before we played! Maxwell's has and always will hold a soft spot in my heart. Between the cigarettes we smoked in that front lounge, to all the times I stood in front of their jukebox trying to decide which Replacements song my friends would most enjoy a drunken sing-a-long to... their closing is truly quite a loss for Jersey and the Northeast in general. It will be missed immensely.

HBR: It's silly how we live in NYC, and we know NOT to be sentimental, because things change so constantly... but there are always changes that come as shocks.

Yup, this is exactly what they look like.

Eddie: It's true, but it's unavoidable. New Yorkers are just as sentimental as anyone else, especially when it comes to any long standing local haunts...

HBR: Let's talk about "Don't Stop to Look". It's a really strong recording, polished enough, and catchy enough songs, to be accessible to the average fan, but it retains some lo-fi grit that gives it a mountain of character. What was the recording process like?

Sharkmuffin's big splash... Mermaid Sex Slave

Some music critics (who get paid a lot more than me), say that rock music is dead, or dying... But that's bullshit. If you're reading Hearts Bleed Radio, you probably know that's bullshit. However, if you still need proof that indie rock still rocks (and hasn't totally become yupster adult contemporary), just listen to Sharkmuffin. They are the antidote to the Bon Iver-ization of indie...

I don't look nearly as good in a black dress and heels...

"Mermaid Sex Slave" is the single off their new EP, She-Gods of Champagne Valley, and it's the kinda punch-you-in-the-face-and-don't-say-sorry rocker that we LOVE here at HBR. The song starts off with a watery two note lick that drifts into the verse, and sets the tone for the poseidosexual barrage of Tarra Thiessen's vocals. The full force of the guitar comes in with the chorus and pulls the song from a wet spacey undersea lair, into the tightness of a small rock club. This is where the song really shines, Thiessen riffs perfectly over the tightness of Natalie Kirch's bass, and the sharp, syncopated beat of drummer Sarah Peterson.  It's a great track, check it out below.





You can hear the rest of She-Gods of Champagne Valley ---> here.

Like Sharkmuffin on Facebook ---> here.

We're happy to announce Sharkmuffin will be playing HBR Showcase #5, at Fort Useless on 7/13! To stay in the loop, Like HBR on Facebook ---> here.

We'll be interviewing Sharkmuffin before that show, so if any of you have any questions for them, email me, or leave them in the "comments" section below.

Check out our Northside Showcase ---> here.

Thanks for reading. I'll catch you at a show.

Breaking Oceanographic News

Oceanographer, home from the expedition... happy.

Our sources confirm (what? you didn't think I had sources?) that Mark Kelley of The Roots is joining the Brooklyn indie band Oceanographer. I'll have to track down Mark at some point and grill him on his decision, but in the meantime we can watch this super 8 music video and imagine a driving, thumping bass-line underneath.

                              

OH, and also, Oceanographer is making their first television appearance, this Friday, at 9pm on the Artie Lange Show (Directv ch. 239), and playing Mercury Lounge on Monday the 10th!

Like Oceanographer on Facebook ---> here.

Like Hearts Bleed Radio on Facebook ---> here.

AND, don't forget to check out the HBR Northside Showcase ---> here.

Quiet Loudly Rocks It Proudly

Quiet Loudly is one of the most sonically deep indie acts in NYC right now. They have an ability to work up an aural tsunami, and then corral it into a tightly written pop song. To hear what I mean, check out "Go Into The Light Smiling" on Bandcamp.  We are extremely lucky to have them performing at the Hearts Bleed Radio Northside Showcase. I sat down lead singer/guitarist Max Goransson, and picked his mind about the band, the album, and the future. Enjoy!

Hearts Bleed Radio: You recorded "Go Into The Light Smiling" with Tony, Sal, and John. But you're going to have a fill in at the 6/14 show. I assume for John?

Max: Yes. Well, John's still going to be away on tour with his other band Naam (who are great). BUT, that's not the only change to our lineup. We will be playing our first show as a five-piece for your showcase. We've made a pretty big change-- Tony has moved over to guitar for all our songs and we've brought in Jonathan Pilkington Kahnt to play bass for us permanently. And he is amazing. And as far as keyboard goes, our good friend Kurt Schneider is going to be filling in for John. And from now on, whenever John is in town and can play with us, he will continue to do so. But, whenever there's a show we want to play and he is on the road, we're going to try to have someone filling in whenever possible. We've been rearranging all our songs to accommodate the change. So, if we ever have to play without keys, we can, and we can still have a nice, full sound. It just might be a little more guitar-centric.

HBR: Looking back on that album, I guess almost a year after it came out... AND going through those changes, like, how has your perception of the album changed? Do you like certain songs better than you used to? Some less?

Max: Well, to be honest, I have a really hard time listening to my own work. I go through phases throughout the process of making an album, as I'm sure most musicians do. There's that first phase when you've just laid down all the tracks and you are super, super pumped and you're convinced it's the best thing you've ever done. Then, you reach a boiling point during mixing the album where you've heard every single detail under a sonic magnifying glass and anything that's not perfect is totally jarring and infuriating. Then, once the album is done being mixed, there's usually a lull when you can take a break from it and you get it mastered. Then, once it's mastered it feels like gold again and you're obsessed with it for a week. And then you go back to nit-picking and finding it intolerable and you need distance. That's how it is for me, anyway. So, I haven't actually listened to the album for a long, long time. But, if I wait for another year before I do, I'll probably love it again. There were definitely a couple songs that weren't my favorites before recording, that became favorites AFTER recording, like Your Wedding/My Funeral.
    

If you don't wear glasses, you have wear a hat. If you don't wear a jacket, you have to wear suspenders.

Coming for me? MEEEEEEE??

What Model Citizens is a local electro-synth-y indie noise pop band. Did that make sense? 'Cause that's what they are... A convergence of several distinct styles. The brainchild of songwriter Alex Musto, WMC has released a new video for the single "Coming For Me".  Effortlessly weird, almost gracefully strange, the video feels like an alternate remake of "Sunglasses at Night" (which I consider to be an awesome video BTW), co-starring The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo.  Keep your eyes peeled for some of my favorite Myrtle J area haunts, Bar Bizarre and Silent Barn.  Enjoy!


Coming For Me by What Model Citizens from Nerd Rage Film on Vimeo.

Check out What Model Citizens on Facebook  --->  Here

Like Hearts Bleed Radio --->  Here

And RSVP for the Hearts Bleed Radio Northside Showcase --->  Here

Catch you down the trail!

Meet Mount Sharp! Mainers on a mission... to Mars... with tacos.

It's a rainy Friday afternoon here in NYC, but lucky for me, I got to spend a chunk of it chatting away with Sarah Wood (Swood) and Bryan Bruchman.  Bryan (guitar/drums) and Swood (guitar/vox), along with Maia Macdonald (guitar/drums) and Ryan Zumsen (bass), make up the Brooklyn indie rock band, Mount Sharp.  We are super happy to have them kicking off our official Northside showcase on 6/14!  Here's a little primer on the band, and their love of tacos... 

Hearts Bleed Radio: So you guys met in Maine, and then ended up in a band together in Brooklyn. How did that happen?

Bryan: We were both living in Portland, Maine, where I was playing in a band (Marie Stella), working at a venue (SPACE Gallery), and running a music blog (HillyTown.com). Sarah had a band called Mango Floss that a few friends with good taste in music saw and started raving about, so I checked them out and loved what I heard. I booked Mango Floss to play a couple shows I was putting on in Maine, so that's where Sarah and I met. Then, we bonded over a long, drawn-out Foursquare battle for the mayorship of a Korean taco restaurant.

Swood: It's how all great friendships begin, really... Tacos.

Bryan: And beer!

HBR: So, how long ago was that? Did you guys come to the city together? Was there kidnapping or bribery involved?

Bryan: Hah!  When was that, Swood?

Swood: That is such a good question. About two years.

Bryan: 2011 was when we met.

Swood: Yeah, and then Bryan moved.

Bryan: I booked Mango Floss to play my Belfast Free Range Festival after-party as well as Hot August Night, On A Boat, AKA Party Barge that year. Then I moved back Brooklyn in 2012. A short while after that I had a breakup and found myself in need of a roommate.

HBR: I wish more places offered Free Range Musicians...

Bryan: Hah!

HBR: And Swood swooped in...

Bryan: Yup. I was up in Maine to work on some videos - and I think for Free Range Festival again - when Sarah and I had tacos at a less-than-awesome place which will remain unnamed, and offered to move to NY, be my roommate, and start a band!

Swood: I decided I needed to get out of Maine, and that coincided with Bryan needing a roommate. Meant to be.

Assuming they are facing Northeast, what time is it?

Old Monk's "Seymour: Video

Here's a picture of Old Monk.  I drew myself in as a pirate.  I'm on the right.

Ok, Ok, so the guitar solo at the end of this is like, epic, Slash standing in front of a church style awesomeness...  but it's also 8-bit and incredibly nerdy.  Anyway, Old Monk rocked out at HBR #3 last weekend, and I just wanted to pass on the new video to "Seymour", which premiered yesterday on Brooklyn Vegan.  They threw in some pop culture references, so keep your eyes peeled for them.


Behold, the pixelated glory of the Seymour video:





Check out the interview we did with Old Monk  ---> Here.

We'll be starting up the next round of interviews soon, as we inch closer to the Hearts Bleed Radio Northside Showcase!  Click here to RSVP!

New Tunes, Old Monk... and Constant Yearning.

Hey there Internetz!  We have a special treat for you!  Meet Old Monk!  They are one of those rare bands who are interesting but still simple...  Musicianship plus melodies...  Familiar, yet fresh... Whatever... you're just gonna have to hear them...  Anyhow, we are super lucky to have them playing Hearts Bleed Radio's 3rd showcase.  I sat down with Josh and Ian via Gchat, here's the transcript:

Hearts Bleed Radio: You guys kinda started out as a long distance project.  How did that happen?

Joshua: Well, I play guitar and Ian plays drums. I met Ian during a short stint I had living in Colorado. Then I moved to New York. We wrote a couple of songs long distance and then he finally moved out here to start the band for real. We had a couple of bassists for a short period, one of which moved to Korea. Then we met Tsugumi and Old Monk happened.

HBR: What was that process like? Writing songs together that far apart, how quick was the turnaround? How much longer did it take to complete like, a 3 min song? Or was it just as quick?

Joshua: It depends really, inspiration hits you at funny times. Sometimes you have huge spurts of creativity
and then you get a bunch of stuff banged out... I'd send it over to Ian and he'd listen and come up with stuff to add.

Ian: The quality was not studio quality, for sure. The ideas were there, and when we finally met up we just had the meat and polished it. Polished meat.

HBR: Maybe, "seasoned meat"? No, I think I like "polished meat" better.

Joshua: Ha.

Ian: Me too. The trading process though, in all seriousness, was just a bunch of ideas, not songs that were album quality. So the turnaround was quick and easy.

Joshua: Ian recorded his with a rock band mic.

This photo makes perfect sense if you stare at it long enough...

HBR: Well, I'm pumped about this show, I can't wait to play with you guys. Are you striving for a certain sound, or are you just like, infected by your influences? 

Ian: Well I did have a crazy night with Pissed Jeans one night, and I think they infected me a lot. Same with Marc Bolan.

HBR: Haha

Giga Herbs: Riding the boat, Froggin'... all in a day's work.

Hello dear readers!  The third Hearts Bleed Radio Showcase is coming up on May 17th, at Matchless in Greenpoint.  Closing out the night will be Giga Herbs, a super fun indie pop band that puts for a kind of post-dada/absurdist vibe...  Or maybe they're just crazy.  You'll have to come to the show and decide for yourself.  I spoke with their collective mind.  Here's what I got:

Hearts Bleed Radio: Ok, so I'm listening to "Mad Weird", your debut album. It's a pretty big block of work, 16 tracks... How do you go about composing?

Giga Herbs: We lobotomize our egos and pack them into a spaceship. We then tear a hole in the space-time continuum and transverse through different dimensional membranes until some sort of cohesive structure is attained. Basically, we usually jam the tunes out.

HBR: Who would you say are your main influences? I hear kinda a straight up 90's indie side, but also, like a groovier Hall and Oates thing.

GH: Daniel Johnston, The Band, Unicorns, and the Wu-Tang Clan. More recently, the Black and Flaming Lips --respectively.

The band, in 16-bit mode.

HBR: I think "Froggin'" is my favorite track on the album. What's the song about?

GH: It's about comin' up and chillin' on that lily pad, y'know what I'm sayin'?

HBR: Oh, that's what I thought... but you never know if there's a hidden meaning. Hey, what is a Giga Herb anyhow?

GH: Well sometimes a predator done come along and park his car on your lawn.

HBR: And that's a Giga Herb?

GH: No, a Giga Herb is a dud.

HBR: A dud? Like, a bomb that doesn't explode?

GH: Exactly. A grand dud.

LUFF: Noise Magic Tremolo Hard On... @1:34, of course.

The second ever Hearts Bleed Radio Showcase Show Event Thing is going down at Cake Shop on 5/8/13, and we are so totally, incredibly, psyched/pumped/stoked, to have LUFF kicking off the night.  I sat down with the guitarists, Sheila Sobolewski (<-- lead vox too) and Robin Pickering via internet chat, and here is what transpired:


Hearts Bleed Radio: For starters, give me a little history of the band. How long have you guys been playing together? Has the lineup changed over the years?

Sheila: Jeez that's a tough one! I started LUFF as a project with just me and a cellist quite a while back, maybe early 2000's? It really was heading towards rock-bandness from the start though. Things didn't work out with the cellist and I started playing with a drummer and a bass player. Friends of mine. It's evolved a lot since then and lots of people have been in the project. I love the current line-up that we have right now. Aleks Gylys and Mike Hurst on drums and bass. Robin and I both play guitar. It's been this line up for a couple years now.

Robin: Yeah I joined about 5 years ago or so.

Sheila: I couldn't get Robin in the band fast enough! I was like, hey so if you ever wanna play with us, um...

Robin: Haha. I was in Triple Creme at the time, so I was a little bizzy...

Sheila: I "borrowed" you.

Luff plays Sealab in 2021.

HBR: You released the "Maybe It's Just Sleeping" EP (which I think is incredible BTW), about a year ago, but you guys haven't played a show in a couple of months. Why the hiatus?

Robin: Thanks!! We've been writing new stuff!

HBR: How many new songs do you think we'll hear on 5/8?

Robin: Probably like 4 new ones. Keyboards, too!

HBR: Who is on the keys? Robin?

Robin: Keys/piano was my first instrument actually, long time ago in jr. high band kind of stuff. I play keys on two songs, just for part of the songs. So it's a keys/guitar double duty.

Sheila: I'm really excited about adding the keyboard! A few years ago I used to use a microkorg for live shows. I sold it. Definitely regretted that sale.

Summer Saints, Spring Rock Out

Summer Saints are an absolute blast to see live, and we're super excited to have them for the first Hearts Bleed Radio show.  We're talking loud, instrument swapping, rhythmic AND melodic, all out rock party goodness.  I spoke with Mark Karges, the sometimes singer, sometimes drummer of the band...


Hearts Bleed Radio: So I saw you guys at Cakeshop in January, when you played with The Planes. I would consider you guys to be a "high energy" band (as would Jeremy from Tenrec). What's you mentality like before a show? Nerves?

Mark: I get some nerves, but if I don't, I feel I don't play as well. Plus we all have a few beers too.

HBR: That always helps. Have you ever had two many?

Mark: Sometimes, but we try to behave as much as possible before playing. We're only human, though.

HBR: It's hard to be in a bar, and like, be waiting to play, and not drink quickly. I was listening to "Road to Hoe" and I hear a lot of Dinosaur Jr. in that track. Are they an influence?

Mark: Yes, definitely.

HBR: Who are some others?

Mark: Husker Du, GBV, Swell Maps... We tend to like fast stuff with some melody. 

HBR: Indie has really drifted away from some of it's "punky-er" roots over the past decade. Does that affect what you do? Even if you're just explaining to someone what you sound like, you can't just really say, "indie" these days.

Mark: We just say rock n' roll.

HBR: Haha, love it. I do to. Say that and hope they don't ask a follow up.Something I like about you guys is the tightness of the rhythm, and the importance it plays in the songs. Do you you guys write that as a group?

Mark: All three of us contribute to the songwriting. Initially they'd start off fully-formed, with one of us bringing a song to practice, but as time has gone by I think the process has gotten more communal, especially with arrangements and stuff like that.

HBR: You just posted a track "Made The Circuit" on SoundCloud. Should we be expecting more tracks any time soon?

Mark: Yep. We've got a few from the same session that just need vocals.

HBR: How did you record them?

Mark: Very poorly, with our pal Billy's eight-track that Joe stole out of his bedroom when the two of them were living together.

HBR: Haha, sounds pretty tight though, do you do the band together live, and then overdub the vocals?

Mark: You got it. None of us are very good singers, so it makes sense to overdub instead of spoiling a perfectly good instrumental take with our caterwauling.

Cleveland's own Kid Tested!

Friday March 22nd is a debutant ball as far as Hearts Bleed Radio is concerned.  We are unveiling ourselves to the world, and while many things are still uncertain (should i use CAPITAL letters?  Should it be solely music based?  How do I trick a college student into being my intern?), we've got the line-up set, and we're ready to talk to the bands!

First up is Shawn Mishak (guitar/vocals) of Kid Tested.  I sat down with Shawn on Gchat the other night (minutes before he had to host an open mic night), and here's what transpired...

Hearts Bleed Radio: Let's go back in time for a second... Kid Tested has been together for over 10 years. Have you guys been active the whole time? Same three dudes?

 Shawn: We have been active since roughly 2001. We are on our 4th drummer, and our second bass player. the new drummer, Jim has been with us for over a year and Dom has been with us for about 5 years..fucking drummers...

   HBR: If they don't die, you consider it a victory and move on. I assume its really hard to find a drummer everywhere, right?

   Shawn: I consider all the people I've had the opportunity to work with a blessing and a privilege. Drummers that don't get sucked into drugs, marriage, or double bass pedals can be tricky. 

Yes, that's an actual Cleveland apartment.                       

Sleeping Contest Official Video

The Planes released our first ever music video on Friday, and celebrated with a show at Don Pedro in Brooklyn.  We're really happy with the way it turned out, and owe a huge debt of gratitude to Ricky Camilleri of CamLin Productions.  Ricky is an old college buddy of mine, and it worked out that he was free to make the trek up to Northampton, MA to shot some footage of us performing at The Elevens.  Unfortunately, Gavin and Daniel couldn't make the voyage with us, so we enlisted Kate Niemczyk (of Northampton's The True Jacqueline) to play bass, and we performed as a trio.

On the way into town, an old abandoned (and for the most part totally gutted) factory complex caught our eye.  I don't know what they used to make there, but it was a sprawling complex with a canal running underneath that at one point spun the turbines that powered the place.  Here's the google maps streetview, but it doesn't really do it justice.  If anyone knows what they used to make here, let me know, cause I'm super interested in old factories/industry.

We found a big open area, played the song on Ricky's iphone (which is hidden in my front jacket pocket), and did our thing.  I can't remember if we did two or three takes, but it must have been one of the quickest and most painless video shoots in history.  Soon after, we met up with Kate, ran through the songs in her apartment and went over to the club.  Ricky shot us playing, mixed it with the factory footage and some found VHS footage, and the Official Sleeping Contest Video was born!

This video was shot on an old VHS camera from 1987, which explains the overall late 80's-90's feel.  But we dig it that way, it's where we came from, and it's kinda how we sound.  I bet we shot hardcore shows at the teen center back in high school with this model camera at some point.  I don't know if Ricky just bought that camera, or if it's been sitting in his parents basement for 25 years, but either way, it worked perfectly for this project!

You should check out more of Ricky's work at CamLin Productions.

Check out Kate's band, The True Jacqueline.

And remember you can stream (free) and download (free or donate if you like) all of our first three releases at theplanesnyc.bandcamp.com!

Changes coming to HBR

hello planet earth and parts beyond,

it's been awhile since i posted anything on here. i'm going to make a couple of changes to ensure that i post more often. for starters, i'm making it the official blog of my band, The Planes. Secondly, i'm going to write about some of the shows that i attend, primarily in the north brooklyn region of earth. Hopefully i won't piss anyone off more than a little.

when and if i get the gumption to write creatively again, i will post that here as well. i hope you've enjoyed my writings in the past, and i hope you're all excited for this awkward change.

regards,

-steve