Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER I will remain forever in awe of Liz Phair’s ability to seamlessly slip the word “fucked” into a dreamy, cloudy-brained pop anthem like “Why Can’t I?” My preoccupation with the song began at the age of ten. It was marked explicit in iTunes and therefore deemed too adult for the music library of my silver iPod Nano. I spent an embarrassing amount of time poring over the song, humming, singing, intently listening each time it came on the radio, searching for the goddamn expletive. The charm of “Why Can’t I?” persisted with the years to come. […]

Photo by MATT SHAVER Leon Bridges was a beam of pure and joyful iridescence after a week of hopeless darkness. Stepping out in a Canadian tuxedo and a crisp white chest-hair-exposing button-down, Bridges gripped a sparkling mic stand with both hands as he crooned the first words of “If It Feels Good (Then It Must Be)” from his 2018 record Good Thing. Doused in deep magenta light, Bridges danced around the stage, moonwalking from one end to the other, periodically reaching out to the crowd to move along with him. Surrounding him on risers were his six bandmates, which included […]

Photo by DYLAN LONG The 88rising crew kicked off their immense new 88 Degrees and Rising tour last night at The Fillmore in Philadelphia with a lineup so extensive, one can only imagine the workload ahead for whoever handles their settlement. The tour, branded with the 88rising record label which has become well renowned for serving as a strong platform for Asian artists, features prominent headliners Rich Brian and Joji. Joining them are the four man rap group Higher Brothers, singer-songwriter Niki, and several other singers and rappers with Asian roots. Something that you don’t see very often in live […]

Photo by PETE TROSHAK A few songs into their first set on Friday night, Belly singer Tanya Donelly let out a deep sigh, looked out into the audience and summed up the feelings of the crowd and the nation with a single sentence: “What a shit week.” Regardless of your political leanings, the firestorm brewing in Washington last week left a lot of psychic trauma and scars on the country, but Donelly and Belly succeeded in bringing release and relief to a captivated audience that happily hung on every note and syllable at Union Transfer on Friday night. Donelly was […]

Photo by MATT SHAVER I heard “Mistaken for Strangers” on the radio when I was thirteen, and my music taste took a drastic 180 degree turn into the world of indie rock and there would be no going back to the likes of Metro Station, Say Anything or All Time Low. The National’s dreary tones and striking rhythms became the soundtrack to every rainy day and long bus ride, a space where I could wallow and brood comfortably. It only seemed fitting that the forecast predicted buckets of rain for their appearance at the Mann Center on Thursday night. With […]

Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER Whenever I walk into the basement of First Unitarian Church, I feel like I’m attending a 1970’s middle school prom—maybe it’s all the wood paneling and Canadian tuxedos. When the friend I was waiting for finally arrived, wading through the crowd armed with a can of PBR in one hand and a vape pen in the other, she complained I was difficult to pick out—“It was like Where’s Waldo, everyone here looks like you.” Seventeen-year-old old Hana Vu [pictured, above] falls into the batch of indie artists that self-produce via Soundcloud and Bandcamp. The LA-based songwriter […]

Photo by JOSH PELTA-HELLER David Byrne — Talking Heads architect and post-New Wave elder statesman of all things arch, artsy and oblique — is the Marcel Duchamp of 20th Century rock n’ roll, transmuting the artifacts of the mundane and the quotidian into magical charms to ward off the confusion, dread and ennui of modern life. He is, in other words, an antidote for our current season in Hell, and his arrival at the Mann last night backed by what is, for lack of a better description, The Greatest Marching Band on Earth, to deliver humane tidings of comfort and […]

Photo by MATT SHAVER I first heard Car Seat Headrest last spring, driving through Southwestern Pennsylvania mountain roads with my mom, on Jenny Eliscu’s satellite radio show. As Will Toledo [pictured, above] alternately screamed and spoke the lyrics of “Bodys” in a matter-of-fact tone, my mom laughed out loud, saying “What is this depressing shit you listen to?” Typical baby boomer parent, unable to understand my millennial malaise. Six months later, I look up at Toledo on the stage of Union Transfer as he sings that same song off of the 2018 re-release of his 2011 DIY triumph, Twin Fantasy, […]

Photo by MARK LIKOSKY Opening with “Before the Dawn” perfectly set the mood for Saturday night’s intimate, unplugged celebration of the 30 year anniversary of the day guitarist Jay Laughlin and his friend Frank “Skip” Candelori started playing music together in a band called Turning Point. Although Skip tragically passed away in 2002, Saturday night, Jay sat with his old acoustic guitar upstairs at Johnny Brendas to walk us through his memories making the audience fell like they were right there in the practice space writing some of early 90’s hardcore’s most seminal material. Some diehard fans from back in […]

Photo courtesy of Getty Images And, in the end, the chap born Reginald Kenneth Dwight 71 years ago – long known better as Elton Hercules John – rose from the piano stool on the Wells Fargo Center stage after closing his hits-heavy 24-song show and soaked up the vociferous Philadelphia crowd’s love one last time. It was only the third of his 300+-date “Farewell Yellow Brick Road” tour – which opened in glamorous Allentown, PA, over the weekend and is expected to circle the globe thru 2021 – but it was the finale of his sold-out two-night stand in Philly. […]

Photo by PETE TROSHAK Let it be known that on Saturday afternoon a hearty band of settlers arrived in the parking lot of The Electric Factory under a dreary skies and occasional torrents of rain to protest much like their forefathers did back in 1773. It wasn’t the hatred of a tyrant king or anger over the price of tea that brought these people together, instead they gathered together for the 215 Block Party to protest the end of summer by drinking quality beer, eating from food trucks and catching some up and coming bands and a legendary New York […]