Photos by PETE TROSHAK For going on six years, The Roots Picnic has been kicking off summer in the city with a diverse eleven hour bonanza of music in blazing 90 degree heat. This year was no different. Hot as hell? Check. Diverse? As with previous years, the line up was all over the place and everywhere at once. Which is to say, double-check. The mainstage crowd was warmed up by Jennah Bell’s rootsy rock and Sonnymoon’s carnal electronic music. Philly’s own Lushlife jumpstarted the second stage tent with an intense, sweaty one-man-and-a-laptop psychedelic hip-hop throwdown. The Robert Glaser Experiment […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See The Dandy Warhols
The fascinating 2004 documentary Dig! chronicles the roller coaster existence of two indie bands who who go from friends to rivals – The Dandy Warhols and The Brian Jonestown Massacre – as they try to survive and thrive in a messed up, backwards-assed music world. The Dandy Warhols look like proper rock stars should, but they come across as relatively normal, and seem poised to achieve stardom via their chameleonic music – a catchy, ersatz re-write of whatever is trending at the moment — and frontman Courtney Taylor’s elegant cheekbones. In contrast, The Brian Jonestown Massacre are darker and […]
BEING THERE: Aftermath
Photo by REUTERS via DAILY MAIL DAILY MAIL: Earlier on Tuesday, emergency crews began searching flattened homes and piles of rubble with cadaver dogs.No survivors were found yesterday, and officials said they hoped to complete three searches of every site of devastation before nightfall on Tuesday. The storm, which barreled through the Oklahoma City suburb for 17 miles on Monday, injured 237 people and killed at least 24, including nine children and four people in Oklahoma City. The heartbreaking-to-read Twitter hashtag #OKMissing has been set up to help families and friends search for missing loved ones. On Monday, emergency workers […]
BEING THERE: Kurt Vile @ Union Transfer
Photo by MEREDITH KLEIBER Back home in Philly for their last U.S. date before embarking on their European tour, Kurt Vile and The Violators were greeted by a loving, sold-out crowd at Union Transfer Saturday night. After a double-opener featuring the folk-rocky stylings of Steve Gunn and the haunting lilt of Angel Olsen, Vile—face shrouded by his trademark brown mane—emerged onto the stage and opened the set with a stirring version of “Wakin on a Pretty Day,” which also serves as the opener on the Violators’ new album, Wakin on a Pretty Daze. “It’s good to be back home,” an all-white-clad […]
BEING THERE: Tom Jones @ The TLA
Photo by RORY MCGLASSON Less than hours 24 hours after wowing fans at the WXPN-hosted Non-Commvention at World Cafe Live on Thursday night, Sir Tom Jones was at back behind the mic for a sold out “Evening With Tom Jones” show at the TLA. The 72-year-old legend, with the one-of-a-king baritone voice, treated Philadelphians to an intimate set of deep-cut covers — John Lee Hooker, Bob Dylan, Jerry Lee Lewis — from his last two records: 2010’s Praise And Blame and the just-released Spirit In The Room. The new album is a Johnny Cash/Rick Rubin-style cover album collaboration with Kings of […]
BEING THERE: Josh Ritter @ The Troc
Photo by RORY MCGLASSON The light turned from red to a deep blue when Josh Ritter took the stage and walked up to the mic. Supple, genuine and totally alone, he almost stuttered his first words to Philadelphians: “We’re gonna’ leave it all here.” Philadelphia was not Josh Ritter& the Royal City Band’s last tour city, but it was the city where Ritter’s parents fell in love. Undoubtedly, the talented singer/songwriter is looking back in admiration on his parents’ marriage, which represents a longer-lasting union the one he and his ex-wife, singer/songwriter Dawn Landes, shared. That was just two years […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See Josh Ritter @ The Troc
We have a pair of tix to see Josh Ritter, aka Americana’s James Taylor/Paul Simon, and his Royal City Band at the Troc on Thursday to some lucky Phawker reader. Why? Because we’re trippin’ balls right now and just realized that Bill Hicks was totally right when he said “all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively, there is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves.” So why pay for Josh Ritter tickets if you don’t have to? […]
City Settles With Woman Punched Out By Cop For $75K AND The Cop Will Likely Get His Job Back
NEWSWORKS: The City of Philadelphia has settled a civil suit brought by a woman who was struck by a Philadelphia police officer after last year’s Puerto Rican Day Parade. In what became a viral video, Lt. Jonathan Josey is seen striking Aida Guzman during a street party in North Philadelphia. Guzman filed the civil suit against the city after Josey, a veteran officer, was acquitted on simple assault charges. The city agreed to a $75,000 settlement on Friday. John McGrody, vice president of the Fraternal Order of Police, said the union is not talking either. Following Josey’s acquittal, McGrody called […]
BEING THERE: Bela Lugosi Is Still Dead
Photo by PETE TROSHAK The scary monsters and super creeps were out in full force at the Trocadero Thursday night to see former Bauhaus frontman Peter Murphy perform his old band’s gravest hits. The leather-clad godfather of goth had slithered into town to celebrate 35 years of Bauhaus, a band formed in 1978 concurrent with the rise of the roiling U.K. punk scene but never quite of it. Bauhaus trafficked in sinister guitar atmospherics stretched across a minimalist rock band configuration and narrated by Murphy’s velveteen voice-of-doom croon. Murphy was in top form Thursday, stalking the stage like a creature […]
VAMPIRE WEEKEND: Diane Young
THE GUARDIAN: Those searching for evidence that, even in a world shrunk by the internet, culture from across the Atlantic can still seem beguilingly exotic to a British audience, might consider the case of Vampire Weekend. They arrived in 2008, a riot of preppy clothes, neat hair, African-inspired guitars and songs that suggested Ivy League backgrounds: replete with titles like Campus and Diplomat’s Son, with lyrical references to punctuation, 17th-century architecture and “good schools and friends with pools”. The band have protested about the detrimental effect all this had on the way they were perceived by those who didn’t grasp […]
BEING THERE: ‘Til Death Do Us Part
Photo by TASLIMA AKHTER TIME: Many powerful photographs have been made in the aftermath of the devastating collapse of a garment factory on the outskirts of Dhaka, Bangladesh. But one photo, by Bangladeshi photographer Taslima Akhter, has emerged as the most heart wrenching, capturing an entire country’s grief in a single image. Shahidul Alam, Bangladeshi photographer, writer and founder of Pathshala, the South Asian Institute of Photography, said of the photo: “This image, while deeply disturbing, is also hauntingly beautiful. An embrace in death, its tenderness rises above the rubble to touch us where we are most vulnerable. By making […]
CONTEST: Win Tix To See Shout Out Louds Tonight!
Time is short, so we’ll spare you the usual too-clever-by-half, hipper-than-thou rock crit spiel and cut to the chase: Swedish nouveau wavers The Shout Out Louds are playing Union Transfer tonight in support of their brand new, three-years-in-the-gestating Optica. And we have a pair of tickets we’d love, love, love to put in your pocket — or just hand the to you, if you prefer. Because time is of the essence we are going to wave the usual concert ticket giveaway requirements and the first lucky reader to email us at FEED@PHAWKER.COM with the word SHOUT! in the subject […]
HELLO IT’S ME: Being Todd Rundgren
EDITOR’S NOTE: We have two pairs of tix to see Todd Rundgren @ the Troc on Saturday where he will be performing his new album, State, in its entirety plus ‘dance versions’ of his classic songs. To qualify, send us an email at FEED@PHAWKER.COM with the phrase HELLO IT’S ME in the subject line. Include your name and mobile number for confirmation. WIKIPEDIA: Todd Harry Rundgren (born June 22, 1948) is an American multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and record producer. Hailed in the early stage of his career as a new pop star, supported by the certified gold solo double LP […]