Wednesday, December 08, 2010
Cinderella, Sweeping Up The Strobe
UWeekly 12-01-2010
4Play
By Don Allred
Freelance Whales/Miniature Tigers
Friday @ The Basement
Indie art-pop kiddies Freelance Whales have been tagged as "twee",
but especially live, there's also something hard-nosed and practical
about the compact, levitating density of this former sidewalk/subway
platform band. Five-part harmonies infiltrate stringed instruments,
glockenspiels, drums and sustained keyboard chords, like the rowdy
ghost breezing through FW's debut album, "Weathervanes." Miniature
Tigers tenaciously swept love's ashes through the Phoenix-to-Hollywood
mirages of 2008's "Tell It To The Volcano", and showtime can bring
sharper focus to the stylish highlights of 2010's "Fortress."
Question Mark and the Mysterians/Professors
Saturday @ The Shrunken Head
"The shadows were all I had/Until you came into my life," garage
pioneer Question Mark drawls in "Got To." Whether or not his seemingly
fickle muse actually ended up crying "96 Tears", she definitely
inspired QMM's 1966 classics. The original combo still cogently mixes
punky, speedy blues with Motown-informed flow. Mysterians peers The
Professors are veterans of Central Ohio's Dantes, Dominions and Mods.
They cover the Stones, Beatles, Animals, even Dylan and the Byrds, in
sonic strobe lights.
Here Come The Mummies
Saturday @ Newport Music Hall
Here Come The Mummies are reputedly full-time members of other bands
plus first-call session players, keeping all contracted identities
literally under wraps. With a line-up averaging nine members, counting
the full horn section, their rich vocal and instrumental harmonies
evoke Senior Prom and pep rally resplendence, plus band bus attitude,
as satire and sheer exuberance get acquainted. Grown-up proficiency
rolls though elements of Ellington, Chicago, yacht rock and
Parliament-Funkadelic. Salty social commentary even celebrates limits
of originality, in expansively pungent perspective.
Buke & Gass
Tuesday @ Kobo
Buke is Arone Dyer, who sings and plays a plugged-in, customized
baritone ukelele, with added pick-ups and strings. She can
simultaneously play an Indian keyboard banjo, via some of her pedals.
Pedals (triggering home-grown electronic sources and kick drums, for
instance) are also employed by Gass, AKA Aron Sanchez, whose electric
bass's range is extended with guitar strings. Buke's youthful voice
and tunes swing confidence and anxiety through the emphatic momentum
of rough-edged, adventurously analytical acid-folk-rock. She's an
"achin' pagan," and a better-equipped Cinderella. ¶ 12/08/2010
4Play
By Don Allred
Freelance Whales/Miniature Tigers
Friday @ The Basement
Indie art-pop kiddies Freelance Whales have been tagged as "twee",
but especially live, there's also something hard-nosed and practical
about the compact, levitating density of this former sidewalk/subway
platform band. Five-part harmonies infiltrate stringed instruments,
glockenspiels, drums and sustained keyboard chords, like the rowdy
ghost breezing through FW's debut album, "Weathervanes." Miniature
Tigers tenaciously swept love's ashes through the Phoenix-to-Hollywood
mirages of 2008's "Tell It To The Volcano", and showtime can bring
sharper focus to the stylish highlights of 2010's "Fortress."
Question Mark and the Mysterians/Professors
Saturday @ The Shrunken Head
"The shadows were all I had/Until you came into my life," garage
pioneer Question Mark drawls in "Got To." Whether or not his seemingly
fickle muse actually ended up crying "96 Tears", she definitely
inspired QMM's 1966 classics. The original combo still cogently mixes
punky, speedy blues with Motown-informed flow. Mysterians peers The
Professors are veterans of Central Ohio's Dantes, Dominions and Mods.
They cover the Stones, Beatles, Animals, even Dylan and the Byrds, in
sonic strobe lights.
Here Come The Mummies
Saturday @ Newport Music Hall
Here Come The Mummies are reputedly full-time members of other bands
plus first-call session players, keeping all contracted identities
literally under wraps. With a line-up averaging nine members, counting
the full horn section, their rich vocal and instrumental harmonies
evoke Senior Prom and pep rally resplendence, plus band bus attitude,
as satire and sheer exuberance get acquainted. Grown-up proficiency
rolls though elements of Ellington, Chicago, yacht rock and
Parliament-Funkadelic. Salty social commentary even celebrates limits
of originality, in expansively pungent perspective.
Buke & Gass
Tuesday @ Kobo
Buke is Arone Dyer, who sings and plays a plugged-in, customized
baritone ukelele, with added pick-ups and strings. She can
simultaneously play an Indian keyboard banjo, via some of her pedals.
Pedals (triggering home-grown electronic sources and kick drums, for
instance) are also employed by Gass, AKA Aron Sanchez, whose electric
bass's range is extended with guitar strings. Buke's youthful voice
and tunes swing confidence and anxiety through the emphatic momentum
of rough-edged, adventurously analytical acid-folk-rock. She's an
"achin' pagan," and a better-equipped Cinderella. ¶ 12/08/2010
