Check it out. American Songwriter Magazine did an exclusive with my favorite, Will Hoge, on the set of his new video for “Favorite Waste of Time.” Really kind of captures Will’s spirit…
This soulful, core-shaking rock star will be in Charlotte on October 25 at The Visulite. Don’t miss it
Sometimes, I feel like there’s this very distinct divide in the music world – between “pop” music and the experimental, indie stuff. Between what the masses listen to and what the “cool kids” and critics are listening to. I love reading the magazines, articles and blogs that talk about the music that falls on the latter side of the line (for example, RSL, which is one of the best music blogs out there), but I consistently fall on the pop side. I totally don’t get the “outside the box” stuff. Maybe this is just representative of my limited mental capacity; perhaps I really know nothing about music at all. For example, I’m totally not ashamed to admit that I just don’t hear what everyone else loves about The Arcade Fire (bring on the critics!). Not one single thing about them appeals to me. Here’s a confession: There’s something about music with melodies that get stuck in your head and lyrics that you can sing along and relate to that grabs me. Pop, ladies and gentleman, is NOT a dirty word to me.
Despite my tendency to love the pop crack…on occasion, there’s an unusual band that grabs me from the very first note I hear them play.
Flagship is one of these bands.
These kids are flipping amazing. The first time I saw them live, they played a late show after one of my favorite little rock singers. I stuck around, more to hang out with my friends than to hear the late show band. But damn. Pull out the old-school microphone a la Robert Smith, and you’re gonna get my attention, no matter WHAT kind of music you’re playing. Add to that that this band that I’d NEVER EVEN HEARD OF before packed out The Evening Muse, and you can color me intrigued.
So I started listening. Closely.
I don’t have the music education background to talk in “lingo” about what this band does that appeals to me. I can’t tell you what time they’re playing in. Couldn’t tell you for the life of me what kind of guitar tones they pull out of their instruments or why it’s cool that Drake plays a Rickenbacker. I just know that it is. And that that I love their music. And that I want to play it. All the time.
Flagship bridges the very divide that I think exists in music. They’re creative and experimental, but their music is totally relatable for me. They’ve got those “earworm” type lyrics – the kind that you find yourself singing all throughout the day – layered on top of really complex melodies and flipping brilliant instrumentation. It’s “indie” music sans pretentiousness. One minute, they’re playing songs that are reminiscent of 80s new age, the next minute they’re channeling classic rockers like Tom Petty, and then to completely throw you for a loop, they play a song that sounds like it’s straight out of Americana. It’s incredible.
And I don’t know if I’m more impressed with lead singer Drake Margolnick with his cut-through-you wailing and haunting refrains or Logan Fincher’s little bursts of disgustingly creative guitar parts. It KILLS me that these kids are so young and they’re playing at this level.
Okay, and I might love, just a little bit that Drake pulls in a little Springsteen “Tunnel of Love,” whether he knows it or not, in their song “Enemies of the State” when he sings “Na na na na, hey…”
Tonight, I watched them play to a crowd of about fifty indie kids at a small bar in Charlotte – the kind of kids that wear Activision t-shirts when they’re too young to know what it was, and dresses and flowers in their hair when the venue attire is obviously jeans and t-shirt fare – and the only thing that kept running through my head was what Samantha from Sex in the City said, when she was talking to Smith about his career as an actor.
“First the girls, then the gays, then everyone else will follow.”
Their fans LOVE them. Rabid, Jersey Shore fist-pumping love them. You look around the crowd and everyone is singing along. People are filling in the parts from the recorded versions of the songs that don’t make it to the live show – hand claps, background vocals, the works. It’s kind of inspiring to see a crowd of young people be this stoked about music (and how old am I that I’m referring to a crowd at a live show as “young people?”).
Another way I know this band has “it” – whatever that “it” is? I was inspired to come home and write this blog. I haven’t been inspired to write much of anything lately, but their show left me buzzing. I’m talking punch-drunk, toe tapping, want to bring all of my friends to their next show buzz.
Glad I’m catching Flagship on the way up. Why aren’t you listening to them already?
Flagship online: Twitter | Facebook | MySpace
3/5 of Flagship
My sophomore year in college was beyond fun. I’d settled in to “college life,” had joined ZTA, and had made some of the best friends that I’d ever had. I have a fairly sharp memory, but I’ve reached “that age” where things have started to blur together – you know, that “Did this happen in that year or this year?” kind of thing. I’ve long since forgotten what my room number was that year, whatever classes I took have left my feeble brain, and I can’t remember for the life of me what the big “hit” show on TV was that year.
But there are a few things I distinctly remember: I fell in love for the first time (and subsequently, had my heart truly broken for the first time); I got a “noise ordinance” violation for the stereo in my 1983 Toyota Tercel being too loud while driving around in town; I suffered a particularly rough incident with peppermint schnapps; I became a “big sister” in the sorority; I desperately tried to understand rugby; and I laughed endlessly about the “tree” that floated up and down 4th floor Minta Martin.
My favorite band, The Counting Crows
Mostly, however, I remember the music. Denise (and Sky, for a time) were across the hall from me and Nicole. We lived with our doors open and one or the other of us was always playing music. That year’s memories are all set against a backdrop of Black 47, The Violent Femmes, Crash Test Dummies, New Order and Pearl Jam. And then…then there was the band that would change music for me forever. The Counting Crows.
Sure, “Mr. Jones” was what led me to by the album that fall in 1993, but I’ll never forget hearing the CD for the first time. I was absolutely transported by the poetry of very first lyric, in the very first song on the album…”Stepped out the front door like a ghost into a fog where no one notices the contrast of white on white…” Back then, I still had delusions that I would someday be a famous author. I studied great writers, I read books by the gross, I immersed myself in language. And then along comes this band, with this singer/writer that phrases things like I’d never heard them phrased in lyrics before. It was absolutely the most incredible thing I’d ever heard.
WHO WRITES LIKE THAT? It was fucking brilliant – it remains brilliant to this day. And the whole ALBUM brims over with lines just like it, chock full of beautiful metaphors and imagery. In places it is sad and broken, in others, hopeful and happy. The writing always questioned. It was sort of like life itself, set against this tapestry of music that was woven with instruments like accordion and banjo. I’ve always loved music, but I think August and Everything After may have been the first time I really listened to music.
Everything changed that year. Bruce Springsteen suddenly had competition in my heart. Because while Bruce told these grand stories, Counting Crows wrote music that, for me, was raw emotion. And we all know that I’m a drama queen…
In the years since, The Counting Crows have only become more cemented in my heart. Sometimes, I feel like Adam Duritz is crawling around inside my head and taking my thoughts, the ones that I speak to no one, and making them eloquent. My heart still breaks every time I hear “Anna Begins,” because I relive that year and learning what it was like to watch someone you love walk away from you. “Daylight Fading” will always be my “striking out on my own” song, the summer I graduated from college, blaring it in my huge apartment that had no furniture, but was filled with hope. When I’m laughing with my friends, it’s “Hangin’ Around” I hear in my head. “Holiday In Spain” makes me cry, every time, and I always listen to it when something is ending – friendships, relationships, vacations – because it sounds like a song about endings to me, even when the narrator doesn’t want it to be. And when I am in crush, I listen to “Accidentally in Love” and laugh at myself and how goo-ily romantic I am. I know, I know – the songs are never about what we think they are about. But that’s the magic of music – songs become what you need them to be. There isn’t an important moment in my life since that time that hasn’t been framed by a Counting Crows song. Their music really is the soundtrack of my life.
I’ve seen them nine times in concert in the 17 years I’ve been a fan. Despite making every effort I have been able to, the closest I’ve gotten is third row, at a show by myself two summers ago, only to have a group of jerks next to me – who could have cared less about the music – literally invade my space and make me uncomfortable the whole show. But tomorrow night, my 10th Counting Crows show, my dream will come true. I will be in the front row. I will be there with one of my closest friends who totally gets my love of their music. I will sing along, I will feel alive, and I will love every minute of it.
I cannot wait.
Sad to hear that the best Grace Potter & The Nocturnals fan site out there is going on hiatus for a bit…but K. Cortez shared this last one with us…what a gift.
I will admit that I’m prone to falling in love with bands easily.
I was late on the Gaslight Anthem train. I really didn’t pay them any mind until about a year ago when Bruce (Springsteen, for those of you completely outside of the Krissie world) got on stage with them at Glastonbury. To me, that’s a big nod to your rock n’ roll prowess. I bought The ’59 Sound. I liked it. But it wasn’t love at first listen.
A few weeks ago, the band released their newest album, American Slang. Um, big crush after the first run through it. Over the past ten days, I’ve driven a bit. 1,300 miles, give or take. I listened to a lot of music. But American Slang is the only album that got the repeat plays. Blared “Diamond Street Church Choir.” Widows down, sunroof open, full-on sing along to “Orphans.” A little air guitar on “Queen of Lower Chelsea.” Hit the back button to listen to “Stay Lucky” three times in a row.
This is a sign of me falling in love, my friends. So much in love that I’m willing to post a marketing gimmick to get an acoustic track of one of their songs. Doesn’t hurt that they are Jersey boys, either.
#2 record of the year? Quite possibly!
I’m not going to attempt a review…I suck at them. The fine people over at Paste Magazine don’t, though. And they pretty much hit the nail on the head with this one.
“The Gaslight Anthem may not be the final answer to any bigger question, but they send you out into the night with your heart slamming and your fingers rapping the steering wheel and plenty of gas in the tank.”
Just buy the record. You won’t be disappointed.
The Gaslight Anthem: Web | Facebook | Twitter | iTunes | Amazon
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