Ageless Indie Rockers The Walkmen Dazzle Sold-Out Crowd at Bimbo’s

Photo Credit: Marisa Plaice

Has any band enjoyed a second (and third) act quite like the Walkmen?

The New York quintet burst upon the scene with two perfect albums—their 2002 debut, “Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me Is Gone,” and their explosive 2004 follow up, “Bows + Arrows.” The first album was a twisted vaudevillian update for modern times and their sophomore release was a scathing rejoinder of urban ennui—you could practically feel the stale beer and cigarette smell on the songs.

But by 2007, the band had largely been overshadowed by their New York City peers, with indie darlings like Grizzly Bear and brooding dad rockers The National stealing the headlines. That was mostly the result of their uninspired 2006 album “A Hundred Miles Off,” and their ill-fated cover of Harry Nilson’s album, “The Pussy Cats.”

Seemingly destined to join the endless list of once-promising bands consigned to anonymity, the Walkmen followed up with 2008’s “You and Me,” a tour-de-force that recounted all of “Bows + Arrows” best moments. It was rapturously received, and they then released two other stellar and inventive albums, “Lisbon” and “Heaven,” before going on a hiatus in 2013 (although they have always disputed that term.)

That unexpected comeback alone would have been a great story, but the Walkmen reemerged last year after a decade-long break to stage their “Revenge Tour,” a string of shows that included an array of sold-out dates and prominent festival appearances. The band sounded as sharp as ever in those performances, and their fans had clearly not forgotten them.

While the band has been less active in 2024, they’ve performed at a smattering of music festivals and they scheduled two West Coast shows at Bimbo’s, the venerable North Beach club in San Francisco. On Thursday, July 11, the band performed the first of those two gigs, and hooboy, they did not disappoint.

The Walkmen have always projected a sense of equitable creative collaboration—each member of the group has embarked on various other cprojects—but in a live setting, it’s hard not to be overwhelmed by the sheer presence of lead singer Hamilton Leithauser. 

He might have a name that recalls feudal aristocrats and an appearance that wouldn’t look out of place in Yale’s Skull and Bones Club, but Leithauser is a caterwauling, feral beast onstage. There is no other indie rock singer who reaches the heights of his vociferous wailing, and his facial gesticulations and general intensity in a live setting are just ridiculously infectious—if you don’t feel compelled to scream alongside him, then you damn well might not have a pulse.

The band opened the show with the relatively tranquil “On the Water,” before entering into a devastating back-to-back of “Juveniles” and “In the New Year.” With its call and response of “You’re one of us/Or one of them,” “Juveniles” has earned its spot as a beloved live favorite, and the manic “In the New Year,” with its whirling organ play, is simply one of the best Walkmen songs ever recorded.

The Walkmen flit seamlessly between soft and loud moments (although Leithauser’s vocal theatrics never tend to abate), so quieter tunes like “138th Street” seem to resonate just as profoundly as their more transgressive sounds, such as “Thinking of a Dream I Had.”

Leithauser has always been an able showman, unafraid to charm audiences with his trademark dry humor, and Walkmen shows are typically laden with references to the band’s history. At the show on Thursday, Leithauser referenced the band’s prior stop at Bottom of the Hill—the legendary punk bar in Potrero Hill—and noted that the group’s only previous time playing at Bimbo’s was a “disaster.” He also mentioned that guitarist Paul Maroon’s father, Fred, was a decorated photographer who previously captured stirring pictures of Bimbo’s, some 60 years ago. 

It all felt very homegrown and familial, which makes sense, considering the band all met as high school students in Washington, D.C. And all those years have done nothing to diminish their live show—Maroon is a criminally underrated (and understated) guitarist, and it’s time to concede that the diminutive Matt Barrick is the best indie rock drummer in the world.

In fact, Barrick’s rapid-fire opening salvo is the definitive moment of the band’s definitive song, “The Rat.” Widely regarded as one of the best songs of the century, “The Rat” has long been THE must-see moment of a Walkmen show, and after closing with that number for years, the band steadily moved it up on its setlist. On Thursday, “The Rat” came near the end of their opening act, and unsurprisingly, blew the doors off Bimbo’s. The entire crowd engaged in a near hysteric rendition of the song, faithfully belting out each word at the top of their lungs. 

After closing out their set with the anthemic “Heaven,” (punctuated by its triumphant lines, “Remember, remember/All we fight for!”), the band returned with an encore of “Thinking of a Dream I Had,” and two of their oldest songs, “That’s the Punch Line,” and “We’ve Been Had.” Actually, “We’ve Been Had,” was the first Walkmen song ever recorded, and Leithauser acknowledged—as he has in the past—the significance of this tune, crediting the track with convincing him that his band had legitimate potential.

More than two decades after recording that song in a snowy New York City evening, Leithauser’s initial impressions clearly still ring true. Then as now, the Walkmen are a dynamic, thrilling and endlessly satisfying outfit. Whatever act comes next, it will be worth seeing.

Setlist:

On the Water 

Juveniles 

In the New Year 

Postcards from Tiny Islands 

Angela Surf City 

Dónde Está la Playa 

Woe Is Me 

I Lost You 

138th Street 

What's in It for Me 

Wake Up 

The Rat 

All Hands and the Cook 

Red Moon 

Canadian Girl 

Heaven

**ENCORE**

Thinking of a Dream I Had 

That's the Punch Line

We’ve Been Had

Peerless janglepop practitioners Ducks Ltd. playing at Rickshaw Stop on Monday

Photo Credit: Dylan Taylor

In 2003, when the Stokes released their sophomore album, “Room on Fire,” it was derided by many critics at the time as a duplicative, redundant effort too similar to the group’s seminal 2001 debut, “Is This It.”

However, as the years have passed, that second album has rightly been reassessed as a classic in its own right, a release that rivals its predecessor for greatness. “If it aint broke, don’t fix it,” is a salty old cliché, but it’s a cliché for a reason—sometimes it’s true.

That same adage applies to Ducks Ltd., a Toronto janglepop duo that turned considerable heads with the release of their 2021 debut album, “Modern Fiction,” a collection of shimmering, reverb-heavy guitar tracks. Three years later, much of that same winning formula was repeated for their dazzling sophomore album, “Harm’s Way.”

Tom McGreevy, the singer and guitarist for Ducks Ltd., who formed the band with lead guitarist Evan Lewis, said the band briefly considered a change in tone and tenor for its follow-up release, but abandoned that idea after feeling it would be disingenuous. 

“When we started working on the record, we were sort of like, ‘okay, are we going to take this in a different direction?’’” said McGreevy. “And then we quickly realized that that’s something you kind of just have to let it happen—you can’t force it. If we tried to self-consciously push something, we were not going to make something that’s honest.”

On Monday night, Ducks Ltd. will bring their tried and true approach to the Rickshaw Stop, where they’ll perform alongside beloved local janglepop outfit Chime School and dreampopper Mo Dotti (a frequent guest at SF venues.)

While the band’s undeniably catchy pop songs recall all the best of their predecessors—everything from the Byrds to Sarah Records bands to outfits on the great New Zealand label Flying Nun Records—the sonic elements of Ducks Ltd. are only half of the group’s appeal.

True millennials, the band writes from an insouciant, weary world view—the product of endless economic uncertainties, increasing artistic and creative marginalization and a listless political class that doesn’t match their values. “Hollowed Out,” the opening track on “Harm’s Way,” leads off with a lyrical salvo that quickly sets the tone for the remainder of the album, with McGreevy lamenting that, “All we ever do is need/Eat, fuck, and sleep/And then repeat forever.”

“I sort of liked that as the first lyrics on the record because it’s almost bordering on self-parody, but I thought a lot of people would get it,” said McGreevy. “You know, it’s about living through the economic and political and social movements of our time. I mean what I say in those lyrics,  but it’s also kind of funny, in this sad way.”

McGreevy’s laconic, dry delivery and tales of urban ennui offer an intriguing contrast to the propulsive, upbeat backdrop of the band’s musical output—every song feels like an urgent race to nowhere in particular. McGreevy noted that the disparate relationship between words and sound has been a practice honed by pop musicians for decades.

“It gets talked about a lot—this idea of holding two different ideas at once, but that’s really just the nature of pop music,” said McGreevy. “Pop music is bright and engaging, but there have always been these kinds of darker songs. If you go back to the 60s, you’ll see songs like ‘The Track of My Tears,’ and ‘Save the Last Dance for Me,’—those are songs with dark sentiments and that tension is what makes them so interesting.”

That arresting tension is prevalent throughout “Harm’s Way,” which is replete with chugging, skittering songs littered with sardonic observations. “Train Full of Gasoline” is a romping affair, full of starry guitar licks, but its messages are on brand for the album—" Bonded by an emptiness/Shared sense of dull dead endedness.” “Deleted Scenes'' is much in that same vein, a classic power pop track that yields words such as “You used to flirt with disaster/Got used to you letting other people down.”

Again—McGreevy notes that this isn’t a new wrinkle to songwriting, but Ducks Ltd.’s skilled musicianship and keen knack for crafting beguiling earworms adds extra depth to that combination. Ducks Ltd. seem incapable of writing songs that aren’t imminently engaging and also imminently relevant.

Additionally, the band offers a tantalizing glimpse of what could be in store on the final track of “Harm’s Way.” A quiet, wistful ballad that might be the sweetest song ever recorded by the band, “Heavy Bag” is a soft, cooing acoustic number that departs from the more clamorous atmosphere of their other work.

“Yeah—we had never really done anything like that before,” said McGreevy. “It was created as almost a demo—the song king of dictated that it had to be done that way. I think we were trying to break our tendency with that song and push a little against our instincts.”

There is understandably no rush from Ducks Ltd. to upend their winning ways. But “Heavy Bag” is proof that no sound or aesthetic is beyond the mastery of their capable hands. It bodes for an exciting future.

Show Details:

Ducks Ltd. with Chime School and Mo Dotti
When: 8 p.m., Monday, July 15
Where: Rickshaw Stop
Tickets: $15, available here.

Post-Disco Band De Lux Celebrating 10th Anniversary of Debut Album with Show at Rickshaw Stop on Friday

Photo credit: Mike Anderson

Most family heirlooms that come from one’s grandparents are staid offerings. 

Watches. Maybe some silverware. Perhaps some old photos.

Sean Guerin had a slightly different experience. Guerin, the founding member of the Los Angeles-based post-disco outfit De Lux, received a synthesizer from his grandfather, and that timely gift has made all the difference in his musical career.

“My grandfather and grandmother were in a jazz group called the The Aldeberts,” said Guerin. “He heavy collected a lot of gear and I inherited this synth. At the time, I didn’t really know what to do with it. I kind of thought the sounds were cheesy at first, but I spent a lot of time with it because, back then, I just didn’t have much equipment. It kind of forced me to learn to love the sounds of that synth and from there, I really embraced that idea of making modern music with older equipment.”

Production of that synthesizer, a Yamaha DX7, ceased in 1989, but the retro-style approach was instrumental in shaping the sound of De Lux’s early records, including their 2014 debut “Voyage,” which the band will perform in full as part of a 10th anniversary celebration at the Rickshaw Stop on Friday. The event will be presented by Throwin’ Bo’s, a local production outfit, in concert with Popscene, the longstanding indie dance pop-up show.

The roots of De Lux trace back to Guerin’s high school days, when he originally met fellow co-founding member Isaac Franco. After exploring various other musical projects over the years, the duo eventually decided to form a band together.

“I would actually be working in the studio and Isaac would come by and we would randomly write things together,” said Guerin. “At the time, he really wasn’t a very proficient bass player, but I always had this motto that it didn’t really matter if you were a great musician, as long as you were passionate about the project. I could tell that he was interested in what he was doing, and he  ended up getting way better at the bass. And that’s what really helped shape our sound.”

While Guerin was very much steeped in the indie rock sounds of bands like Arcade Fire, Wolf Parade and Built to Spill, he also had an affinity for the dance-punk outfits on James Murphy’s venerable label, DFA Records. Franco came from a slightly different background—his older brother had a bountiful record collection of 70s and 80s disco classics, in addition to more adventurous albums from the Italo disco genre and underground African artists. 

The combination of those influences resulted in a dancy, breezy aesthetic—a sound that captured the adventurous nature and propulsive rhythms of classic disco sounds without the overproduced sheen that marred some of those efforts. Guerin’s voice is a dead-ringer for David Byrne, so in addition to the nightclub vibes to records like “Voyage,” there is also a distinct new wave feel.

“That first album was a big Talking Heads moment for us,” said Guerin. “I hadn’t listened to that record [“Voyage”] in a long time before we had to get ready for these anniversary shows. And honestly, I do like every song on that album, which is cool. A lot of those tracks still hit for me—I’m excited to play them again.”

In recent years, De Lux have grown more boundless in their approach to songcraft, as evidenced by last year’s 29-minute single, “Love is Hard Work,” a dazzling journey through different dance music eras.

That track (which was later released in a multi-song format, consisting of nine different pieces), emphasized the textured sonic elements of the sound, with Geurin’s voice often absent or settled in below the mix. With its amorphous, evolving structure, “Love is Hard Work,” also showcased some of the band’s more recent inspirations, including African Boogie artists. That lengthy single followed the band’s 2022 record, “Do You Need a Release?” an album that saw De Lux pull away from its more classic dancefunk sound in favor of softer, gentler tunes.

Guerin said the band—whose live lineup includes Tyler Lott on Guitar, Taylor Rodiger on synths and Briar Seavey on drums, in addition to the founding members—is currently working on material for a new De Lux album and at the moment, about five songs are in finalized form, although he didn’t have an exact release timeline. He’s also working on a few other projects at the moment, including producing a new album for promising young artist, Gelli Haha.

For now, the band is focused on their upcoming performance at the Rickshaw Stop, a live show that will be driven by their old-fashioned approach to a newfangled setup—an approach that dates back to Sean’s grandfather’s wizened ways.

“With that synthesizer he gave me, he left all these Post-It notes, and one of them said, ‘synths don’t make stilted, disposable, boring, grooveless, crappy music—musicians do,’” said Guerin. “That was his philosophy. It’s not the equipment—it’s how you use it.”

Show Details:

Who: De Lux with Big Sis, Touch and DJ Guillermo
When: 8 p.m., Friday, July 12
Where: Rickshaw Stop
Tickets: $15, available here.

Movie-theater concert embodies a thriving music scene in the Richmond

Originally posted in the SF Examiner on July 1.

For generations, San Francisco’s music scene has been defined by its neighborhoods.

Back in the 1950s—before racist urban renewal policies upended the neighborhood—the Fillmore District was home to a vibrant jazz scene, featuring dozens of African American-owned establishments.

Most famously, the 60s counter-culture movement started in the Haight-Ashbury, pioneered by psychedelic outfits like the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Big Brother and the Holding Company. Decades later, in the 2000s, the city’s famed and frenetic garage rock scene took root in the Mission District, as bands led by Thee Oh Sees, Sic Alps and Ty Segall created a sense of community around small dive clubs and rent-controlled apartments.

Even the Tenderloin—with its warren of basements, art galleries, bars and recording studios—has a reputation for fostering the careers of young and burgeoning indie rock bands.

The Richmond District—the sprawling residential neighborhood in San Francisco’s northern reaches—has never enjoyed such a reputation. Mostly famed for its proximity to Golden Gate Park and as a last redoubt for (somewhat) affordable living in the city, the Richmond can boast of no distinct musical legacy.

In recent years, however, that has started to change. A new cohort of musicians have proudly set up home in the neighborhood, and the advent of venues with unique and exciting programming have suddenly made the quiet community a bustling and vibrant artistic hub. 

On Friday, the neighborhood will be the center of the city’s tight-knit musical world, when the 4 Star Theater on Clement Street hosts the Fresh & Onlys, a beloved San Francisco institution who will be performing publicly for the first time in six years.

Shayde Sartin, a founding member of the Fresh & Onlys—who rose to ascendancy alongside so many of their peers in the Mission District—drew parallels between that scene in the 2000s and the one currently happening in the Richmond District.

“The one thing that most scenes need to be healthy is this sort of condensed community, and that’s what we had in the Mission District,” said Sartin, who now lives in the Richmond. “I see that happening in the Richmond because there’s a lot of bands out here. A lot of people really appreciate this neighborhood, myself included. I think the Richmond has turned out to be this nice little harbor for these bands and for this scene”

Much of the Richmond’s newfound artistic vigor can be attributed to Adam Bergeron, the proprietor of the 4 Star Theater (2200 Clement Street) and Balboa Theater (3630 Balboa Street)—two movie cinemas in the neighborhood that have greatly expanded their offerings in recent years. 

Bergeron has owned the Balboa Theater and its sister theater, the Vogue on Sacramento Street, for more than a decade under his CinemaSF umbrella organization, but prior to entering the movie business, he ran music venues like 12 Galaxies in the Mission District and the Crepe Place in Santa Cruz. As a result, he forged longstanding relationships with musicians, often employing them in his movie theaters (it was a common sight to see members of local bands like the She’s or hardcore legend Tony Molina behind the counter at the Balboa and the Vogue.)

Sensing an opportunity, Bergeron, who runs CinemaSF with his wife, Jaimi Holker, began incorporating live music into the programming at the Balboa Theater, starting around 2017. Local bands regularly performed in the vintage cinema—which first opened in 1926—with Bergeron sometimes incorporating live music with screenings of classic movies.

In late 2022, he began taking over operations at the 4 Star Theater, which had been shuttered for two years due to COVID. After a slow start, Bergeron applied his formula of interlaying live music, interactive Q&A events and movie screenings to the venue, eventually building a new following to match the Balboa. In the decade-plus of managing venues in the Richmond, he’s said he’s definitely noticed a change in the neighborhood.

“When I first started here, it was a different world,” said Bergeron. “It was really hard to get people to come out here to watch a movie. But then, things like Uber and Lyft changed that. And I think people realized that the Richmond District is this really cool neighborhood. Like, you can get to the park from here, and there is like a cool surf culture here. And I do think introducing some entertainment options into the neighborhood has helped bring a new crowd here as well.”

In addition to regularly featuring a host of local acts like Chime School, Half Stack, Andrew St. James, and the Neutrals, Bergeron was able to land nationally-recognized artists such as Animal Collective, Robyn Hitchcock and the Flamin’ Groovies (a legendary San Francisco band.) Those artists added heft and credibility to Bergeron’s project, but managing the venues did not come without difficulty.

Initially, 4 Star struggled to attract customers—particularly to its movie screenings. At one point, the venue even hosted a GoFundMe Me campaign to support its mission. However, things changed when Bergeron invited Ben Wintroub, owner of Tunnel Records, to set up a second location within the 4 Star building. Wintroub, a Marin County native, who opened up Tunnel Records in the outer stretches of the Sunset District in 2017, leapt at the opportunity.

“Adam was a longtime customer at our shop, and I always really admired the kind of businesses he created,” said Wintroub. “As soon as he mentioned that he had this second theater that was kind of being underutilized, it didn’t take long for us to come up with a plan for Tunnel Records to be a tenant. And I know this sounds a little dated, but the Richmond District just had that vibe of San Francisco that I fell in love with growing up, going to music shows in the 90s. It just has this loose, unpretentious feeling to it, and I wanted to be part of that culture.” 

Bergeron credits Tunnel Records for reviving 4 Star, and now, the lion’s share of the live CinemaSF events takes place at that venue. The combination of retail space, movies and live performances has a special appeal for many, including Tim Cohen, the lead singer and founding member of the Fresh & Onlys.

“For people like me, this venue has it completely figured out,” said Cohen. “I could spend literally my entire day here. I would browse the record store for hours, go watch a movie and then catch a live show.”

While business owners like Bergeron and Wintroub have contributed to the new cultural vibes of the Richmond District, the masses of musicians who have moved to the neighborhood in search of low rent and more living space have undoubtedly made an impact. Members from bands like April Magazine and the Umbrellas call the neighborhood home.

No artist has done more to extol the everyday wonders of living in the Richmond than Glenn Donaldson of the Reds, Pinks and Purples. Every one of the band’s album covers is adorned with pastel-soaked images from the neighborhood, and Donaldson’s lyrics and song titles are teeming with local references. Donaldson has been living in San Francisco since 1995 and has always been an integral part of the music scene, but it wasn’t until his dreampop project with the Reds, Pinks and Purples, that he received national acclaim (international, actually—he just wrapped a tour in the UK.)

In 2022, Donaldson told the Examiner that the Richmond often helped inspire his songwriting ideas.

“I decided to do this idea inspired by the Kink’s ‘Are The Village Green Preservation Society’,” said Donaldson. “Just write about what’s right here, right in my neighborhood. So, a lot of the songs were composed in my head when I was just walking around the Richmond.”

Donaldson is a longtime friend of Sartin of the Fresh & Onlys, whose return to live music is a true boon to San Francisco. Although the group is closely associated with the late 2000s garage rock scene (the Fresh & Onlys debut album was the third release ever on John Dwyer’s Castle Face Records, the defining local institution of that moment), they never fit neatly into that box of scrawling, lo-fi mayhem.

Formed in 2008 by Sartin and Cohen, who were eventually joined by drummer Kyle Gibson and guitarist Wymond Miles, the band’s early offerings were frenetic and uproarious—irreverent garage rock send-offs. But their second album—“Play It Strange,” which landed on Pitchfork’s coveted year-end music list for 2010—eschewed much of that dissonance, yielding beautiful, haunting songs like “Waterfall,” a once-in-a-generation track that captured the band at their high point.

The releases following “Play it Strange,” pushed the envelope even further, as the band embraced more polished production sounds and dutifully crafted songwriting approaches. Albums such as “Long Slow Dance” and “House of Spirits” were undeniably gorgeous creations, more dreampop than punk rock and showcasing just how vast the Fresh & Onlys oeuvre could stretch.

“At some point, we kind of exhausted our means for trying to be lo-fi and grungy, so to speak,” said Cohen. “We were like, let’s see how these songs can sound like in this shimmering, romantic milieu, to see if we can sound actually pretty. It wasn’t a conscious thing or a reaction to how people perceived us—we always steered our own ship. That’s just what we wanted to do at the time.”

Despite the group’s increasingly engaging sound, the Fresh & Onlys’ lineup shifted and splintered in later years, with typical band dynamics—health troubles, personal life changes—reducing the lineup to just Miles and Cohen at one point. Eventually, Miles moved to Colorado, and the band stopped performing live, with the group playing just one private show—at a friend’s birthday party—since 2018.

Although divided among different locales, the band never considered themselves broken-up, and they often discussed plans of reconnecting for live shows. The Friday show has been years in the making, and was made possible with Miles back in town for the Fourth of July holiday. 

“Adam asked us to do this show and we’re all big fans of the 4 Star and Balboa and what’s he doing in the Richmond,” said Sartin. “We were all interested in seeing how this feels, to visit this part of our history.”

Both Cohen and Sartin expressed their enduring love for the city—and to have their return to live music take place at the Richmond District feels particularly prescient.

“Whenever we went out on tour, we were so proud to be this San Francisco band,” said Cohen, who added that the group is considering adding additional live dates beyond this 4 Star show. “This show is going to be a little fly-by-the seat-of-our-pants kind of thing. But we’ve always been that way. And I think people appreciate that.”

In a city famous for embracing the strange and unpredictable, the Fresh & Onlys playing in the Richmond District on the Fourth of July holiday cannot feel more quintessentially San Francisco.

Real Estate mixing things up for their latest tour

Originally published in the San Francisco Examiner on March 12

For more than a decade, Real Estate have been defined by their dependable excellence. Every couple of years, the New Jersey indie rock band is basically guaranteed to release an album of languid beauty, combining elements of catchy jangle pop, melodious harmonies and intriguing wordplay.

Although reliability has become almost synonymous for the band at this point, Real Estate have opted to do something decidedly off brand for their latest tour. Their shows have been displays of unpredictable eccentricity, with their tour opener in New York City only available to attendees with the name Daniel (the name of their latest album) and subsequent performances embracing interactive audience set pieces.

For their show last month at The Independent, the band played a game of rock bingo, where each popped ball encouraged a new prompt, such as “drummer plays guitar” and when they make their return to San Francisco for a show at Bimbo’s 365 Club on Wednesday, that same kind of random energy will be present.

“It just kind of dawned on me that we didn’t have to do the same thing every night,” said Real Estate bassist and founding member Alex Bleeker. “It’s kind of crazy that people gather in a room and are still willing to look at us after all these years. And there’s so many other things you can do than just stand on stage and play your songs.”

While the band is devoted to delivering a unique experience, Real Estate does not need to rely on gimmicks to put on a compelling show. “Daniel,” the group’s sixth full-length album, is another document of flawless and clever songwriting, crafted in the mode of their New Jersey slack-rocker predecessors The Feelies and power-pop auteurs Big Star.

The group recorded the album in Nashville, and their countrified environs bleed into the record. That’s particularly noticeable in the presence of the pedal steel, an instrument that thrusts the band from the suburbs of New Jersey into the murkier swamps of the Deep South.

The pedal steel pops up periodically throughout “Daniel,” acting as a guiding North Star (“Haunted World”), a searing and silvery complementary addition (“Interior”) and as ominous and forlorn backdrop (“You Are Here.”)

“It wasn’t like we wrote those songs with pedal steel in mind, but we just couldn’t resist,” said Bleeker. “It was about embracing the history of the place–embracing Nashville.”

Daniel is powered by the cooing vocals of primary songwriter Martin Courtney, whose pillowy delivery has become a trademark for Real Estate. His hushed tones and the band’s gentle pacing make every Real Estate album imminently listenable, but each new offering brings a different wrinkle to the group, something evidenced by the latest decision to embrace pedal steel.

And like past albums, “Daniel” features a cameo appearance from Bleeker on lead vocals, this time for the Dylanesque ballad “Victoria.” Bleeker, who also records as a solo artist and as Alex Bleeker and the Freaks, has long reveled in his supporting role—happy to act as the palate cleanser and gruffer foil to Courtney’s more placid demeanor.

“We’re not dogmatic at all about having a song of mine in every album,” said Bleeker. “Martin is our chief songwriter, so he’s like the meat and potatoes of what’s going on in Real Estate. But if I have a song that comes up during our writing process that makes sense to include and sounds good, we’ll add it into the mix.”

Although he met Courtney and Real Estate guitarist Julian Lynch as kids growing up in New Jersey, for the past decade Bleeker has lived in Marin County. His presence here has turned the Bay Area into a kind of home away from home for Real Estate, who are semi-regular presences in San Francisco, often playing at The Chapel in the Mission District.

However, the band has never performed at Bimbo’s and Bleeker has actually never stepped foot in the venerable North Beach venue.

“I’m very excited to play at Bimbo’s—it seems like it has such a cool vibe,” said Bleeker. “All the photos I’ve seen of the place just gives it this legendary kind of feel. I’ve been in the Bay Area for a decade now, so I’m almost nearing local status, which makes these San Francisco shows so much fun. I think we’re all super jazzed to be bookending our West Coast tour with another gig here. It’s going to be fun. And different, for sure.”

Torrey siblings to bring shoegaze magic to Make Out Room

Originally published in the SF Examiner on February 28

While the entire musical world might be at our fingertips now, thanks to streaming services and the internet, there are still few better methods of discovering amazing new bands than having a cool older sibling who knows about music.

That time-honored tradition is what led to the creation of Torrey, a band composed of Kelly Gonsalves, his younger sister Ryann and three other members. The band will be playing on Friday at the Make Out Room as part of an album release party for its second full-length record.

“Oh, I definitely got to piggyback off all the hard work that Kelly was doing tracking down music when we were young,” said Ryann Gonsalves, who is four years younger than Kelly. “He was going on all these torrenting websites and making mixes and I would get to benefit from the trickle down of all that. I’d listen to that music, and just be like, ‘My god, this is awesome.’”

Growing up in the East Bay, Kelly said, there was always music playing in the Gonsalves household from bands such as the B-52s and the Cranberries. In the early 2000s, he discovered the albums of indie rock bands such as the Strokes and Wolf Parade, falling further in love with music and inspiring him to pick up the guitar.

Kelly began writing short compositions and sending them to Ryann, who was also exploring music. Eventually, the two started collaborating together, and Torrey was born in 2018. They released an EP in 2019, and their first full-length album, “Something Happy” came out in 2021.

Their latest album, “Torrey,” will debut on March 8, and it features some of the band’s most robust, layered and fully-realized songs to date. The Gonsalves siblings worked closely with Matt Ferrara, lead singer of San Francisco band The Umbrellas, to produce tracks that are teeming with different elements and rich in texture, resulting in gorgeous dreampop and shoegaze creations.

“By the time we were ready to work with [Ferrara] , Ryann and I had these songs that were pretty much complete, but we knew we wanted to add more to them,” said Kelly Gonzalves. “We wanted to include these flourishes and gave him (Ferrera) a lot of creative freedom to include synths and keyboards and maybe some guitar solos. It was important for us to be collaborative in that regard.”

While the first two Torrey albums were self-released, the latest LP is being issued on Slumberland Records, a legendary Oakland label that has long been a champion of local groups.

A collection of ethereal tracks that channel white noise and dissonant feedback into gorgeous, atmospheric landscapes, the new self-titled album evokes much of the great past Slumberland acts, such as Black Tambourine, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart and Frankie Rose.

Although the songs have disparate elements — scrawling waves of noise with stirring, uplifting melodies — the contrasts work in a strangely compelling way, a reflection of the Gonsalves’ siblings differing, yet complementary approaches.

“Of course we grew up together, but we’re very different people and I think that works in so many positive ways,” said Ryann Gonsalves. “It’s been super interesting to go back and forth with these different ideas and to be discussing different moods and themes. It really turns into this fun, wild-card puzzle, where we balance each other out. Somehow it all works.”

While Kelly typically draws the sonic foundation of each song, Ryann will provide melodies and lyrics. Although Ryann’s lyrics are deeply personal, they’re written in a manner that is more opaque and mysterious, providing opportunities for listeners (even Kelly) to interpret them through their own perspectives.

“I kind of make my own meanings to what Ryann writes,” her brother said. “I’m in the headspace of playing guitar and coming up with chord progressions and when Ryann adds lyrics they take on this different impression for me.”

While the duo were responsible for writing all the songs on the band’s latest album, Torrey has now grown into a five-piece live band, featuring Sinclair Riley on drums, Adam Honingford on lead guitar, and Susie Chinisci on synths and backing vocals.

Now both living in Oakland, Ryann and Kelly are just one more element of a resurgent Bay Area indie rock scene — a tight-knit, cohesive group of acts, many of them which are featured on Slumberland Records (Chime School, The Umbrellas and Papercuts, to name a few.)

“I feel like being on Slumberland is sort of like coming full circle for us,” said Ryann Gonsalves. “One of the first bands I really fell in love with was Veronica Falls, who were signed to Slumberland at the time. To end up on the same label as a band that inspiring, and to be part of this group with so many of our friends — it just feels right.”

Art-pop duo Water From Your Eyes coming to Regency Ballroom

Originally published in the SF Examiner on February 21

Listening to Water From Your Eyes — the New York art-pop duo that will be playing at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco on Feb. 27 — can make for an utterly delirious experience.

The sonic backdrop for their songs is hallucinatory and wildly energetic, arrays of jagged guitars slicing through jittery synth compositions and throbbing rhythm movements.

The instruments all blend and merge together — not in the wall-of-sound shoegaze style, but in an alien, minimalist manner in which the original aims and purposes of each tool are deliberately upended.

On top of this beguiling combination is the dispassionate and deadpan vocal delivery of singer Rachel Brown, who emerges above the instrumental chaos with an almost angelic serenity. Brown, who uses they/them pronouns, gives the distinct impression of someone who stops by a riotous all-night rave purely for the refreshments.

“You know, when it comes to my delivery, I’m mostly just trying to enunciate my words correctly,” Brown said. “I feel like I talk pretty dryly most of the time, and that translates into how I sing. I don’t get that animated too often, unless it’s about pretty stupid stuff.”

Brown’s vocal takes might be unconventional, but they only add an illusory excitement to the work of Water From Your Eyes, a disparate approach that can make each song feel like a mystery to unlock. On the group’s latest album, 2023’s “Everyone’s Crushed,” the band’s fearlessness is taken to new heights, with traditional song structures and tropes eschewed in favor of relentless exploration.

“When we’re working on recording the vocals and doing the lyrics, the way Rachel handles everything is very natural,” said Nate Amos, the other half of the duo.

“It almost feels detached from what’s going on in the words, but that’s kind of what makes it all work,” Amos said. “I feel like not emphasizing a particular emotion in the vocal delivery turns the song into a little bit more of an inkblot. Then it can be interpreted in different ways rather than like, ‘Oh, this person sounds so sad or so happy or whatever.’”

Water from Your Eyes started nearly a decade ago, when Amos and Brown were both living in Chicago. The two were dating, but they eventually split up, and Brown relocated to New York City. Intent on maintaining their burgeoning musical collaboration, Amos moved to New York as well, and the band has steadily developed and evolved its sound over the course of five full-length albums.

The early catalog of the band is more steeped in traditional indie-rock settings, with acoustic guitars and soothing synths accompanying Brown’s expressive and expansive singing style. The duo continued to venture outside of those familiar terrains for each successive album, culminating in the adventurous atmosphere of “Everyone’s Crushed,” which was released on the legendary indie label Matador Records. Each track acts as a palate cleanser, providing an alternative reality to its successor song. The tunes include brooding, scratchy industrial offerings (“Open”), austere ballads (“14”) and sleekly polished club bangers (“Out There.”)

“I actually thought, at the time we were making this album, that it was all pretty tame,” Amos said. “There was definitely no intention of like, ‘Let’s really push it with this one’, although I guess I see why some people might think it’s a little weird.”

Despite the uncommon nature of the album, it was widely celebrated, landing on best-of-2023 lists from outlets such as The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and Pitchfork.

“It’s been really nice to see how this has been received,” Brown said. “It’s kind of been unbelievable in a way that I know this is all happening, because I’ve seen it. But in no way has any of this registered.”

The duo has come a long way from its early beginnings, a sentiment that can be best distilled from the music video for “Barley,” a propulsive track highlighted by Brown’s brazenly monotone opening line, “One, two, three, four/I count mountains.” In that video, Brown and Amos play corporate drones working in a joyless, fluorescent-lighted office space.

“Neither of us have had typical office jobs before, but we’ve both had these very frustrating jobs in the past,” Amos said. “I think we both have a greater appreciation for where we’re at now after doing that kind of work.”

Delightfully offbeat Being Dead can't wait for first-ever SF performance

Originally published in the SF Examiner on February 21

According to Being Dead, the Austin-based group that performing at the Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco on Sunday, the band’s origins can be traced back to its two founding members.

Both of them had a special appreciation for the unvarnished wonders of the human body.

“We were actually in rival nudist colonies, and we met after they merged together,” said Cody Dosier, who more commonly goes by his nom de plume, Gumball. “But it turned out to be a very aggressive community and everything became very degrading. And we both decided that we weren’t having fun doing that anymore and that we should challenge ourselves by creating art — by making music.”

Sounds like a heartwarming story — but Dosier and his creative partner Juli Keller (who goes by Falcon B----) don’t always stick to it. They’ve also told reporters that they met at Yale University, at a Cinnabon bakery and at their 10-year high school reunion.

Regardless of the band’s true past, what’s most exciting about Being Dead is what they’re doing these days. The band’s long-awaited full-length debut, “When Horses Would Run,” which arrived last year, is a kaleidoscopic collection of art-rock, garage, psychedelic, pop and lo-fi tunes.

“There wasn’t some masterful design with the album — we just have a lot of different kinds of musical tastes,” said Falcon B----. “We tried to put things together and weave them all into one interesting piece. Then we just kind of crossed our fingers that the outcome would be fun. It feels like an adventure that way.”

The songs range from delightfully offbeat gospel tunes (“God vs. Bible”) to careening surf-rock anthems (“The Great American Picnic”), to jazzy renditions of female empowerment (“Muriel’s Big Day Off”). And of course, no album is complete without a mission statement hyping up the band’s aim of “having a good time” (“We Are Being Dead”).

Somehow, it all works — listening to the album feels exactly like the kind of winsome journey hoped for by Falcon B----.

It can be fun to play spot the influences on the album — there is the shrill dexterity of icy post-punk group Women; the reckless, nobody’s-behind-the-wheel manic energy of Dehd; and the ebullient, adventurous nature of the Unicorns — but collectively, the sound is pure Being Dead: a singular and unique output.

“Considering that we basically just threw random darts at a dartboard, the album sounds pretty cohesive,” Falcon B---- said. “There were a number of influences we wanted to include, but it was pretty much all improv. It works, but that’s just mostly by chance.”

The rollicking sonic landscape of “When Horses Would Run” is matched by equally evocative lyricism, with Falcon B---- and Gumball detailing mythical creatures, strange cult scenes and images of suburban ennui. They have an endearing soft spot for animals, particularly the equines that make up the album title.

“Horses are very strong, and they’re actually the fastest land animals in the world,” Gumball said. “It’s called horsepower for a reason. I’ve never heard of anything called cheetah power.”

While “When Horses Would Run” marks the band’s first full-length recording, the band has been playing live since 2016 and has built up quite the cult following, particularly in its hometown of Austin, Texas. Their frenetic shows have a reputation for being surreal pieces of performance art, with the occasional audience plant provoking the band into increasingly outlandish acts of onstage zaniness.

“We’ve always had this small underground following, which has been pretty neat,” Falcon B---- said. “It definitely makes the shows more fun and interesting.”

Falcon B---- and Gumball — who are joined in the band by bassist Ricky Moto— are already working on their follow-up album to “When Horses Would Run,” which they hope to release this fall. Their current tour, in which they are opening for the atmospheric act Husbands, is the most extensive of their career to date, and they have plans to visit Europe and the U.K. in 2024 as well.

Sunday’s show at the Rickshaw Stop will be the band’s first-ever appearance in San Francisco, a moment its members are eagerly anticipating.

“I was planning on living in San Francisco for a while, but I have never been there in my adult life,” Falcon B---- said. “I can’t wait to go to Golden Gate Park and look at sailboats crisscrossing the big blue ocean. We both think San Francisco is a great city.”

It might not be a nudist colony (or a Cinnabon), but with its long history of proudly celebrating unconventional characters, San Francisco seems like the perfect venue to host Being Dead.

Snail Mail to host two days of music at Great American Music Hall as part of annual Noise Pop fest

Originally posted in the SF Examiner on February 21

If you are fortunate enough to run into Snail Mail singer-songwriter Lindsey Jordan in public these days, you’ll probably notice that she’s holding a camera or a phone to document the moment.

Jordan first burst upon the scene nearly a decade ago as a precocious wunderkind, releasing her debut EP, “Habit” as a 16-year-old. Her first full-length album — 2018’s “Lush,” a fully-formed collection of wistful indie-pop songs — landed her on endless music publication lists for album of the year.

Yet during those halcyon early days, when she was touring relentlessly and playing nonstop, Jordan had little time to reflect and appreciate the uniqueness of her situation. Now, she said, she has a renewed focus on capturing and cherishing the ephemera of her prodigious music career.

“I’m way more in like an archivist period in my life,” said Jordan, now 24. “I’m keeping passes and souvenirs from everywhere now. When everything first happened, it was just so much, so fast, and it wasn’t like I wasn’t grateful for everything, but it just didn’t really register. Now, I want to take a lot of pictures and, you know, keep wristbands and just try to appreciate everything a little more.”

Expect plenty of Polaroids to snap on March 1 and 2, when Snail Mail hosts two days of music at the Great American Music Hall. A festival-within-a-festival, the two shows are being billed as the second annual Valentine West, an event curated by Jordan featuring some of her favorite artists (the event title is a tribute to her sophomore album, “Valentine.”).

The two-day gathering will be a highlight of this year’s Noise Pop Music and Arts Festival, an annual weeklong-plus music event that takes place in multiple venues throughout the Bay Area.

This year’s Noise Pop lineup features legendary hip-hop group Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, lo-fi troubadour John Darnielle of the Mountain Goats, and avant-garde impresario Laetitia Sadier of the post-rock outfit Stereolab, among more than 100 other acts.

There will be plenty of Bay Area groups included in that lineup, including ubiquitous musician Stephen Steinbrink, who will open for Snail Mail on March 1, and Richmond district dream-poppers The Reds, Pink and Purples, who will take the stage March 2.

“We toured a little with Stephen when he was playing in [now-disbanded] Girlpool and just became massive fans of his work,” said Jordan. “I haven’t been following the San Francisco scene super closely, but every band I’ve heard from The City, I’ve really liked.”

Valentine West will be one of only a handful of live dates for Jordan and Snail Mail this year. Even though it’s been more than two years since the release of “Valentine,” Jordan said she is intent on keeping up a semi-regular touring schedule for Snail Mail (which is a multipiece ensemble live) to keep its performances tight, and also to ensure that the band stays on people’s peripheries in an age of ever-dwindling attention spans.

She’s also mindful of maintaining a healthy approach to her work. Following the runaway smash success of “Lush,” Jordan said she struggled with the overwhelming stress that accompanied the whirlwind life of a musician.

Despite those challenges and a lingering sense of outsized expectations entering her second album, Jordan managed to dazzle again with “Valentine,” which was released in 2021. Featuring slight changes to her vocal inflections, more emphasis on gauzy synth work (Jordan is a highly celebrated guitarist) and increasingly mature lyrical interplay, “Valentine” represented the next logical evolution of a talented artist.

“I’m really proud of that album, because I was just going through so many natural disasters in my life at the time,” Jordan said. “Coming off ‘Lush,’ I was putting myself through the wringer, asking myself, ‘How am I going to do this again?’ But eventually I was able to navigate things and I just feel so much better as a result of that experience.”

Jordan said she’s working on new material, although she doesn’t have a definitive timetable for the next Snail Mail record. She said she doesn’t want to push the album too far out, though, because she understands just how precious the opportunity she has at the moment.

“I started this thing off as this teenage pop project, which always made me worried that people’s attention would kind of fade away after the whole teenager thing kind of died down,” she said. “I was always nervous that I wouldn’t be able to come up with enough songs to keep us from fading into obscurity, so it’s been so important for me to keep myself out there and continue pushing myself as an artist.

“But I feel like I know what it takes to keep the Snail Mail ship running now. It’s kind of a rickety pirate ship at times, but we make it work.”