Category: Concert Review

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Concert Review

Murdoc’s Local Music Picture Blog #4-ish

So after a short blogging hiatus, I have returned with my fourth installment to the Local Music Picture Blog. My hiatus does not mean that I didn’t attend any shows, I was just having an allergic reaction to my computer… or something like that…which seems to be carrying over to this post, as the posting of pictures just does not want to work for me 🙁 . But don’t worry, you can see all my pictures clicking on my name and then clicking on Pics.

But anyways, last Thursday, I went to The Brewery to rock out with The Pneurotics, Pink Flag, River City Ransom, and The Dry Heathens, and rocking out is exactly what went down.

The Pneurotics are an alt rock based out of Chapel Hill. Their 2008 release, Forty, is relaxed alt. rock which features a few slight folk music nuances. Most of the show, however, was performances of material that will be released on the yet to be named album they intend to release in the fall of 2009. The new material is solid, driving, guitar heavy rock’n roll, and I for one can not wait til fall to get my hands on the cd. The Pneurotics next show is The Johnny Cash Bash at The Pinhook. They will be paying tribute to Johnny Cash with The Tender Fruit, Gambling The Muse, and Bull City.

Pink Flag… where to start? Pink Flag is a three piece, all girl, pop punk /grunge rock extravaganza that is based out of Durham. Now I have to be honest here, the first time I listened to  Introducing Pink Flag & The Homewrekers, I was ify about it. But having seen Pink Flag live, I do have a new appreciation for the album. And anyone that thinks they are the stereotypical, all girl bands are bad or ok at best, type of outfit; go see them live and they will destroy your brain with awesome. All the girls can play and sing great, as shown when they switched out their instruments and vocal roles. Their next show will be tonight at the Relay For Life Benefit at Local 506 with I Was Totally Destroying It and Lake Inferior. Pink Flag will also be featured at WKNC & Tir Na Nog’s Local Beer, Local Band night on March 26th with Whatever Brains.

River City Ransom, third to take the stage, is a five man, pop group based in Raleigh. RCR’s performance was perhaps the most laid back of the night. The group’s Myspace claims the groups is Punk, but I think they are straight Indie Rock. We’ll have to wait and see what direction they choose to go in as the group as just recently added a few members. River City Ransom’s next showing will be at the Reservoir on March 23rd with The Dry Heathens and Dark Knights of Camelot.

The Dry Heathens were last on the night, and the Durham based, indie punk,  group showed up to kick ass as usual. This makes the third time I’ve seen them and I am pretty sure they get better each time. If you can not make it to their show on March 23rd, I suggest you make it to the second night of Viking Storm (the Hammer No More The Finger’s CD release celebration weekend) when they play with The Beast, Deleted Scenes, The Future Kings of Nowhere, and Hammer No More The Fingers. The show will be  freaking awesome  and worth every penny. And if you can’t make either of those shows I encourage you to listen to The Dry Heathens first releases, First Contact With Ground, because it is a truely great album.

Hopefully next week I will have pictures  in the picture blog, but in the mean time, don’t forget to check out The Rock Report and catch a great local show!

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Concert Review

Submit Your DBB 6 Photos!

If you were one of the hundreds of people I saw at DBB6 taking pictures of the bands and the crowd, we would LOVE to show off your pics online.  Please send any digital copies of pictures to wkncphoto@gmail.com.  All pictures will be credited, and if you have a website please include that in the email as well!

Thanks to everyone who came out to the Pour House the last two nights to help make this years Double Barrel Benefit the best ever!  It was truly a legendary show and we were happy so many of you could make it out!

Be on the lookout for more upcoming post-DBB blogs in the next couple of days as we wrap everything up.

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Concert Review

Recap: Rosebuds, Megafaun and Love Language at Cat’s Cradle

Saturday night at Cat’s Cradle was perfect. I trudged through last week, snow and school and all, and what was really getting me through was knowing that on Saturday, I’d get to see The Rosebuds and just dance it out.

Every time I see The Rosebuds, it reaffirms my theory that Kelly and Ivan are actually the coolest people on earth.  It’s so obvious that they give it their all, and that’s why as a result their shows are always really fun. Saturday was no exception. I won’t go into great detail about their set, because if you weren’t their it will just make you feel jealous and bummed out, but rest assured, they put on an excellent show, complete with pink Christmas lights and a very confused little dog who appeared on stage during the encore.

The Rosebuds, photo by Mike Alston

The Rosebuds were great, but they’re always great. What made Saturday night so especially awesome was that it was a great show from start to finish.

Lately I’ve been really loving  The Love Language, who started off the night. They are all so energetic and cute, I saw them at the Local 506 back in December and had been looking forward to seeing them again ever since.  Even though they apologized several times for having colds, they did not disappoint. If they hadn’t mentioned it, I don’t think I would’ve suspected that they were not feeling up to their A-game. I highly recommend checking out their MySpace, because every last one of their songs is spectacular.

Oh, and Megafaun. They’re from your backyard. These guys seriously rule. Much like The Rosebuds, they were very in touch with the crowd. I like feeling like a show is interactive, so I give them points for initiating an elaborate singalong during which they divided the crowd into three sections with three different singing parts. Bonus points also for burning incense during their set, and for their very long, very manly beards.

Bradley Cook of Megafaun, photo by Mike Alston

Long story short, Saturday night at Cat’s Cradle was totally awesome. There is such a wealth of local music in the Triangle, and I think that’s something that we’re all really lucky to be a part of. This music comes from your neighbors, you know? Whenever I’m listening to these bands and thinking about how much they rule, that’s what really blows my mind about it all. This music comes from my neighbors.

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Concert Review

The Sign of Evil Existence

Rotting Christ

Rotting Christ is one of my all time favorite bands in the metal world. I have been to all of their Lucifer Over America tours, which have been their only American tours as well as own all of their cds. I have guitar picks from both shows as well as autographs and photos from all of the band members. I got to both shows about 3-4 hours early.  Needless to say, I am a fanboy of Rotting Christ. However these guys are one of the purest and truest metal bands in the scene. They put so much emotion into both their studio work as well as their live shows. The band members treat all their fans like they were truly brothers and sisters. I have been honored to sit down and talk with Sakis, the lead vocalist, rythmn guitarist, and founder of the band.  He is one of the nicest guys I have had the chance to meet in the metal world. The show, at Volume 11, was top notch. I didn’t much care for the opening bands, even though I was excited to see thr opening band Epicurean, they disappointed vocal wise. Their singer couldn’t seem to hit the notes that he sang on the album, he was very badly off key. Mantic Ritual I had never heard going into the show, but they played some good old fashioned thrash metal. However none of these guys mattered because I was front and center for the band I had been waiting since they announced they would be touring here again, Rotting Christ. If you are a true metal head, you need to experience this band live. They are truly masters of their craft writing such beautiful music and heavy lyrics. They played with so much energy that the crowd was acting just as crazy as they were. They played a multitude of tracks from many albums, though most of their tracks came off the recently released Theogonia. They played, what I considered their single and probably best track, “King of a Stellar War”. They also touched on my favorite all time album of theirs, Thy Mighty Contract, and played “Turn All Sufferings Into Plauges” and “Sign of Evil Existence”. Truly this show was a sign of evil existence as we were shown metal in it’s purest form. Anyone should go see Rotting Christ just because they are one of the greatest metal bands out there.

Setlist

The Sign of Prime Creation
Kervanos Kivernitos
Athanatoi Este
Enuma Elish
King of a Stellar War
The Sign of Evil Existence
Transform A Suffering Into Plagues
The Fifth Illusion
Satani
In Domine Sathani
Phobos Synagogue
Nemecic
Threnody

Encore:
Non Serviam

-Noobhammer

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Concert Review Local Music

It May Not Be Metal, But You Can Still Head Bang If Ya Want.

Welcome to my first installment of the (at least biweekly) Local Music Picture Blog!

A Tin Djinn and Goner rocked out WKNC & Tir Na Nog’s Local Beer, Local Band last night (1/08/09), and if you weren’t there, you missed something great. The night started off with A Tin Djinn who lost a lot of their equipment recently in fire, but it didn’t stop them from jamming out with a strange mix of music that can only be described as truly unique. I couldn’t figure out if I wanted to get up and dance or sit back and chill with a cold brew. And if you can get past the polka-dot jump suit, face paint, and trench coat combination, A Tin Djinn may be the band for you.

A Tin Djinn: If you were to take The Pixies and Queen, extract their DNA and then cross breed them in some strange animal orgy, you would get A Tin Djinn. Think mellow, not quite hard rock… hard rock.

Goner: Think a high energy funk-tastic rock show, that urges you to get up and move. Goner has played Local Beer, Local Band several times now and they bring a set full of energy and excitement that you can’t help but want to get up and thrash around to, even though it isn’t the type of music you associate encouraging mosh pits.

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Concert Review

Hands Up for 2009

I decided to ring in the new year at the Local 506 in Chapel Hill for their “Rockin’ Eve” show. Normally anything titled “Rockin’ Eve” would turn me away, but it the lineup was Hammer No More The Fingers, Red Collar and Kerbloki. I managed to miss all but about two songs from HNMTF and those were spent inching my way toward the bar. Let’s just say the place was a little crowded.

If you check out Red Collar’s MySpace, next to “sounds like” it says “there’s going to be a fire.” That’s actually a pretty accurate description. The band is VERY high energy. It didn’t hurt that it was New Year’s Eve and before their set the crowd celebrated the birthdays of drummer Jonathan Truesdale and bassist Beth Kutchma and the two year anniversary of Hammer No More The Fingers. There was cake.

It’s about 15 minutes to midnight, we’re all ready to rock, the lights dim and the band launches into Bruce Springsteen’s “Dancing in the Dark.” After appropriately pumping up the crowd, they squeezed in “Hands Up” before the countdown. I won’t rely exactly what the band suggested we do with 2008, should there be any children reading, but the idea was to move forward.

The first time I saw Red Collar was at the WKNC Double Barrel Benefit 5 in Feb. 2008. I caught them again in the fall at one our Local Beer Local Band nights at Tir Na Nog. If you are serious about making yourself “a better you” in 2009, I suggest you add “see more local shows” to your resolution list and put Red Collar at the top.