Radio 94.7 in Sacramento will be presenting a special multi-artist concert event in December dubbed, “Electric Christmas”. The line-up includes performances by Cage the Elephant, Alt-J, GroupLove, Capital Cities, The Features and MS MR. The concert event will be held at Sleep Train Arena on December 4th, and tickets are currently on sale at Ticketmaster. [Read more…]
Following a successful run in the UK in September and October, Thomas Dolby is bringing his special theatrical experience to the United States in November. “The Invisible Lighthouse – Film and Live Performance by Thomas Dolby” is a screening of his documentary along with his live “transmedia” performance of the accompanying soundtrack. The film is about the closure of a lighthouse on an island off the East Anglian coast that served as an airfield, testing ground for experimental weapons, and home to the main transmission network for the BBC World Service. [Read more…]
Singer-songwriter Anna Nalick is scheduled to play a handful of concert dates along the West Coast this month. The critically acclaimed artist is best known for her debut album, Wreck of the Day, which featured the hit song “Breathe (2 AM)”, and she has since released a second studio album, Broken Doll & Odds & Ends. [Read more…]
The Scottish synthpop group Chvrches is kicking off a massive world tour this month, beginning with a dozen dates in the United States before hitting the UK, Asia, Australia and New Zealand, and Europe. Their debut studio album, The Bones of What You Believe, debuted in September. [Read more…]
KMFDM, the pioneering industrial band with origins going back to the early 80s in Germany, is in the midst of a U.S. tour that kicked off in Boise a few weeks ago and is terminating on the West Coast. The current incarnation of the band is supporting their latest studio album, Kunst, which was released earlier this year. [Read more…]
Grammy Award-winning Irish singer-songwriter Sinead O’Connor will be performing in a series of concerts across the United States, kicking off tonight with three consecutive shows in Chicago. Her most recent album, How About I Be Me (And You Be You)?, was released last year. [Read more…]
Charli XCX’s first U.S. headlining tour kicked off this past week, making an early stop in San Francisco at Slim’s last night to a dedicated and enthusiastic young crowd. The high energy evening kicked off with opening sets by LIZ and Kitten, providing a showcase of music with three young women fronting acts with three different styles of music. While Charli has been making music and performing going back several years, she broke much wider into the pop culture consciousness in the past year with Icona Pop’s “I Love It”, which she wrote and also provided vocals to in the hit pop song. Her own music, off her debut album True Romance, is a bit more experimental and darker by contrast, which is why she gave the song to the synthpop Swedish duo for their own album. Charli has had a productive time since I last saw her opening for Santigold in the Summer of 2012, having toured with Coldplay, Paramore, Marina and the Diamonds, as well as put out a lot of new music and music videos like the recently released “SuperLove“. She is definitely one to continue to watch as she forges her own unique path through the music industry. She put on a great show last night and really seems to have grown into having a real command on the stage (with new band in tow) and has inspired and sparked the imagination of a generation of fans.
“Thank you so, so much for being here tonight. It means so, so much to us.” Lizzy Plapinger, the “MS” in MS MR thanking the crowd at the Independent in San Francisco last night for being “early adopters” of their music, while the “MR” half, Max Hershenow, preps the crowd for the last song of the night, “Hurricane”. Appropriately enough, the new band has taken the music industry by storm with their phenomenal first studio album, Secondhand Rapture, which I certainly rank as one of the Top 10 Albums of 2013. Their unique blend of at once dark and poppy electronic music has taken me back to those same feelings I had when I found Yazoo 30 years ago (with another male-female duo in Vince Clarke and Alison Moyet), though updated and reflective of our time today. This was the third of three sell out shows at The Independent in the past week, which is remarkable since it was only four months ago that I saw them take the same stage supporting CSS back in June. In much the same way Imagine Dragons graduated from The Independent (they played there as well earlier this year) to filling sports arenas, I suspect that MS MR will continue on with their upward trajectory, carried by their awesome music and brilliant live performances, which sound as sublime as the studio recordings. This is definitely a tour that fan who are lucky enough to check out will not forget.
Victoria Christina Hesketh, AKA Little Boots, tonight embarked on her world tour supporting the highly acclaimed Nocturnes, which was released in May. [Read more…]
“We do it for love, sweet love…” Fittingly, the final words sung on stage both Saturday and Sunday night in San Francisco by GROUPLOVE, from their hit song, “Colours”. Playing back-to-back shows as part of their special run of their “Seesaw Tour”, performing at two small venues in select cities, doing one traditional show and one acoustic-style show, each night featured a different kind of show, almost as if seen, heard, and felt through a kaleidoscope that shifted not just night to night, but within each show. GROUPLOVE is a band with probably the best energy of anyone playing today – such joy and positivity beaming not just from the speakers at the venues, but from the artists themselves – their expressions and jumping around, and interactions with the audience. The funny thing is that the audiences and shows kind of played counter to expectations, with the “heavy” night at The Independent skewing older and more mellow and the “light” night at The Chapel being much more youthful and boundless, which seemed to fuel the band into rocking their acoustic instruments on the tiny stage, which could barely contain them. Two incredible shows that delivered well beyond expectations.