Queen City Sounds Podcast – Page 13 – Queen City Sounds and Art

Queen City Sounds Podcast S3E08: Ghost Canyon Fest

Ghost Canyon Fest organizers (L-R: Brian Dooley, Cory Hager, Jeremy Brashaw and Sean Dove), photo by Tom Murphy

Ghost Canyon Fest is “A Boundary-Pushing DIY Music Festival” that runs August 11-13 across three venues. The event germinated as an idea among friends in the bands New Standards Men, Moon Pussy and Almanac Man who attended and/or performed at events like PRF BBQ, Caterwaul and No Coast and felt there was enough interest and enough mutual connections among bands well outside of Denver to hold a viable, like-minded festival in the Mile High City. In year’s past Denver hosted multiple festivals of strongly focused curation like Goldrush Festival, Transistor Festival, Denver Noise Fest, DAD Fest , Ultra Metal and in Boulder Communikey among others but left field sounds are largely not included in most other festivals in Denver. Ghost Canyon Fest in its inaugural year of 2023 goes to some length to shine a light on those sounds in a more high profile way including a mention in a recent issue of The Wire as a festival of note. If you go, expect to see stars of local and non-local noise rock, post-metal, noise and experimental dance and drone including BIG|BRAVE, Quits, Masma Dream World, Big’N, Church Fire, Pleasure Venom and of course the projects of the event organizers. For a full list and a schedule of events please and to purchase passes for the weekend or single nights visit the Ghost Canyon Fest website. At the site you can link to curated playlists created by various artists performing that weekend. This interview includes a conversation with Jeremy Brashaw (New Standards Men), Cory Hager (Moon Pussy), Sean Dove (Almanac Man) and Brian Dooley (Almanac Man).

Listen to our interview with the organizers on Bandcamp and look for our interviews with various artists performing at Ghost Canyon Fest in the coming weeks.

Ghost Canyon Fest website

Queen City Sounds Podcast S3E07: Charming Disaster

Charming Disaster is a “goth-folk duo” comprised of Ellia Bisker and Jeff Morris based out of Brooklyn, NY that has since 2012 written high concept songs that explore themes of human exploration of the natural world and the ways our attempts at explaining the world and our lives weave their way into culture in fascinating ways that are often hidden from contemporary society. In its songwriting Charming Disaster uncover these secret and often merely neglected connections and turn those paths of curiosity into fascinating narratives for its body of work. The project’s latest album is Super Natural History, a musical cabinet of curiosities in which each song is a curio and oddity of our collective mythological heritage in the form of stories of witchcraft, monsters and the underworld and where our ideas of magic and science intersect in alchemical fashion. The music is rooted in a sense of wonder and strong songcraft that renders the sometimes unusual subject matter accessible and immediately relatable.

Listen to our interview with Charming Disaster on Bandcamp, listen to Super Natural History below where you can also purchase the album digitally, on CD or vinyl on the group’s own Bandcamp site and follow the adventures and exploits of Charming Disaster at charmingdisaster.com.

Queen City Sounds Podcast S3E06: Isadora Eden

Isadora Eden started as a solo project in a more indie singer-songwriter vein but even the early releases were imbued with an imaginative flair and an ear for deeper emotional coloring. As Eden brought on board collaborators to help flesh out the sound in the newer songs she was writing the music evolved into a darker, more sonically rich sound that was a bit more like something one might expect to hear from a songwriter like PJ Harvey or Mary Timony but more darkwave, more flourishes of atmospheric sounds both guitar-rooted and electronic akin to the stranger end of shoegaze. This creative period has resulted in one of the more fascinating records of 2023 in forget what makes it glow, the debut full-length for the project. Eden’s deeply evocative voice guides you through an introspective set of songs that are melancholic, reflective and in the end cathartic. Like the kind of dream pop record with some grit and edge, willing to wax noisy in moments as if to embody the way life and our subsconscious experiences are analog and meaningful, intimate, in a way pristine digital and curated experiences rarely are. The album will be available on vinyl and digital and for more information on finding group’s releases, social media and upcoming shows please visit the band’s website.

Listen to our interview with Isadora Eden and main songwriting partner and drummer Sumner Erhard on Bandcamp and catch one of the album release live shows listed below.

Thursday 7.13 w/Mystee and SGRNY at The Lair (207 ½ S. 3rd) 7 p.m. Laramie, WY

Friday 7.14 at The Lyric Cinema 7:30 p.m. w/Safekeeper, Elke and Mystee

Saturday 7.15 w/Pink Lady Monster and Deth Rali at The Marquis 7 p.m.

Queen City Sounds Podcast S3E05: Carl Baggaley of The Royal Arctic Institute

The Royal Arctic Institute, photo by Charlotte Hysen

The Royal Arctic Institute calls itself “an instrumental, post-punk, cinematic jazz quintet” and is currently based out of New York City. Its compositions strike one as soundtrack music for coastal noir with the hard to define sense that part of its sonic DNA is nearby large bodies of water and the ways sunrise and sunset ripple across the ocean. There is the mood of day into night as though the music was conceived and written for a time between an active workday and night time plans. The elegant melodies and percussion rise and resolve with an intuitive grace and evoke emotional states like the musicians have in mind creating imagery with luminous layers of tone and sonic shading. In 2022 the group released the From Catnip to Coma EP and in 2023 a companion EP From Coma To Catharsis perhaps charting and processing the long stretch of the early pandemic and its effects on life and the psyche. Both records were recorded and produced by James McNew of Yo La Tengo fame in the historic Neumann Leather Factory in Hoboken, New Jersey. The band consists of veteran musicians drummer Lyle Hysen (Das Damen, Arthur Lee), guitarists John Leon (Roky Erickson, Summer Wardrobe, Abra Moore) and Lynn Wright (And The Wiremen, Bee And Flower, Shilpa Ray), bassist David Motamed (Das Damen, Two Dollar Guitar, Arthur Lee, Townes Van Zandt) and keyboardist Carl Baggaley (Headbrain, Gramercy Arms) whose musical chemistry is obvious across the project’s recorded output. On August 4, 2023 Already Dead Records and Tapes will release a full length album on 12” LP vinyl of the two EPs combined as Catnip to Coma to Catharsis.

Listen to our interview with Carl Baggaley on Bandcamp and follow The Royal Arctic Institute at the links below.

theroyalarctic.com

The Royal Arctic Institute on Bandcamp

Queen City Sounds Podcast S3E04: REZN

REZN is a heavy psych band from Chicago whose forays into evocative and haunting music incorporate the aesthetics of doom, shoegaze and cinematic ambient to create dynamic soundscapes that capture a sense of the cosmic and of the deep mystery of nature. The group recently released its new album Solace. The record’s cover looks like something one might have expected on an old Rainbow or Hawkwind record of windswept mountains and the sunlight breaking through a raging storm. The music within is not unlike that expectation set of epic journeys and existential catharsis through finely sculpted and orchestrated volume and majestically accented rhythms. If Lovecraft and Michael Moorcock had somehow collaborated on a dark science fantasy trilogy in the modern era this is the music for that story—menace, spiritual contemplation and transcendence.

Listen to our interview with bassist Phil Cangelosi on Bandcamp and catch REZN on tour now (dates, streaming music and more information available at rezn.band) including a stop at the Hi-Dive in Denver with local doom legends Oryx on Friday, July 7, 2023.

Queen City Sounds Podcast S3E03: Bestial Mouths

Bestial Mouths, photo by Elemental Eyes Photography

Bestial Mouths began in 2009 as a band that early on might be considered post-punk but even its debut EP, 2009’s Stabile Vices, had elements of noise and industrial set to ritualistic rhythms with tribal percussion. All along, vocalist Lynette Cerezo who has a background in fashion and design brought to performances a striking visual presentation that drew upon the imagery of mythology and dreams in a creative interplay with the music. Cerezo’s lyrics have always explored issues of gender, identity and personal liberation and whether combined with the performance or not, certainly enhanced by the live experience, meant as a conduit for mutual inspiration and uplift by challenging arbitrary societal notions of “proper” social roles and behavior and aesthetics. A Bestial Mouths show and the music embodies aspects of the subconscious and what has traditionally been relegated to artistic darkness and the feminine, the intuitive and the supernatural. Cerezo through the practice of her art reclaims all of that as a source of power and dignity by demonstrating how it isn’t negative, that it is a part of a complete human life and that such things can be harnessed to the benefit of the self and all.

More recent Bestial Mouths records starting with the new arc of music since the project has been mainly headed by Cerezo since 2018 has reconciled the early post-punk and Goth sound and noise completely with the more mystical and non-Western experimental sonic ideas and rhythms that have been a feature if not the focus of the music since the beginning. But in 2020’s RESURRECTEDINBLACK, the first Bestial Mouths record crafted with Cerezo at the creative helm it’s all there for a listening experience not unlike the psycho-mystical depths of a Dead Can Dance album but darker and more harrowing and cathartic. The new album R.O.T.T. (inmyskin), with the acronym standing for Road of Thousand Tears drops on August 11, 2023 and continues the path of its predecessor but with the songs seemingly emerging from the murk that seemed entirely appropriate for a set of songs from a time of great uncertainty and treading new musical paths. Those appreciate Diamanda Galás’ elemental catharsis, psychic fearlessness and avant-garde sensibilities might find a great deal to appreciate about Bestial Mouths as will those with a taste for the political industrial punk of ADULT. and Jarboe’s deeply emotional and unfettered vocal performances but while in Swans and since.

Listen to our interview with Lynette Cerezo of Bestial Mouths on Bandcamp and catch the group perform in Colorado on Wednesday, June 21 at Vulture’s in Colorado Springs with WitchHands and eHpH and on Thursday, June 22 at Hi-Dive in Denver with Church Fire and DJ Shannon Von Kell as well as other dates announced on the band’s website (linked below) where you can find more information and links to listen and purchase music and merch.

bestialmouths.com

Queen City Sounds Podcast S2E50: Antibroth

Antibroth is the kind of band that defies easy categorization even though its angular rhythms is in line with post-punk but its energy is more what you’d expect out of a hardcore band but the sonics are more experimental and the sense of humor more surreal than fits neatly into a genre. The trio formed when Jeremy Mock and Dan Switalski met in the music production program at Denver University where they also met original drummer Wesley Wolfe. But early in the band’s existence Wolfe moved on to other concerns and Hayden Bosch stepped into the role after Mock saw him play in his former emo band at a school event and was struck by Bosch’s hard hitting style. Antibroth formed with its current line up right before the 2020 pandemic but when shows started happening again in later 2021 the group was able to demonstrate how it had been able to develop and woodshed material and became a fixture in the Denver underground who as relative newcomers encountered all the odd situations new bands face in terms of shows and venues available to them but quickly encountered hardcore shows at Seventh Circle Music Collective, Mutiny Information Café and other venues where hardcore and increasingly other likeminded bands were performing. Anyone that got to see Antibroth got to see a group with a lot of energy that harnessed a math-rock-esque precision worthy of Hella and Don Caballero and channeled it into music that could sound sometimes thrillingly unhinged but always captivating for not sounding like much else you were likely to encounter in Denver music with strong hooks and memorable melodies. And now Antibroth is closing the chapter of its existence with a final EP Satan and the Dying Baby (out June 16, 2023) and a tour with Endless, Nameless from Denver out to the East Coast and back. The three members of the band are going their separate ways on good terms and in the history of music many of the best bands have two and a half albums and some singles and done. Antibroth has definitely left its mark on anyone fortunate enough to catch one of the band’s spirited shows.

Listen to our interview with Antibroth on Bandcamp and give a listen to Satan and the Dying Baby and its other releases at the link below. Also below is the tour route for Antibroth’s last hurrah of live performances.

Antibroth Spring/Summer 2023 Tour with Endless, Nameless
June 9 – Denver, CO
@d3artswestwood w/ @rosevariety @wrathofthelamb

June 11 – Lincoln, NE
Rancho Rodeo w/ Säbo

6/12 – Ames, IA
@theaholeames w/Moscow Puzzles and Perfect Strangers

6/13 Chicago, IL
@subtchicago w/ @tenmonthsummerband

6/14 Dayton, OH
@blindrageshop SUPPORT TBA

6/16 Queens, NY
@barfreda801 w/ @fallofthealbatross @voicemail.bandcamp @_mineshaft

6/17 New Brunswick, NJ
Mum’s House w/ @pyre_screamo @hysteria_the_band

6/18 Philadelphia, PA
@breadboxphilly w/ @mtworry @queasy.does.it

6/19 Pittsburgh, PA
@mr_roboto_project w/ @fficus_pgh

6/20 Cincinnati, OH
@dsgn_cllctv w/ @tinafeyband @badman.cin

6/21 St. Louis, MO
@sinkholestl SUPPORT TBA

6/23 Lawrence, KS
@toiletbowl.lfk w/ @jackoffs.lfk @thesewingcircle.kc

6/24 Wichita, KS
@lumberyardks w/ @jackass.the.band @noboysict @badeyesmusic

Queen City Sounds Podcast S2E49: Ivan Julian

Ivan Julian is a guitarist, singer and songwriter who many may know as a founding member of Richard Hell and the Voidoids. He has also contributed to music by as well as performed with the likes of Isley Brothers, The Clash (for instance he played on “The Call Up” from 1980’s Sandinista!), Matthew Sweet (with whom he toured for a number of years in the 90s), The Bongos, Shriekback and others. The child of a Navy officer, Julian spent a great deal of time living in other parts of the world including Haiti and Cuba but ended up in Washington D.C. as happens with families who have jobs with the federal government. Julian began playing guitar in his early teen years and was a touring musician at age 17 as a member of The Foundations. In his 20s Julian was part of that influential CBGB’s scene and crossed paths with a broad swath of the punk world and No Wave scenes and formed a group called Lovelies in 1988 with his then life Cynthia Sley of Bush Tetras. In February 2023 Julian released his new album under his name called Swing Your Lanterns, an album about the nature of character in a time of troubles and how that overlaps with the human condition, it’s an album about timeless themes of love and loss, dreams and contemplating the deeper meaning of it all. Musically it brings together the sounds of Julian’s long career with elements of punk attitude, blues, R&B, pop and art rock. It finds Julian in an imaginative mode with poignant commentary on our current era.

Listen to our interview with Julian on Bandcamp and give a listen to Swing Your Lanterns on Bandcamp where you can also purchase the album on digital, CD and pre-order the limited edition 160 gram vinyl.

Queen City Sounds Podcast S2E48: Rue Bainbridge

Rue Bainbridge at Lafayette Electronic Arts Festival, April 21, 2023, photo by Tom Murphy

Rue Bainbridge is the duo of Gryphon Rue and Benton C. Bainbridge who fuse an expanded practice of cinematic and sonic art. Using a hacked game console and other electronic devices to generate imagery and synth and musical saw to shape unique tones and frequencies in a way that generates what the project calls “electric calligraphy.” In the live setting the duo use a mesh screen upon which to project the minimalist yet intricate visuals improvising together with the sounds/music in a dynamic interplay unlike much of anything else in the realm of experimental music and visual art. The visuals and the sounds invite those present to engage in a mutual act of imagination and interpretation and in the live setting Rue and Bainbridge play off the reactions and responses of the audience in a way that makes each performance unique as each takes place in a different environment geographically and emotionally/psychologically.

Though initially getting off the ground in New York City and crafting performances in unconventional spaces and those more so, Rue Bainbridge have presented their shows on five continents in art museums, outdoor venues, for broadcast and a wide range of spaces inspiring the creative expansion of the project. In 2022 and 2023 Rue Bainbridge performed at the Lafayette Electronic Arts Festival and for the 2022 event they employed a large wall as part of an impromptu canvas for the visuals and in 2023 it was indoors at the Center For Musical Arts. The wide ranging visual expression with stylized geometric shapes and luminous sketches in sync with composed and improvised drones, field recordings and other samples and textural and harmonic tones felt like being witness to and immersed in a nonverbal yet deeply emotionally communicative act of a shared experience alive for those moments like a collective performance art piece. It had an effect that struck one as intimate and cosmic at once and one that you knew was ephemeral and more poignant because of it.

After the show I got to speak with the duo in one of the other performance spaces in the venue and we discussed a bit of their background and approach to their craft and performance and the heady ideas that have informed what they try to do with their art.

For more information on the project and their shows please visit Gryphon Rue’s website and follow Rue Bainbridge on Instagram.

Queen City Sounds Podcast S2E47: scott crow

Now known more for his political activism and writings on subjects as diverse worker cooperatives, animals liberation, environmentalism, prison abolition, police brutality, anarchism and general alternative economic models to capitalism including mutual aid and disaster relief, scott crow was also a member of political industrial dance acts Lesson Seven and Audio Assault. One might compare Lesson Seven’s music to EBM and electronic industrial groups like Skinny Puppy, with whom the project toured on the latter’s 1988 VIVI Sect VI tour sharing a similar political ethos. At the time most of those industrial and adjacent bands, a good number with whom Lesson Seven shared the stage with over the years, had an outlook critical of a political and social order that had become entrenched in the USA and more or less globally starting in the mid-1970s and dramatically throughout the 1980s with the Reagan and Thatcher regimes in America and the UK respectively: a crypto-authoritarian and austerity policy agenda that has worked to dismantle environmental, labor and civil rights laws and regulations hard won by over a century of grassroots struggle and a brief window of relative political openness to change. The music crow and his bandmates and likeminded artists made commented on this state of affairs with insight and gave it an accessibility that dance-oriented music can, perhaps echoing the famous words of Emma Goldman from her 1931/1934 autobiography Living My Life: “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be a part of your revolution.” Meaning the austere and joyless, inhuman and uncompassionate, revolutionary culture she observed regularly throughout her lifetime that missed the point of human and non-human liberation broadly.

As an author crow reflected on his life and work in his first book Black Flags and Windmills: Hope, Anarchy and the Common Ground Collective (2015) and published selections of his work in Emergency, Hearts, Molotov Dreams (2016). The record label Emergency Hearts crow started to release new music with a similar ethos to that of his own early time in music that resonates through to today and to reissue some of the older albums that have been neglected for decades. Releasing work and collaborations between artists such as Dead Voices on Air, Laibach, Lee “Scratch” Perry, the recently passed Mark Stewart (The Pop Group), Del The Funky Homosapien, Angelo Moore, Mark Pistel, Time (the Denver-based rapper and political writer), Stephen Mallinder (Cabaret Voltaire), MDC, Sole and a host of others has brought crow and not only his sense of the fusion of music, culture and politics but his ear for music that is and can be impactful to a modern era of music at a time when it can spread more rapidly and not merely serve as background entertainment due to its vital content.

Listen to our interview with crow on Bandcamp and for more information on the artist, writer, filmmaker, father and organizer, please visit scottcrow.org and for Emergency Hearts releases, take a look at the label’s Bandcamp.