I Never Got My Ears Pierced and Look How I Turned Out

Los Campesinos! were so much fun at the Echo last night. I had high expectations going into this one as all of their songs are insanely catchy, and they produced what is so far my favorite single of the year, "The International Tweexcore Underground." They did not dissapoint. The only minor complaint that anyone in my group had was that Aleksandra Campesions!' mic wasn't quite loud enough. Though what we could hear of her vocals sounded great. Of course the live full energy blast of the aforementioned single made my week, but the same level of energy was present in every song. The breakout hit, "You! Me! Dancing!" worked particularly well in a live setting, as did closer "Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks." That one ended with choreography! Also worth making note of was Gareth Campesinos!' charming stage banter. Self depricating comments, genuine exitement over the fact that they were staying in Hollywood, sincere appreciation for the crowd, and intros like this one, "This is a cover of a song by a band called Pavement..."

It broke my heart just a little that they didn't have vinyl copies of the "Inernational Tweexcore Underground" single along with them. The b-side contains covers of BOTH Heavenly's "C is the Heavenly Option, and"Black Flag's "Police Story," in order to appease the two characters in the song who are engaged in a pretty heavy twee v. hardcore argument. I was anxious obtain a copy so that I could finally hear what they had done with both songs. Fortunately I discovered that they are now posted on their Myspace page. Shockingly enough I'm slightly partial to "C is the Heavenly Option," but the Black Flag cover is pretty damn cool as well. Anyone else have any thoughts on the covers, and/or the live show? I'd love to know!

Indie In One Minute AND Goth In One Minute

Wow, never again will I let another day go by without checking Rock Insider at least once, and nor should you. Jax posted this last Monday. So in case you missed it like I did, I'm reposting it here.



Then yesterday she posted this one, so I figured I would go ahead and make today "Twofer Tuesday." Except instead of back to back Led Zeppelin songs, you get back to back hilarious (and quite informative) videos. Almost as good, right?...

Listening Too Long To One Song: The Whitsundays "Sorry James"

Mmm, tracks like this one make me feel like I am visiting some sort of parallel universe that is three parts 1964/ one part 2007. I also kind of feel like I want to stay there forever.

"Sorry James" is the sort of psychedelic, bouncy, reverb drenched pop that makes me want to put on a mini skirt, find a club filled with like minded people, and dance! Though the story it tells is a bittersweet one, it is nearly impossible to hear the music behind it without wanting to move.

The project is an intriguing direction for Paul Arnusch who spends most of his time wandering about in the territories of post punk (his work with the Floor,) and post rock (his work with Faunts.) I, for one, am ready to hear so much more from The Whitsundays. Fortunately for all of us their self titled debut album will be available via the excellent Friendly Fire label on January 22, 2008.

You can download "Sorry James" here:

The Whitsundays "Sorry James"

You can also check out the song "I Want It All" on their Myspace page (and become friends!)

Listening Too Long To One Song: Bubblegum Lemonade "That Thing You Do"

I recently received an email alerting me to the release of a compilation called "The Matinee Hit Parade" in celebration of the fact that Matinee Recordings turns 10 years old this month. The party that the label put on in celebration of this birthday remains one of my favorite live music events so far this year. You can click here to read my review of that show. So naturally an email from them announcing a "very special compilation," that features 13 Matinee artists providing "a new, 45-caliber A-side," made me jump up and down a little bit. It also made me feel a little guilty over the fact that I had not yet taken the time to become familiar with the myriad of exciting new Matinee signings including The Electric Pop Group and Bubblegum Lemonade. I immediately made my way to Matinee's Myspace page with the intention of using it as a spring board to get to the individual bands' pages. What I was greeted with, however, was a cover of a song that I love from a movie that I love, but not that many people seem to share my opinion of. Except the sweet, sixties style, pop that I adored in the original had been replaced with sweet, fuzzy, eighties style (but sixties influenced,) Scottish pop that I just might adore even more. Listening to the song repeatedly for the past few days hasn't helped me to make up my mind. I think that a viewing of "That Thing You Do" might be the only thing to resolve this. Although, Bubblegum Lemonade do get bonus points for being a band that actually exists, and for being Scottish.

You can listen to Bubblegum Lemonade's cover of the song "That Thing You Do"
here.

Once I'm finally past my current state of nostalgic bliss, I expect to dive fully into the Matinee Hit Parade compilation. The track list looks kind of amazing:

1. Math and Physics Club - A Little Romance
2. Would-Be-Goods - Temporary Best Friend
3. The Lucksmiths - Good Light
4. The Electric Pop Group - My Only Inspiration
5. Clay Hips - Failure
6. Bubblegum Lemonade - Tyler
7. The Hermit Crabs - Sophia
8. Harper Lee - Ilene
9. The Guild League - Call To Prayer
10. Strawberry Whiplash - Summershine
11. Slipslide - Let Things Fall Apart
12. The Pines - Train From Wycombe
13. Lovejoy - Astronauts

You can download TWO tracks from the compilation below. The first is Bubblegum Lemonade proving that they have so much more to offer than simply great covers. The second is The Electric Pop Group proving that they have so much to offer period.

Bubblegum Lemonade "Tyler"
The Electric Pop Group "My Only Inspiration"

You can pay a visit to the Matinee Recordings website to pick up your very own copy of this release:

Matinee Order

Check out the news on all of the aforementioned new signings, and long-time favorites as well:

Matinee News

And listen to songs from these artists by going here:

Matinee Sounds

Your new favorite band might just be waiting for you...

There's Really Nothing To Understand, Let's Go And See Our Favorite Band

If only every night of mine could be spent watching outstanding ROCK bands while also getting to play Archers Of Loaf to a crowd of people who are actually excited to hear Archers Of Loaf.

Last night at the Scene was tremendous ammounts of fun. Huge thanks go out to the Bentleys, The Forms, The Valley Arena, and Signal Hill. All played fantastic sets. Signal Hill closed the night on just the right note with their beautiful, LOUD, instrumental, post- rock jams. I'll be the first to admit that LOUD, instrumental post- rock jams aren't my number one go to when it comes to music, but WOW! I strongly recommend that you see them live as soon as you can.


Speaking of my number one go to when it comes to music though, the YAY! label has a night at the Smell on Saturday. I don't think that it is actually possible for me to be more excited about this. The YAY! label has been my favorite local (well, Oxnard, close enough) musical discovery in recent memory. They claim to be, "Here to put the fun back in pop!" So far they are doing a fantastic job. They prefer releases to be on vinyl, and publish fanzines. Seriously, fanzines. What is not to love? Four of the YAY! bands will be at the Smell on Saturday November 17:

Maria

The Tartans

Catwalk

Sea Lions

So far I've only seen Maria, and Sea Lions live. Both bands made me smile. I'm fairly confident that the Tartans and Catwalk will have the same effect. Hopefully, I'll see some of you there.

Come Spend Some Time With Us! This Wednesday November 14th at the Scene Bar!

It's here! It's here! Us Squaregilrs are beyond excited to be presenting this night along with Radio Free Silver Lake, and Rock Insider.

You can (and really should) visit all of the bands on myspace by clicking on the following links:

The Valley Arena

The Forms

The Bentleys

Signal Hill

We've heard some amazing things about each band's live show. Including this quote from Radio Free Silver Lake,

"We are helping put on a great night at The Scene with Rock Insider and Square Girls featuring The Valley Arena, The Bentleys, The Forms, and Signal Hill – the latter of which are a fucking incredible post rock outfit who are responsible for one of my favorite shows so far this year."

And that guy goes to ALOT of shows. Surely this one is not to be missed.

The Squaregirls will be your DJs for the night, so come on over and say, "hi." We can't wait to see all of you there!

Listening Too Long To One Song: John Cale "Charlemagne"

Is it just me, or do we all have a handful of songs that we have to hear again and again, try to unravel until we can finally pinpoint what it is that makes them so good, and why exactly it is they have the effect that they do on us? The Hold Steady have song called "Certain Songs" which states that, "Certain songs get so scratched into our souls." John Cale's song "Charlemagne" has been one of those for me for a long time. I recently noticed it on a playlist that I made awhile back. I put it on, and sure enough, I have found it difficult to listen to anything else. "Charlemagne" shows up a little over half way through the album Vintage Violence. Though the entire album is great, I always seem to get stuck on that particular song. There is something about the lovely intro, beginning only with piano and viola while the rest of the instruments unassumingly filter in. Something about the line "Many tries, many tries, simple stories are the best." Something about the vocals, the outro...

You can buy a copy of Vintage Violence through either of the links posted below:

John Cale Vintage Violence

John Cale Vintage Violence-Remastered

Top of the Pops!

Art Brut may very well be my new favorite live band. They rocked through their catalouge last night at the Henry Fonda with exactly the kind of energy and sense of fun that you would expect to see from Art Brut. I've missed them almost too many times to count now, and I was beginning to think that they might turn into a band that I would never see perform. Due to this, I'd been imagining Eddie Argos' stage banter as the stuff of legend, I was not disappointed. My personal favorite line of the night came when he introduced "Good Weekend:" "It was number one, in Narnia... Aslan bought the first copy." Am I going to hell for thinking that is hilarious? Excellent local band Kissing tigers got um, a shout out later in the song. So did the Mighty Lemon Drops. This resulted in a good ammount of celebration where we were standing, with members of both of those bands in attendance. Makes sense as Dave Newton (the Mighty Lemon Drops) produced albums for openers the Blood Arm (who I sadly missed due to Santa Monica traffic,) and Kissing Tigers. He is producing the new album for the Henry Clay People as well. I'm going to take a wild guess that it will be fantastic, because they are fantastic. And since I attended this show with Joey from the Henry Clay People, I was introduced to Dave. Amazingly, I managed to make it through the evening without asking him a single nerdy C86 question.

Then of course "America's number 1 bar band" the Hold Steady are always a good time, I can't descibe what it is that makes me love this band so much. Something about the way Craig Finn presents his stories of kids and "killer parties," mixed in with a fair ammount of religious imagery is completely endearing (he even tends to act out moments of dialougue in the songs.) Everyone else in the band the band knows how to put on a good show, and it is near impossible to watch them without smiling. I can't imagine ever getting tired of watching them, and I really can't believe that I almost talked myself out of this one because I was feeling anti-social. No longer, the upcoming week brings me back to my usual schedule of a show nearly every night culminating with the Radio Free Silver Lake/Rock Insider/Squaregirls (!) presented night with the Valley Arena/the Forms/the Bentleys/Signal Hill on Wednesday the 14 at the Scene Bar in Glendale (ahem.) The Hold Steady/Art Brut was just the thing to get me back on track!

Check out Art Brut performing a similar rendition of "Good Weekend" to the one I saw last night posted below.

Art Brut - Good Weekend - Live @ Hideout 09/08/07 w/ banter

LISTENING TOO LONG TO ONE SONG: THE ROYAL WE "ALL THE RAGE"

As much as I enjoy recieving emails from Geographic Music, there is always a certain element of sadness involved. They never contain updates on a new Pastels album, and they are usually announcing some extraordinarily cool film screening that I can never attend because, sadly, I don't live in Glasgow. For those of you that are curious, Geographic is a small imprint of Domino Records run by the Pastels to introduce us to interesting artists that span a variety of genres beyond simply rock/pop (jazz, world, etc.) The latest email that I recieved from them was no exception to the sadness rule, announcing both the debut album, and demise of The Royal We.

THE ROYAL WE


The Royal We walk the line between straightforward rock and giddy pop better than most bands I have heard in a while. I personally cannot stop listening to the single "All The Rage." It's exciting, and it's catchy as hell. The kind of song that you will desperately wish to have stuck in your head for days. The rest of the songs that I've heard so far are equally as exciting, and equally as enjoyable. As I mentioned, the sad part of this post is the Royal We are no more. They played their final show to some seriously lucky Glaswegians last night. Sigh. At least they left us with what promises to be an outstanding first and last album. You can pick up your copy of it here:

DOMINO RECORDS/THE ROYAL WE/THE ROYAL WE

INTERVIEW: MATH & PHYSICS CLUB

Okay, so the Squaregirls have admitted to having crushes on bands in the past (see our recent post about Le Switch). But honestly, with so many good bands out there, can we really be expected to give our loyalty to just one? With the release of their lovely new EP, “Baby, I’m Yours,” Math & Physics Club have been the subject of the majority of our infatuation lately.

Founding members James and Charles grew up in Olympia, Washington, listening to huge amounts of Beat Happening, Teenage Fanclub, the Stone Roses (they do a fantastic cover of “Sally Cinnamon”), the Housemartins, and the Posies. Last (but not least) to join the band Ethan (bass) shares these affinities, particularly for the Posies. Kevin (drums) grew up playing jazz. Saundrah was classically trained in violin and viola. She was also part of an Americana group, and an experimental "Wall of Sound" band before joining Math & Physics Club. Collectively, they make excellent use of their various influences and backgrounds to create recordings that will fit perfectly in your collection alongside any of the aforementioned bands.


Squaregirl Marion was lucky enough to sit down with four of the quintet for a chat at the Crocodile Café in Seattle. After some clamoring over my digital recording device, we got right down to the serious, hard-hitting interview. Well, sort of.

SQGM: So you are all mathematicians, and physicists?

Kevin: We met in Cambridge in ’82. Charles had just been snubbed for the Nobel ... again.

SQGM: And that’s when you figured, forget academia, let’s start a band?

James: Well, the academic spotlight was getting to us, we wanted to kind of step away from that a little bit...

SQGM: Okay, in all seriousness. I’m curious, as an outsider: The Pacific Northwest seems so welcoming to anyone who wants to start a band. Is this really the case?

Charles: I think it is, Seattle just seems like a really supportive community.

James: I don’t know if it is just like people genuinely like you and they are willing to listen to you, or if they’re just really polite, maybe a little bit of both. Of course there is a little bit of competition, there always is, but we are pretty much able to avoid that. For the most part we are able to be around generally nice, supportive people. Plus, there is a huge tradition in the Northwest of DIY all-ages shows. That ethic is kind of underlying in everything.

Kevin: Yeah, maybe if you were in Minnesota or something, you know, everybody likes curling. Here, though, getting a band together is just the thing that people do. People don’t do it cause they want to make it big; it’s just a way that people hang out with their friends. You don’t always play the greatest gigs when you’re starting out, but you can get them. And you meet bands really fast.

James: Kevin’s probably the best one to talk to about this with cause he’s from Boston. We’re all from the Northwest, so he can tell you how it compares to a different town.

Kevin: Yeah, it’s very different. It’s way more cutthroat to even get a band [together]. Trying to book a show in Boston is a nightmare. There are many fewer places that you’d want to play. In Seattle there are a lot of places where you think, “It’d be alright to play there.” And in Boston you’re connected to New York and Philadelphia, and there is a big label thing going on. A lot of nights get booked up for up-and-coming label acts.

SQGM: It seems like this is a place where you can really feel comfortable experimenting. Even if you don’t know a particular style of music that well, you can still get something going?

James: Yeah, there are a lot of really small places that are really open to that.

Kevin: Of course, it does help, if you want to try something really wacky, to have some friends that are willing to go and watch it.

Charles: And if you are in a smaller band, or if you are underage, there is a really good house party circuit here.

James: That we never really figured out how to tap into.

Kevin: Although a house show was the first show that we ever played as a full band. It was Ethan’s friend who set it up, though.

SQGM: Wasn’t it something like you played two shows and then were signed to Matinee?

Kevin: It was one show, although that’s not really accurate. It was the first show we played as a band with the five of us, but James and Charles had been working on stuff for a while.

James: Yeah, it appeared as though this happened overnight, but it was actually something that had been coming together for a while.

Charles: The big goal for James and I was to put out a record, so instead of focusing on getting out and playing shows, we were more focused on finding someone to help us put out our record. We would have liked to have had shows too, but we didn’t really put our energy into that; we put our energy into getting a demo together and sending that out.

Ethan: Kevin, Saundrah and I joined probably within a three-month period of each other. I was the last one to join. Charles and James had put together songs, and when I heard an early incarnation of the band playing, I knew I really wanted to be a part of that. We were all able to put our mark on the EP, but they really shaped it.

Charles: The funny thing is though, talking about how supportive it is, we couldn’t find people to play with us for so long. We’d go see bands that we liked, and there would be tons of people there, but we just couldn’t figure out how to connect with them. And we didn’t know anyone.

James: I can’t tell you how many times me and Charles would go to a show, and we’d have this material, a disk, in the back of our pockets. We’d be sweating with pure raw nerve, not wanting to go up and look like an idiot for talking to somebody. There was this divide between us and someone in a proper band playing a show.

Charles: We were just nervous to take that step and become, you know, a band. It seemed like such a huge thing to us.

SQGM: Was it more being intimidated of actually talking to people in the scene, or “Oh my God, this will make us a real band?”

James: I don’t know, that’s a good question. Probably a little of both. We were just shy, I think; we didn’t really know anybody.

Charles: We didn’t consider ourselves very good musicians and didn’t want to go up to someone and be like, “Hey man, do you know anybody? We’ve got this band.”

James: Right, you could go up and talk to people after shows, and people are always really nice. You could go up and talk to Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow after a Posies show, but it’s really different when you want to hand them something that you’ve done. Then it becomes about, are you abusing a relationship to further your musical goals?

SQGM: And where do you draw the line?

Charles: One thing that’s really different for us as opposed to other bands who are just starting out is that we only had a demo, but we were able to gain the support of Three Imaginary Girls and KEXP. So we never really had to hit the streets, except for our very first show at the Hideaway, before Ethan joined the band. We didn’t really have to create something out of completely nothing. We already had these people supporting us. Then people look at you a little differently. That probably affected how we transitioned into the scene.

SQGM: I’m sure, but I’m sure there was also a tremendous amount of work that went into the project before you got it to Three Imaginary Girls and KEXP?

James: Yes, a lot of work, but you know not any more or less than any other band. Just done a little bit differently.

Charles: You know, other bands play tons of shows, hone their skills that way. We were just kind of doing that in our basement, writing songs and practicing them. We didn’t really play them for anybody.

James: On occasion we’d play them for our girlfriends, or a group of friends, and at the end it would be like, “Well, are we going to go out to dinner now?” or “Hey, nice place you have here.” It was never anything about the music. So that made it even harder to go up to an actual musician and say, “Here, listen to this.”

Charles: That’s why the internet has been so revolutionary. You can just drop an mp3 out there and wait for somebody to come along.

Kevin: Yeah, with me it was like, “Hey, I just moved here from Boston and I don’t know anyone, so you guys wanna play?”

James: That was the biggest coup, scoring Kevin.

Kevin: Yeah, until you found out my hidden past.

The term “funk” is thrown around the table.

SQGM: You were in a funk band?

Kevin: No, I was a jazz drummer, and I played in a soul band in Boston, but I wouldn’t call it funk. All my life, I had only done this high-concept drumming. I was trying to write pop songs on my own, so I really just wanted to play drums in a pop band. These guys were the perfect fit. Some people have held that [past] against the band actually.

Charles: But we always thought when we were trying to get a band together, the most important thing would be to get a good drummer.

James: There are a ton of drummers, but it’s tough to find one that fits. You have all of these people with so much ability and they want to put every ounce of that into every song. But Kevin, and really everyone in this band, seems to have the ability to pull back depending on what’s needed for each song. And he looks good, does he not?

It is mutually agreed upon that Kevin looks good.

James: There was a time when we were in San Francisco at this crowded dessert place and we were waiting outside, and Kevin just went up to these two random people and talked them into coming to our show.

Kevin: Yeah, you caught me not only when I decided that I wanted to play drums in a pop band, but also when I went crazy.

James: Are you familiar with the A-Team?

Charles: Oh God.

Kevin: She’s going to print this.

Ethan: Stop talking.

James: If you were to line up the five members of the A-Team, and the five members of the Math & Physics Club, I think it would be unanimous that Kevin would be Faceman.

Kevin: That’s not so bad. I don’t get the leather jacket, though. I would want the faux leather jacket.

Ethan: I think James would be Murdock.

James: Yeah, I’m pretty much Murdock.

Charles: Ethan, you’re B.A. cause we have to knock you out to fly you anywhere.

James: Yeah, Ethan’s B.A. That makes [Charles] the Colonel by default.

Charles: And then Saundrah is Amy, I guess.

James: Yeah, yeah definitely. Just like on the A-Team, Amy doesn’t make appearances every time.

Charles: You know she’s there, you just don’t know where.

Saundrah is, in fact, at dinner with Tullycraft at this point.

SQGM: On that note, was it always the intention to have a girl in the band, or more, we need a violinist, and she’s really good?

Charles: No, we didn’t really have a plan in mind except we thought we would like to have some strings — cello, violin, somebody who did something a little different. Saundrah came up on Craigslist, and I remember reading her influences and thinking, “Oh, this could be cool.” So we just started emailing. She’s the first to admit she was never really into this kind of pop music, but she has a really great ear for melody and knowing what fits in what spot.

SQGM: It sounds like an interesting dynamic with the various musical backgrounds contained in the band. How does that affect the songwriting process?

Kevin: I think it’s impossible for five people to work together collectively without some chatter here and there, but if there were growing pains they were relatively minor. We were able to get the right sound pretty quick. We sort of immediately had the right sound, and then it was more a matter of just kind of guiding that sound along. And people saying, “Well what about this? Or this? Or this?” We got lucky.

Charles: There was definitely a transition from where James and I were controlling everything. We had all these songs that were all done, [but] we had to go from that to “Okay, how do we introduce songs? Where are they coming from? Who’s writing what?”

Kevin: The rest of us were sort of feeling that out. We were in various stages of our own creative process and determining what we wanted to contribute.

Charles: Plus, James and I had known each other since we were kids, and didn’t know any of them.

James: The first two EPs were kind of written before we had the rest of the band in place.

SQGM: I was actually wondering about that. So the first EP was pretty much together when the band was assembled; it just became about adding the missing components?

James: For the first EP, Charles and I even wrote bass lines, and drum parts, rough as they were.

Kevin: And I just rewrote them.

James: Yeah, we pretty much just dumped everything.

Kevin: Although I still play that little drum beat of yours in the middle of “Weekends Away.”

Charles: Most of the time it’s like, “I’m kind of feeling like this or something,” but that was one where we were like, “Do a Johnny Cash shuffle beat thing,” and he just came up with this (mimes the particular drum beat) and we were like, “Yeah!”

James: Cause that was something we couldn’t come up with on our little drum machine.

Charles: If we could we wouldn’t even talk to you [Kevin].

Kevin: You guys would be so much leaner.

James: Right before we all met, I actually found online, for free, a complete sampling of some vintage drum set that had good brush sounds, but there was no need to use them once we found [Kevin], so we just shelved it.

Kevin: I should have never spent that 7-50 on a set of brushes.

James: No, there is just no way to compare what we were trying to do with live drums.

SQGM: Well, on that note, can you talk about “Do You Keep a Diary” from the new EP. What made you decide to present an electropop song?

Charles: Yeah, you have to talk to Ethan about that.

SQGM: Okay, I was going to ask whose idea it was, cause personally I think it sounds great.

Ethan: Wait till you hear it tonight!

SQGM: Oh, is it going to be the full-on electronic version?

Ethan: No, it’s going to be a different version.

Charles: Did you hear it in Santa Barbara?

SQGM: I did.

Charles: So you heard the acoustic version.

Ethan: This version tonight is just going to be way more disco.

SQGM: Oh yes, a live band discofied version of an electropop song is the just kind of thing I like to see!

Kevin: Yeah, that one’s all Jones (Ethan).

Ethan: I like that kind of music, too. We tried that one out for the album. I thought it was a good song that had a good chorus, but it just wasn’t happening.

Charles: It sounded like a Stone Roses rip-off.

Ethan: It sounded like the Byrds to me. Which is fine, but...

SQGM: Sure, nothing wrong with sounding like the Byrds, but if you have the ability to take something in a more surprising direction...

Charles: (to Ethan) Did you have the EP version back then?

Ethan: Well, I had my first demo of it before the album came out. I just put it together tapping drum sounds on my keyboard. Actually, the funny thing about that is that the bass on that version is a stand-up bass sampled from a mellotron.

Charles: Ethan just passed that [song] around like “Hey, I did something fun with this. We don’t have to do anything with it...”

James: I think [Charles] and I heard it first, and I thought it was awesome. It totally made me more interested in the song. We talked about it for the album, but didn’t do anything with it, and Ethan just kept working on it. Then we had the EP and we figured it would be a good place to try it.

SQGM: Yeah, I like that it’s completely unexpected, and it works.

James: We do have an acoustic version of that song as well.

SQGM: Cool, for the B-sides collection?

Charles: For the EP comp.

Kevin: We recorded it live in studio.

James: Yeah, we did it all live in one take.

SQGM: Really?

Kevin: Yeah, actually that’s the song I’m most proud of just because I didn’t think we’d be able to do it.

James: I’m most proud of that as well. It was just pure musicianship.

At this point the band members had last-minute things to do to prepare for their show later in the evening. I thanked them for their time, and they could not have been any more gracious. So the infatuation grows.

Baby I'm Yours - Math & Physics Club

Just don't let the music stop…

After missing the Pipettes three times at SXSW ’06, I finally caught them last Thursday night at the Echoplex. These three lovely ladies and the fine lads of their backup band The Cassettes had to postpone their tour due to visa issues, which moved their venue from Avalon to the Echoplex. Unfortunate for them, but great for their fans, who didn’t have to pay $15 for parking and another $20 in fees to Ticketbastard.
With their adorable 60’s-esque pop, exuberant synchronized choreography and clever stage banter, the girls were well worth the wait. In matching polka dotted outfits, the Pipettes are cute enough to make any boy want to be their boyfriend and cool enough to make any girl want to be their best friend.
Although some of their songs might start to sound similar, the girls expertly reignited the night at key moments with some of their bigger toe tapping hits such as “It Hurts To See You Dance So Well”, “Dirty Mind" and my personal favorite “Pull Shapes."
For a Thursday night, it was a groovin’ good time. And as they say (sing) themselves…
We are the Pipettes
And we've got no regrets
If you haven't noticed yet
We're the prettiest girls you've ever met
We haven't finished with you yet

And they so haven't.

Pull Shapes - the Pipettes