I love it when El Ten Eleven comes to town. Unfortunately for me and their other fans in the area, it’s been a few years. But they returned on Saturday, Sept. 19 to Pearl Street Warehouse in support of their latest album, Nowhere Faster.
Pity anyone who doesn’t know about Jungle, as the only explanation can be that the unknowing have been living under a rock.
But this group’s music — a refreshing contemporary blend of soul, disco, and funk — is exactly the antidote to bring any listener out of the darkness, lift their spirits and move their body.
Nearly 6,000 listeners experienced the Jungle effect in person at the Wharf in DC last week for what was a two-night, sold-out takeover of The Anthem and a party that anyone in attendance is unlikely to forget.
North Carolina’s Avett Brothers’ — Scott and Seth — albums have achieved considerable success: Their major-label debut, I and Love and You, went to No. 16 on the Billboard Top 200, 2012’s The Carpenter reached No. 4 (and was nominated for a Grammy for Best Americana Album) –and 2016’s True Sadness peaked at No. 3. But the Avetts built their reputations on their dynamic shows, and they’re best experienced as a live band. Their recent show at Wolf Trap, with alt-rock stalwarts Guster opening — the second of two nights there — was exactly the kind of high-energy performance, we’ve come to expect from them.
The spaceship sent a fierce tremble through Capital One Arena, the hum of its engines whipping the crowd into a frenzy before its commander had even appeared or sung a word.
And by “spaceship,” I mean the lighting rig, lowered to the floor of the in-the-round stage in a shape vaguely reminiscent of a shuttle’s thrusters. And by “commander,” I’m speaking, of course, about Garth Brooks.
By the time Brooks’ Blame It All on My Roots Tour reached Washington, it had already carried at least 100,000 people into an orbit of music, nostalgia, and timelessness.
A lot has happened for Tyler Ballgame in a short time.
The Rhode Island native’s been on the Jimmy Kimmel Live! show and CBS Saturday Morning. He was at the center of a reported label bidding war won by Rough Trade. He’s played the prestigious Newport Folk Festival in his home state. And he’s collaborated with an impressive list of artists, including Vulfmon last fall and, more recently, Belle & Sebastian.
Taking a name that he made up one night on the spot and making it known far and wide, he’s broken out with his crooning abilities and his impassioned delivery. But for all he’s accomplished, he’s still making his way through small venues across the country as part of his current tour.
The LA-based vocalist brought his band to the nation’s capital last week, jamming a set full of his most soulful tunes and treating a packed DC9 audience to a beautiful night of music.
Danny Elfman has spent decades moving among seemingly incompatible musical worlds — new wave, film scores, industrial rock, orchestral music, and the manic art rock of Oingo Boingo. But at The Fillmore Silver Spring on Sept. 14, he demonstrated that they belong together far more naturally than one might expect.
Annapolis Songwriters Festival: Of Magic Potions and Superpowers
Words by Liz Wyatt
Photos by Steve Satzberg
For four talent-packed days, the Annapolis Songwriters Festival filled the historic streets, bars, restaurants, and music venues of downtown Annapolis with giants — and not just Young the Giant.
From Sept. 10-13, songwriters from around the country converged on Maryland’s capital for performances stretching from late morning well into the night at venues including 49 West, Rams Head On Stage, The Garden on Market Space, Blackwall Hitch, Stan and Joe’s Saloon, Galway Bay, and the festival’s large Calvert Street stage.
Few touring bands today channel a joyful, soul-stirring energy of street-corner party music quite like The California Honeydrops. On Saturday, Oct. 3, the Bay Area-based outfit brings their mix of Bay Area R&B, New Orleans second-line brass, southern soul, and delta blues to the iconic 9:30 Club for a night guaranteed to transform the room into a dance floor.
When close relatives (especially siblings) sing together, the result is often what is called “blood harmony,” the similarities in the two voices almost melding together into a single instrument. Lydia Slagle and Laura Rogers, who perform as The Secret Sisters, are part of this long tradition in country and folk music.
They’re also fantastic songwriters; they may have only released five albums (they’re recording a new one soon), but they already have a number of gems, and they delighted the audience at The Birchmere with a selection of their best material on Friday evening.
If you’ve been paying attention to the underground circuit lately, you already know that Quebec’s microtonal math-rock duo Angine de Poitrine is currently delivering some of the most bizarre, exhilarating, and technically jaw-dropping live music anywhere on the continent. Wrapping up their two separate nights in Washington DC at the historic Lincoln Theatre, Khn de Poitrine and Klek de Poitrine delivered a masterclass in controlled sonic chaos.
