We’ve already mentioned the 2014 WRIR Spring Fund Drive to you this week, but we just received some new information about the event that only makes it clearer how important WRIR (97.3 on your FM radio dial) is to the Richmond music community.
We’ve already mentioned the 2014 WRIR Spring Fund Drive to you this week, but we just received some new information about the event that only makes it clearer how important WRIR (97.3 on your FM radio dial) is to the Richmond music community. The fund drive kicks off today, Friday March 14, and between 5 PM today and 7 PM Tuesday March 25, WRIR will be hosting live performances by 18 different local bands.
Live performances on air are a semi-regular occurrence throughout the year on WRIR, but 18 bands in 12 days is a remarkable amount of music even for them. The performers will encompass every imaginable genre of music–jazz, metal, reggae, old-time country, and traditional music from Southeast Asia, among others. Most noteworthy will be a performance by Inter Arma, the local metal band whose 2013 second album, Sky Burial, has received acclaim everywhere from Pitchfork to Rolling Stone and is surely one of the biggest success stories of the RVA music scene in 2013. Also performing will be up-and-coming experimental punk-jazz instrumental quartet Dumb Waiter, psychedelic indie-folk crew Hypercolor, No BS! Brass-affiliated jazz combo the Marcus Tenney Trio, reggae powerhouse Mighty Joshua and his Zion #5 band, and many more! It all kicks off today at 5 PM on the Global A Go-Go show with a performance from Gamelan Raga Kusuma, a local percussion ensemble that plays the traditional Indonesian music known as gamelan.
Here’s the full schedule of performances you can look forward to over the next two weeks:
Fri March 14, 5 p.m.: Gamelan Raga Kusuma (Global A Go-Go)
Sat March 15, 1 p.m.: The Vacant Stairs (New Breakfast Snob)
Sun March 16, 9 a.m.: Kevin’s Kats (Sunday Morning Jazz)
Sun March 16, 3 p.m.: Mighty Joshua & Zion #5 (The Other Black Music)
Mon March 17, 5 p.m.: Clay Spokes (Lost Music Saloon)
Tue March 18, 5 p.m.: Twain (Wide Ear Folk)
Tue March 18, 6 p.m.: Hypercolor (Wide Ear Folk)
Tue March 18, 7 p.m.: RVA Old Timers (The Edge of Americana)
Tue March 18, 11 p.m.: The Moonbees (Pop Goes The World)
Wed March 19, 5 p.m.: Awesome Few (The Lotus Land Show)
Thu March 19, 7 p.m.: Dumb Waiter (Activate!)
Fri March 21, 5 p.m.: Miramar (Global A Go-Go)
Sat March 22, 1 p.m.: Don Babylon (New Breakfast Snob)
Sat March 22, 5 p.m.: Inter Arma (River City Limits)
Sun March 23, 9 a.m.: Marcus Tenney Trio (Sunday Morning Jazz)
Mon March 24, 5 p.m.: Milagro Saints (Lost Music Saloon)
Tue March 25, 5 p.m.: The Stray Birds (Wide Ear Folk)
Tue March 25, 7 p.m.: Old Dominion Playboys (The Edge of Americana)
To donate to WRIR’s Spring Fund Drive, go to their website at wrir.org, and check out this 2010 RVA TV feature shot when The Riot Before played live on air for that year’s WRIR Fund Drive.