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Nothing To Do With Finish Lines: An Interview With No BS! Brass

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As I rounded the corner to meet up with some members of No BS! Brass at Minimum Wage, an Oregon Hill music studio, I was greeted by Reggie Pace coming out of a small white bus parked on the curb. He ushered me towards a modest two-story building I had seen many times but never taken the time to consider. Opening a gate, he lead me down a side yard lined with sound equipment of various eras, mounted cattywampus on the fence and framed by Christmas lights winding in nonsensical circles. He led me through a doorway into a vestibule piled floor to ceiling with snare drums of varying colors and sizes centered around a curving staircase ascending into the unknown above. Reggie quickly climbed the stairs, and I was alone. 

Walking through a soundproofed door, I found myself in a dingy yet impressive studio with no windows or natural light to speak of. Turning, I saw four other members of No BS! Brass sitting on stools in a far corner next to a vocal booth; a 12 pack of White Claw hard seltzer stood center stage. I introduced myself to Sam Reed, Bryan Hooten, Sam Koff, and David Hood — faces and names that I had seen and heard but never had the opportunity to meet formally.  

Speaking briefly with them about where they came from and what brought them to Richmond, a common theme emerged: Virginia Commonwealth University. For the members who didn’t come from Richmond, it was almost universally VCU’s music department that brought them here. They told me all the usual stories, about studying with folks like Ella Fitzgerald alum Tony Garcia, renowned arranger and composer Doug Richards, world-class trumpet player Rex Richardson, saxophonist Al Regni, and other names that floored me almost as much as the amiability of their company. 

A towering institution in the Richmond music scene, No BS! Brass was founded in 2006 by Pace and drummer/Minimum Wage owner Lance Koehler as an outlet to perform in a New Orleans-style brass  band, but with original compositions. Their music is defined by pull-no-punches power with a notable lack of any kind of “chill.” When they do bring it down, it is to simultaneously challenge listeners to pay attention even as the ensemble dares them not to. Enormous diatonic brass compositions slowly collapse into atonal arrhythmic trumpet solos that extend for what seems like an eternity yet are impossible to look away from. The next thing you know, the band has completely switched gears and are suddenly in the middle of a rap verse or a towering vocal line — seamlessly transitioning from one pillar of their sound to another. 

No BS! Brass collaborated with Hourglass Sessions, performing their song “Vibrate Higher,” from their new album, Undying, released in June of 2022. Watch that session below, then read on for our interview with No BS! Brass.

I sat down to talk to a few members of No BS! Brass to hear about their songwriting process, their take on the Richmond music scene, releasing physical music in a streaming-dominated market, and the idea of local fame vs. international fame. 

Note: Lightly edited for clarity and ease of conversation. Edited for length.  

A lot of the younger artists love the Richmond scene. However, some that I’ve spoken to recently are concerned that it’s dominated by these larger cover bands full of older cats who have been around the block a few times. As one of the most successful original bands still basing itself out of Richmond, what are your thoughts on that?  

Reggie Pace: What do we think of the old cats, or the people asking the question? [Room laughs] 

David Hood: Am I an old cat? 

Sam Reed: I do think that there’s room for younger artists, and I don’t think it’s dominating the scene. I feel like there’s a little bit more room for original music and newer artists in Richmond than there is for the cover band scene. 

RP: In every city, the most visible version of live music is cover bands. That’s just how music works. Unless you are a serious music fan, the most live music you ever see, period, is at functions, and functions have cover bands and things of that nature. I think there’s always been space for original music, but original music does not have a built-in fanbase that cover bands already have. There’s a familiarity there that, as a band that is only doing original material, you have to put yourself out there in places that are not looking for someone to play “Piano Man.” That’s kinda just yelling at the clouds in a way, you know what I mean? These cool young bands don’t want to play at Maggiano’s.  

SR: It’s two different things, I think. 

RP: Yeah, they’re two different things. But… the smallness that you speak of, I think, does tie that together, because a lot of us have played in those types of situations, and spent a lot of time trying to make original stuff, our own artistic expressions. The people who are making original music, I don’t think they are at odds. I don’t think it’s the same pile of money. It’s pulling out of two different funds. That’s kind of like saying that you’re competing with the Flying Squirrels or something. Baseball is dominating the Richmond landscape! What are these young musicians gonna do? 

[Room Laughs] 

Bryan Hooten: There’s plenty of musicians who are playing in original music bands that also play in cover bands. And that’s something that I was gonna bring up; on some level, what you’re doing has to be economically viable. And so, if that’s original music, you got to figure out how to get people to come to it. That’s just as much a concern for original music as it is for cover bands. 

RP: Right, and that’s the thing: cover bands don’t necessarily have to worry about it. Because they know that you’re gonna play all Michael McDonald and Peter Gabriel and people are gonna go, “Oh, I already know those songs.”  

DH: The cover band scene might be kind of overflowing right now. It’s hard trying to start a new cover band. We’re in an  interesting spot because of the pandemic. It’s kind of a reset, with clubs opening up and all that. With situations like that, I think you can always find opportunity; you just have to be clever. 

RP: And make sure people know about your stuff. As an artist, the newest [thing], after the pandemic — you kinda have to start from the beginning with whatever you’re doing. You have to have music that people like, and present it to them. I don’t think it goes any further than that. You either present it to them at a house show — I’ve played a bajillion house shows — or you present it to them at a country club. You know? I’m still me if I have to do that. And guess what? I see those people. And guess what? They’ve been to the [No BS!] Brass Band show. “Oh, I’ve seen you at Gallery 5, I didn’t know you did this.”

There’s a certain amount of mingling that artists have to do if success is one of the goals. If you’re just doing your art, you can definitely find a path where you go, “I’m just gonna do the best art I can, and hopefully people find it.” That’s definitely one way, but an artist has to actively sell a show — even if it was a house show. People have unsuccessful house shows, by the way. “Ah my house shows are so popping, and the Broadberry wouldn’t let me play!” Naw, that’s not what happens. I have yet to see a band that was really killing it, where some sort of opportunity didn’t present itself, because people are looking at this part of the country right now. Specifically this city and Virginia. So I guess I’m a bit more optimistic. Make some music that you think is so awesome that you want to tell everybody about. I feel like that happens so much: “Oh I don’t want to play my parents my album, they’re gonna hate it.” Yo, if you’re scared of someone saying they’re gonna hate your album, then you might not be in the game at all.  

SR: There’s so much support around music in Richmond. That’s why I think it’s a good place for a younger artist, a newer artist, an original artist. People will come out and support your shows. We have places like the Camel and the Broadberry, Brambly [Park], now Maymont, that are really supporting younger original artists.  

RP: I usually have an opener for our shows. It’s usually a band that I have seen out somewhere in town. This next show, I think Lobby Boy is gonna open up. And I just saw them the other day when I was playing with Piranha Rama. I’m just out doing what I do, and I see a band and go, “Oh, they’re great.” That’s me doing my part. We’ve been doing that for 15 years. 

BH: Having high school bands open for us. 

RP: We’ve always done that. And I think that is a big thing — to get to the root of your question. It is the job of older artists to make sure that younger ones are getting some guidance, if they would like it. Because… they don’t necessarily want that shit.  

[Room laughs] 

RP: Young musician don’t necessarily want to hear nobody’s mouth about any of it. You  can’t just swoop in and go, “Hey guys, I’m here to lay down some game for you!” 

BH: Sam [Koff] is in a group: Pay Rent [Brass Band]. John [Hulley]’s not here but he runs it, and that was built out of a sense of opportunity in a pandemic time, doing covers. 

Didn’t y’all do the Megaman thing [A show featuring the music from the Nintendo video game Mega Man III at the Camel last October]? 

Sam Koff: Yeah, exactly! There’s an opportunity for people to play on patios in Scott’s Addition during brunch. That was the initial idea: we’re all friends, half of us live together, let’s go play and try to make enough money to pay our rent. And we’re doing that, so…

RP: In Scott’s Addition, I used to throw a lot more shows in town, before I had to do all the stuff I have to do. But occasionally I still do, so Ardent [Craft Ales] was throwing their anniversary party. I usually book that show, and it’s just Scott’s Addition in the middle of a Saturday. These are not necessarily music fans. This is like, two in the afternoon, and I have Pay Rent Brass, and I have Kelli Strawbridge Trio, Deau Eyes played, Night Idea played, and they played at two in the afternoon for people drinking beer. Oh and Pet Shop, a kind of southern rock band played, because I was trying to mix it up.  

Photo by Lauren Serpa, via No BS! Brass/Facebook

So you’re talking a lot about art, and making the best art that you can. I want to hear about the writing process for a band like this. All these solo artists I’ve been  talking to, and all these three-piece rock bands, the writing process is very personal, and they write when it comes to them. What is it like for a giant 12-piece brass band? Is it more academic than that? 

RP: Generating art that comes from inside of you that’s true, but now you want it to translate into several people working together… with this particular group, you definitely have to have some craft involved. An understanding of having to communicate whatever your musical idea is to the group. Back in the day when I was writing everything, it was more like, “I have this thing, this whole song. I’m gonna give these four parts to the trombones, I’m gonna give these parts to the trumpet—the melody part. I’m gonna change it here, I’m gonna move the verse around here.” And that’s the craft you learn in music school. The structure of things is something that’s craft-based.

As we’ve expanded, we’ve got Bryan and a lot of other people writing; Bryan writes completely different. The song shows up pretty much done. We come through and go, “How about this?” 

BH: 80-90%. 

DH: It will SAY final version, but that’s… 

[Room laughs] 

BH: It’s kind of inevitable that it has to go through the band process of playing it to figure out how to make it what it should be. 

RP: Because we aren’t robots, right? And no matter whatever sort of MIDI thing makes, it never sounds the way it is going to sound. And a piano — it’s the same thing. No matter how you play something on piano, when you move that to brass… it’s different. You have to change where the octaves are, and really get into the weeds. When we added Sam [Reed] to the band, when our homie Rob [Quallich, Trumpet] left town… Rob takes up a lot of space in that higher register. Powerful sound. I was like, “Okay, how do we flip that into something else?” So I asked Sam if she wanted to be in the band, and I was like, “Okay, how do we navigate this now?” Just figuring out ways to visualize how to make the song move, and have a structure and a vibe within itself, is something that I care about. Grooves from different parts of the world, grooves that are different tempos, different accent points. And then Bryan brings a completely different thing to the table.  

BH: Yeah, I was gonna say that for me, the hinge point in our band creative process was the Mingus album [Fight Song: A Tribute To Charles Mingus]. Before then, we would spend a lot of time together coming up with the parts. Reggie would play for us what we needed to do; we kind of learned things by  ear. That is a very creative process, but also very time-consuming. As we all know, as you get older and you have more responsibilities, you got to go to bed a little earlier. So when we did the Mingus album, there was more from the various arrangers of, “All right, I’m gonna write an arrangement and bring in the parts, and we’re gonna play those parts.”

And still, I’ll hand something to Dave [Hood], and he’ll be like,  “Ah that doesn’t really work as well. Here’s how we could fix that and make it sound better.” Since then, it has been more the case that the composers will bring in an 80-90% finished thing, and then we’ll kind of work out some things about the form: “Hey that section, we should play again,” or “Eh, we don’t really need that part.” That’s how the process has kind of evolved. And for me personally, like Reggie said, all the creative part of it is the same as if I was just coming up with something for myself. Usually writing something down on paper is the very last step. I’m trying to wait until I have most of it worked out, and how it will go, or what things I want to just hand to Sam or Reggie to think about before I start putting ink on the page.  

RP: It’s a part of it that you don’t want to overcook it, too. “I know something about this song is gonna change.” So you can’t fall in love with whatever, you know? 

BH: You don’t know what it’s gonna be like until the band plays it.  

I wanted to backtrack a little bit to a comment that Bryan made about financial viability, specifically in terms of releasing music. Almost every other artist I’ve spoken to is starting to release music on vinyl, and it seems to be the way a lot of people like to listen. But is streaming the future, or just a fad? Are  physical copies the way to go? 

RP: Well first, streaming is the present, and No BS! Brass has always released on vinyl.  Almost all our albums can be found on vinyl. So, we’ve been doing that, even when it wasn’t cool. I think it’s kinda the wild west, man. Might as well try whatever the fuck. 

BH: I do think that unless you are Drake or Taylor Swift, you’re not making a ton of money off of streaming. But people who might license your music for whatever it is — for  a TV show, for a movie, for a commercial — can hear it. So there’s a tradeoff to getting your music to as many people as possible.  

RP: Back in the day, they called it “exposure.”  

SR: There is no better way to do it. 

DH: Before, when you were like, “Oh, I wanted to learn more about that band,” there was Myspace music, forever ago. And then, people don’t even really look at websites all that much. It’s all social media content, and Spotify has become one of those repositories. I’ll hear a group and I’ll go, “Oh, I want to check their music out.” Spotify is the first place I go to.  

BH: You can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube. Everyone’s used to streaming now, and listening to whatever they want for the cost of a CD per month. I don’t think you’re really gonna convince people to spend more money on music.  

Do you think streaming has ruined our attention spans for music? Does digital music prioritize singles, as opposed to a physical record that you experience as a  whole unit? 

RP: I think they’re all singles now. That’s an interesting way of putting it, I didn’t think about it that way. But all your songs need to be a single, I guess. In a way, you see people just trying to release as much music as possible. Just putting it out there, and then someone clicks your name, and then maybe their phone will cycle through all your music. It’s tough to judge it, really. Other than the not-making-any-money part.  

SR: I feel like singles have always helped. It’s much different now than it was then, but singles have always helped in selling full albums, and I think that they still do.

RP: If you think about the Thriller album, there’s still songs most people don’t know from it. It’s one of the biggest albums ever, and people know the singles.  

BH: To your point, I do think there is something good and healing and positive about sitting and listening to an album, like sitting and watching a play from beginning to end. But I don’t think we can try to control the market so that people can only do that.  

SR: There are people out there who still want their physical copies, and who love listening  to an entire album.  

DH: And when you’re talking about financial viability, there’s the merch aspect of it: vinyl,  or t-shirts, or selling digital downloads with a poster. Whatever you wanna do, the artist stands to make more money that way. But I don’t think it’s mutually exclusive.  

RP: I think everything is just merch now. You are yourself, and you make an album, or you sell t-shirts. If you think about it, all the biggest rappers have told everybody that they don’t wanna rap no more, and they started shoe companies, and clothing companies, or whatever else, you know? 

BH: Then they can retire. 

Photo by Lauren Serpa, via No BS! Brass/Facebook

RP: Yeah, they’re doing something else. “Maybe I’ll make an album again. MAYBE.” So, I think vinyl, to Bryan’s point, is an experience: you pull it out the jacket, you set it down, you’re looking at it, and you do zone in for 40 minutes. I think that experience is something that people are thinking is cool. And collecting things, I don’t think is ever gonna go away. I think the idea of only collecting things on your phone is short-sighted. Not the other way around. If you’re going full meta, I think that’s cool too, but people just collect things. So I think there’s always gonna be a space for artists generating art. Even people who don’t necessarily listen to music will support a band or support their friends by buying a CD. 

SR: I bought a CD from a guy yesterday. I was at Wawa, and he was just outside in his car with his kids, and he’s selling physical CDs. My son says to me, “Why would you  waste your money?” I said, “This is this person’s art, whether I like it or not. He put the time and creativity in it to make his art, and that’s worth something to him. I support that.” And I think people will always support that. 

RP: I bought a CD on Belvidere and Broad, and the dude just raps over the Blueprint album [Jay-Z, 2001]. His voice is louder, and he’s just rapping the whole time.  

[Room laughs] 

You all are quite a big act, with something like 30,000 monthly listeners on Spotify. This is an archaic term for the music industry, having only ever been a myth at best, but was there ever point where you felt like you all were “discovered,” or are  you still waiting for your “big break?” 

DH: I think that’s different for everyone, right? 

RP: Well, when I was on tour with Bon Iver, people were looking at stuff that I was doing, and I know we got some looks because of that. I think Jimmy Fallon’s talked about our album.  

DH: It was like, “Well I won’t put them on, but we like your music!” 

[Room Laughs] 

RP: We got kinda like, “Oh they’re listening to it, maybe they’ll put us on Fallon!” They dangle the carrot in your face, you know. The Tiny Desk Concert! That was a big deal. That was our first video that got a million views. We have a couple that are close. I don’t really know. We are discovered in our world — brass players and anyone who follows anything close to brass bands. We are in that world for sure. But I guess we are still waiting to be discovered. 

Don’t you also have an international audience? 

RP: That’s true I forgot about that: Germany holds up down, France, the Netherlands…

BH: Brass bands are big in the European tradition. 

RP: Yeah, they love us. Canada. Trombone players biked up to us when we were playing in Amsterdam going, “NO BS! BRASS!” South America too. There was a band in Ecuador, several bands in Mexico City, that were covering our songs. It was cool. 

BH: Papaya Brass.  

RP: Yeah, people show us love. There’s a little brass scene in Japan that shows us love too. It would be nice to be so-called “discovered” enough in a way to go see them all. To go see everybody that’s been holding us down all these years.  

DH: We get contacted a lot by military bands, and schools — usually high schools, but also college groups — to get copies of our music. Those are just like these little worlds of music. 

BH: Music school kids know who we are.  

We’ll I’ve seen y’all play, I know your names, and people know who you are. You certainly have this in-the-scene notoriety. Do you desire the next level though? 

RP: For sure. Anybody who would like to help out? 

[Room laughs] 

SR: Bring us to Vegas! 

RP: I have dreams about a whole show that I could put on. I’ve been producing stuff during the  pandemic, little videos. Eat With Pace is about to be the shit! So… yes. Anybody who would like to holler at us, we’re down. We have been an independent group grinding for years, so let’s go. Someone turn on the faucet for your boy. Let us mingle in those waters for a second and see how we like it.  

SR: And in order to keep a band going for as long as No BS! has been going, you want to take different opportunities and go to different levels.  

BH: The thing is that it’s not linear. Sometimes you’re doing it because it’s a different experience, sometimes you’re doing it because it’s a growth thing. All these different dimensions in which you’re growing and covering new ground 

RP: The European tours were so sick that I’m definitely addicted to travel in that way in general. My whole thing coming out of high school was, “I’m gonna see the world! I don’t know how I’m gonna do it, but it’s happening.” Music is how I got there, and I was like, “All right, I’m sticking with this music thing.” That’s really what I want. I want No BS! to head on to Tokyo, head back to Amsterdam, head on to Singapore; wherever they want us to play, we’ll be there.  

DH: It’s awesome too, talking to some High School students, and we’re like, “Oh yeah, we went to Paris, and we went here…” And they’re like, “You went to all those places!” Yeah man, be a  musician.  

Well, in order to do that you need freedom. Do y’all keep day jobs, and do they give you the freedom you need to pursue this? Do they hold you back in any way?

RP: I mean, I’ve had a job, and not had a job, then had a job, and then not had that job, throughout my whole life. It doesn’t hold back what I want to do. Some days it holds you down, coming out of the pandemic it held me down. It’s kind of off to the side, in a way. Artists are all working on whatever they want to work on, and then sometimes we can get people together and work on a thing together. But then you run up into the money wall and you have to make some decisions. And then you just start making those decisions, like, “Hey guys, I got to go work for a little while, I’ll be back!” You know, or not! And that’s just life.

Honestly, there isn’t an occupation in which that isn’t the case; you always are looking for some sort of upward mobility in whatever you do. Unless you come out of college and get some sick gig immediately. Well then, bask in the glory of being better than us. Just keep moving forward, keep following whatever your passion is, and try to fund yourself the best you can. And funding people around you: funding your family, funding your friends, funding other artists, buying CDs at Wawa. 

BH: I think on some level, you’re gonna keep growing and you’re still gonna keep doing that gig for the money. Or whatever version of that. Those things are still in your head. 

RP: And that’s just life right there. And hustle! I think the artists’ life probably requires a little bit of hustle, and if you ain’t ready for that, then you probably ain’t gonna make it. The end. It requires thick skin. A lot of “No”s.  

SR: I have always chosen music or art over a regular 9-5 situation. Not that everyone has to do that, because it works differently for everyone. But a lot of times, when I do go get a job, it comes to the point where I go, “Okay, am I gonna do this if this is gonna affect me being able to perform?” I will quit a job, but I’ve also gotten to a point in my life where my work outside of music is flexible for music. I work everything around it, because that’s something that I have to do.

SK: Every job I’ve ever had, I’ve had to give an ultimatum: I’m gonna have to quit this job, or you can still have me, but I need to get exactly the hours that I need. The good thing about being a musician is that there are a bunch of different ways: you can teach a little bit, you can arrange — all of these bands need to hire horn arrangers.  

RP: It won’t even be that expensive, and your horns won’t be trash.  

SK: And then there’s gigs, and there’s the cover bands. That helps a lot, and it all comes together and is in service, ultimately, of the art that we need to make.  

BH: Even Dillard [Watt, Trombone], who is a full-time financial analyst or something, there were periods of time where we were traveling a lot, and he was somehow making it work. I don’t know how he was able to spend all that time not in the office, but he figured it out.  

RP: I try not to get too bitter and salty, and it’s a gift to be able to generate money with your talents. Some people just got to go to that warehouse, get their life done, and compartmentalize work to being over here, and do their life. It’s a gift to be able to generate any sort of income or happiness from other people; people wanting you to work for them just for your talents. So I try to take that seriously, and keep that part of the forefront.  

Let’s get even more abstract, why don’t we: When will you have succeeded? Have you succeeded? What does that mean to you? 

RP: Succeeded in what? Life? 

This. When will this have worked out?

RP: Well, this has worked out many times. 

[Room laughs] 

BH: You know, this is very abstract also, but you kind of have to do your work, and not be attached to what the outcome is. You’ve made it when your tune gets played and it sounds good, even if nobody’s there.  

Photo by Lauren Serpa, via No BS! Brass/Facebook

RP: It’s just a part of me. You think about the cartoon Dexter[‘s Laboratory], you ever seen that show? There’s  a Dexter inside of me that just wants to get his work done, but he’s got school, and his sister’s in  here, but he just wants to get his work done! You see all this stuff that he’s built, and you only go in and see him… his lab is already built, and people are bothering him. I think artists have a little bit of that side of them that’s just like, “Hey man, I got to get to my work. I’ve got some work that I need to do.” And it’s got nothing to do with finish lines. Like Wynton Marsalis, he talks about how there is no ending to practice.  

DH: That’s something music school teaches you.  

SR: I think it’s important, too, to ask yourself at the end of the day, “Did I succeed today?” That doesn’t mean that you are a millionaire now, but did you go your best in this day, in the moment, or in this song? If you did your best, then you succeeded.  

BH: It’s an ebb and flow, and a continuum. Because some people go, “We need to be on a late night show!” and they’re fixated on that. Then what? I don’t know. We’ve had situations where we just do the thing, and then every now and then we look around and go—like when we did the Kid Rock cruise, we were like, “This is crazy! I don’t know if we made it, but this is crazy!”  

RP: Or playing at a castle in France. We were like, “We’re in a castle… This is crazy.” 

SR: This happen to musicians a lot, where you just look around at the rest of the band like, “Yo, what is this? This is cool!”  

BH: Concepts like getting discovered and making it have at least 50% to do with people and things outside of your control. Those are great things to aspire to, but for most people that is not the reason they do it.  

Tell me about the experience of making your Hourglass Session. 

RP: I was way into it. I hollered at them on Instagram or something, and I was like, “Yo, I want to do one of these Hourglass Sessions, it looks kinda cool!” They asked what I wanted to do, and I told them I wanted to do this thing with projectors. They’re great to deal with, and we found that studio. The idea of going to space, being in the desert, all these things, and they were game for it. And then the production was top-notch. [Dillon Douglasson] was doing sound, and I was worried. I was like, “Alright, my man says he’s got it.” I’m not even gonna lie, I was worried. We had a lot of microphones up there, and we needed some way to hear Sam [Reed], because she was on a wireless.

We were doing staging, and she was on one part of the warehouse and walked to the other. We had done this one gig, this corporate gig where we were just furniture in Las Vegas, where they’re like, “We’re the such-and-such corporation and we’re having a great time!” And then a brass band comes out! We flew to Vegas, did that, flew home. So I always had an idea of a Las Vegas-esque stage show for this group. Because if we could all get wireless, then we could move and take up the space. I brought that up, and they were like, “Sure!” The camera followed Sam [Reed] to where the brass band is, and we’re on this wall, and then it follows Sam [Reed] to where the band was performing. The people on the wall kind of walked through here, and we kind of choreographed that, and then made a new scene, and we walked over here and the background changes, and then time for Taylor [Barnett]’s solo, and we’re headed to space. They  really nailed it. It is a take for all the nerds out there: that is a take of music, and of filming. That is not a music video in a sense, that is a live performance. That needs to be said more about their stuff: this is happening for real. 

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No BS! Brass’s latest album, Undying, can found on most streaming platforms, and is available to purchase digitally on Bandcamp. There is also a vinyl version that was released at their Broadberry gig on Saturday, July 2. Look for it out in the world wherever you buy vinyl albums.

RVA Shows You Must See This Week: June 15 – June 21

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FEATURED SHOW
Saturday, June 18, 8 PM
No Moniker, Piranha Rama, Lobby Boy, Gnawing @ Black Iris – $8 in advance, $12 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Ever notice how the music scene’s activity always gets ramped up in the summer? School’s out, everybody’s feeling alive again, and big plans are being made. One of the great things that comes from all that are new albums from bands who’ve spent the winter woodshedding. Of course, this year summer is extra crazy, because we may as well call it the first summer in three years, at least where the music world is concerned. So: is it any surprise that bands we haven’t heard from in years are suddenly springing into action with entire albums’ worth of new material? I certainly don’t think so.

No Moniker’s been around the Richmond scene for a dang minute now, and while members have come and gone, singer-guitarist Jordan Scott has remained at the helm the entire time, even if her pronouns have changed in the interim (so much love for that). Since No Moniker’s last release back in 2019, she’s paired up with drummer Madison Hinson and stripped the band down to a duo that has spent the past couple of years putting together a brand new set of deliciously off-kilter alt-pop tunes. That entire set will enter the world this Saturday under the name Let’s Don’t (an excellent album title if I’ve ever heard one). That album is the reason for the season where this big throwdown at Black Iris is concerned; not only will Let’s Don’t be available in its entirety, No Moniker will also be delivering us a headlining set full of awesome new tunes.

If you’ve been paying attention to what this band has been up to over the past year or so, you’ve heard a few of these tunes already — “One To One,” released as a single last month, was the fourth teaser track from Let’s Don’t to enter the world, and all of them are a blast in their own right, with a common thread of bouncy postpunk basslines, introspective lyrics, and tasty pop melodies tying all of them together. If you’re as inclined as I am to respond by saying, “More of this, please,” then Black Iris is where you need to be Saturday night. And while No Moniker’s LP release set is going to be enough to constitute a full evening’s worth of entertainment, you’ll get a massive bonus helping of Virginia indie in all its forms, as they’re joined by nine-piece indie-surf-pop supergroup Piranha Rama, upbeat postpunk/new-wave popsters Lobby Boy, and jangle-grunge noise-rockers Gnawing. It’s a veritable all-you-can-eat buffet of amazing music — and if you’re still hungry for sound, grab a copy of the new No Moniker LP on your way out the door. There, that’s your whole weekend sorted. You’re welcome.

Wednesday, June 15, 7 PM
Gag, Under Attack, Killing Pace, Caustic Agent @ Cobra Cabana – $8
I love hardcore. I cut my teeth in Richmond’s hardcore scene, and even as this city’s music scene has exploded across a thousand different genres, I still am always looking for the great hardcore shows that prove this city is still in touch with its roots. My favorite kind of local hardcore show is one like this one — at a venue big and legal enough that I can safely write about it, without being driven by some label-sponsored four-band package tour that keeps any local openers from getting onto the bill. Places like Cobra Cabana and Fuzzy Cactus are bringing that energy these days, and it’s been too goddamn long if you ask me, so I am super glad to see it.

Let’s talk about who is actually playing this show, though. Gag hails from Olympia, Washington, but if you’re expecting Beat Happening, you couldn’t be barking further up the wrong tree. 2020’s Still Laughing, released on Iron Lung Records, is a raging, out-of-control blast of degenerate hardcore, full of reverbed vocals and noise-rock riffs even as it goes a thousand miles an hour and packs a dangerous punch. If you love Poison Idea or Verbal Abuse, this band is squarely in your wheelhouse, but fans of everything from the Laughing Hyenas to the Dwarves are sure to get a lot out of the Gag set at Cobra Cabana. Thankfully, you’ll also get a great window into the Richmond hardcore scene circa 2022, with sets from ripping-fast old-school thrashcore combo Under Attack (who just released a split with legendary Dutch hardcore band Seein’ Red), metallic crust-core sickos Killing Pace, and pummeling old-school hardcore newcomers Caustic Agent. Richmond hardcore is still a real thing; come out tonight and find out for yourself.

Thursday, June 16, 7 PM
Gillian Carter, Infant Island, To Forget, In Wolves’ Clothing @ The Bike Shop – $10
It’s probably been at least five years now since I stopped worrying about whether the term “screamo” has any validity. While my objections to it (which are many, drop me an email if you’re really curious) still stand, I’ve accepted the fact that, when people use the term “screamo” today, they’re talking about a style of music I really love — one that incorporates melody, metallic influences, hardcore tempos, and yeah, a whole lot of really emotional screaming. It’s great stuff, and I really feel bad for anyone who is totally blowing it by letting the fact that the name for the genre is pretty goofy keep them from listening to its many excellent practitioners.

A lot of said excellent practitioners come from right here in Richmond, but the first name on this bill is that of Gillian Carter, a long-running Florida trio who, just in the past couple of weeks, have finally followed up their outstanding 2019 LP, …This Earth-Shaped Tomb, with a new EP called Songs Of Summer. At a total length of 3:28, it blows by so fast that you might miss it if you go in the other room for a soda, but Gillian Carter’s rich back catalog means they’re more than ready to give you a nice full set at The Bike Shop tomorrow night. And when they do play those two new songs, it’ll prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that they continue to operate at the peak of their powers — as they have for years now. With a bill featuring two of the foremost currently active Richmond-based screamo practitioners (Infant Island and In Wolves’ Clothing), plus the excellent Charleston, SC-based trio To Forget, this show will be a festival of the senses that won’t soon leave your mind. That’s true regardless of how goofy the genre name is.

Friday, June 17, 10 PM
Two Thumbs Down, Combat, Rikki Rakki, Kat Nap @ Ipanema Cafe – $10
Earlier this week, I watched that Roger Ebert documentary, Life Itself, so when I see a band on this week’s upcoming-show roster called Two Thumbs Down, I gotta admit that’s the first place my mind goes. That said, unlike the way Siskel and Ebert felt about Lost Highway or Faces Of Death, I really dig New York’s Two Thumbs Down, an energetic, upbeat band who mix indie vibes, pop-punk songwriting touches, and the occasional third-wave ska influences into a tasty smoothie on 2021’s End All Be All. That album’s been out for over six months now, but their original tour was booked for the moment when the Omicron wave was spiking, so they had to delay everything, and there’s no way they won’t be stoked to hit the stage and give these songs their all at Ipanema late Friday night.

Another touring band on this bill is Combat, who hail from Baltimore and are apparently just bandleader Holden Wolf and a laptop on this tour. I’m not convinced that’ll do anything to drain the massive amount of energy this band displays on their new EP, Text Me When You Get Back, because I’m honestly not sure anything could. The frenetic, nervous brand of jangly pop-punk they dish out here is a ton of fun, and even hearing a guy and a computer recreate it should still be a blast. This bill is rounded out by some equally charming and peppy homegrown Richmond all-stars, by which I of course mean alt-garage rockers Rikki Rakki and indie-folk newcomers Kat Nap. This show is at Ipanema, which has only recently started hosting shows again after three years or so out of the game. Yay for venues getting back into the swing of things!

Saturday, June 18, 7 PM
Beatles Party, feat. Goldrush, Warren Campbell, David Long @ Gallery 5 – $10 in advance, $12 at the door (order tickets HERE)
My wife is a big Beatles fan. I mean, I think everyone who digs rock n’ roll music has to give the Beatles some credit, and sure, I had a Beatles phase back when I was 12 or 13 like a lot of other people, but I’ve heard way more Beatles tunes since I got married five years ago than I had in the previous 25 or so years. And my first takeaway from that renewed immersion was: damn, I forgot how great the Beatles really were. If you also have forgotten how great the Beatles were, Richmond’s got a show coming this week that’s perfect for acting as a strong reminder. I’m not talking about the Ringo Starr show out at the racetrack on Tuesday, either (sorry Ringo). I’m talking about this Gallery 5 event, which is not only honoring Sir Paul McCartney on his 80th birthday but is also bringing Goldrush back into action!

If Prabir Mehta isn’t Richmond’s biggest Beatles fan, he’s certainly one of them, and the fact that he’s reunited with his classically-trained pals Matt and Treesa Gold to bring Goldrush back into action for the first time in three years probably has a fair amount to do with all that. They’re promising an evening full of Beatles and solo McCartney tunes to make all the Fab Four fans happy, but I gotta say, y’all — upon revisiting, I’d found I’d forgotten how great Goldrush really were too. So I for one hope at least a few originals grace our ears as part of the festivities. Regardless, this will be a fun evening that is sure to be far less boomer-saturated, not to mention friendlier to your wallet, than the aforementioned big Ringo throwdown. Send Mom and Dad off to that one. Go to this show yourself.

Sunday, June 19, 7 PM
Arlie, Nordista Freeze @ Richmond Music Hall at Capital Ale House – $15 in advance, $18 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Every week there’s some new band I discover and fall in love with during the process of making this column. This week, Arlie is the one. I’d never heard of them before receiving a press release two weeks ago touting their upcoming Richmond Music Hall date and their new LP, Break The Curse. As is my usual process, I filed away this information in preparation for the day when I would decide which shows I was writing about this week (usually, this two-to-three-hour process takes place on Monday afternoon. This week, it took place this morning, in case you were wondering why the column came out at 4 pm today), but when I finally got around to cueing the album up on my Apple Music account at like 10 am this morning, I was blown away.

A big part of that is Arlie’s hybrid approach to the indie-flavored pop sound within which they operate. Since Haim made it big six or seven years ago, I’ve heard a lot of bands within the alt-pop world follow their lead in much more overtly pulling from the sounds of the 80s — not Prince and Madonna either, but less-remembered talents like Rick Springfield, Corey Hart, or Joe Jackson. Arlie do that, for sure, but more on a sonic level. Where actual songcraft is concerned, these guys are much closer to modern emo-pop goodness, and when they really nail the combo, as they do on tracks like “Poppin” and “Landline,” the result is absolutely undeniable and will get you up out of your chair dancing around every single time. That’s what really matters in this business, so my honest advice is not to worry about all the pop-crit pontificating I’ve been doing for the past two paragraphs. Follow your heart, and your feet, to the dancefloor. I promise you won’t regret it.

Tuesday, June 21, 8 PM
Sonoa, Cyber Twin, Tanglewood Revival @ The Camel – $7 in advance, $10 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Tuesday night isn’t necessarily the most active night for live music, but there are a lot of hidden gems that could easily slip under your radar if you don’t pay attention. This Tuesday night show at The Camel is a great example of what I’m talking about, and far be it from me to advocate for FOMO, but if you don’t show up this Tuesday night and catch Sonoa — yet another band from this week’s crop of shows that I totally wasn’t expecting, but was delighted to find — you really will be missing out.

Sonoa are a New Jersey combo who’ve got one foot in the introspective indie world and the other in the most spaced-out corner of the modern math-rock landscape. Vocalist Gabriel Yoder Shenk has a voice that can’t help but remind me of Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard, but on Sonoa’s 2021 LP Forward Motion, he lays it down overtop of riffs and melodies that are much stronger and contain far more inspiration and energy than anything Death Cab’s done since at least Narrow Stairs. The fact that Sonoa aren’t afraid to crank up the distortion on their guitars is a very welcome fact as well. They’re sure to liven up a humdrum midweek night at The Camel this Tuesday, and god knows we all need more of that in our lives. You know what to do.

Email me if you’ve got any tips for me about upcoming shows (that take place after the week this column covers -– this week’s column has obviously already been written): [email protected]com

RVA Shows You Must See This Week: June 1 – June 7

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FEATURED SHOW
Friday, June 3, 10 PM
Queer Fundraiser, feat. Harli & The House Of Jupiter, Cherub Tree, Roughshod, Neurotix @ Ipanema – $7 (order tickets HERE)
Welcome to Pride Month, everyone! There was a time when I felt really good about where things stood, and where things were going, with the LGBTQ community. However, with authoritarian conservatism in ascent, and repressive laws coming into effect that, under some circumstances, could make the very existence of people like me (I’m transgender, ICYMI) a crime, it’s hard to feel anything but vague concern when I think about Pride-related things these days. Not that I’m entirely without hope; my wife has taken to pointing out the many ways in which positive depictions of LGBTQ people are pushing the kind of people who want to oppress and erase us all further and further to the cultural margins, and she has a good point. However, if the repressive forces continue down the path toward minority rule (which the United States Constitution not only allows but tacitly encourages), our cultural victories may not be enough.

To me, that just means we need to try that much harder to stay proud, keep fighting for our rights, and most importantly, taking care of each other, and of our allies in struggle, so that we can get through this long hard time. With that in mind, the work of Peter’s Place, a Richmond-based organization that does addiction recovery work with a focus on support for LGBTQ people, is highly essential. This fundraiser at Black Iris [NOTE: It has been moved to Ipanema -ed] is raising money for Peter’s Place, and considering how many of us struggle to find hope in the face of the terrible sociopolitical landscape we face now, we can use all the help we can get. So this show is, without a doubt, raising money for a great cause.

It’s also shining a light on several up-and-coming local and regional musical talents who absolutely deserve the shine. Harli & the House Of Jupiter are located in Richmond these days, but I first heard about them from my friends in Charlottesville, and the sound they’re bringing to RVA is absolutely worth the praise the C-ville kids gave them. With a sound that mixes heavy proto-metal riffage and a driving rock n’ roll pulse with Harli Saxon’s arresting, soulful vocals, Harli & The House Of Jupiter are worth hearing immediately if not sooner. Washington DC’s Cherub Tree have some intriguing acoustic indie sounds to offer as well, bringing a minimal, atmospheric sound to their recent singles, including the memorably titled “Maybe It’s A Stomach Bug.” Local talents Roughshod and Neurotix round out a lineup that brings great sounds for a great cause to RVA this Friday night. You know what to do.

Wednesday, June 1, 8 PM
Daniel Romano’s Outfit, Carson McHone @ Richmond Music Hall at Capital Ale House – $15 in advance, $18 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Canada is an intriguing nation. We have a decent picture of what it’s like — after all, it’s just right across the border up there, basically like the northern Midwest but colder. However, there’s a lot that goes on up there, especially where culture is concerned, that we never find out about. That might be why I didn’t really know much about Daniel Romano and his Outfit, who will be bringing the power-pop sound of their latest LP, Cobra Poems, to Capital Ale House’s Richmond Music Hall tonight. I liked what I heard when I checked it out, and if you’re a fan of dudes like Ben Kweller or Paul Collins, he of the American Beat, you’ll probably find a lot to like here as well. What surprised me, though, was the extensiveness of Romano’s resume, once I started digging a little deeper. Starting as the frontman for Canadian punk group Attack In Black, he’s gone on to record over a dozen solo albums since 2010, as well as seven albums backed by the Outfit, who’ll be backing him on this trip through Richmond.

One thing Daniel Romano’s Outfit has done, which should give you an idea about where they’re coming from, is a 2020 album called Daniel Romano’s Outfit Do (What Could Have Been) Infidels by Bob Dylan and The Plugz, a full-length reimagining of Bob Dylan’s 1983 album, Infidels, as if Dylan had recorded the album with Los Angeles Chicano punk band The Plugz backing him up (as they did on a single David Letterman performance in 1983). It’s hard for me to see that level of nerdery as anything other than awesome, and considering that album followed up a full-length collaboration with Tool drummer Danny Carey, and that Daniel Romano’s Outfit have released three more albums since that Dylan covers album came out two years ago, I am also impressed by the man’s prolific nature and the impressive stylistic variety of his music. That of course also means that I have no idea what version of Daniel Romano’s Outfit we’ll get at Richmond Music Hall tonight. But whatever he chooses to lay on us, I’m sure it will be awesome.

Thursday, June 2, 8 PM
Posture & The Grizzly, Marshall’s Law @ The Camel – $10 in advance, $12 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Ever go to a show and get so blown away by some opening act you’d previously never heard of that the set by the band you came to see almost feels like an anticlimax? That happened to me back in 2014 when I caught Posture & The Grizzly second on a five-band bill at the Broadberry. The band I’d come to see was The World Is A Beautiful Place And I Am No Longer Afraid To Die, and Posture & The Grizzly’s four-piece lineup that night was mostly made up of moonlighting TWIABP members. However, it was the outstanding emo-punk songs written and memorably performed with a ton of heart by frontman Jordan Chmielowski that blew me away, and it was clear that his talent would shine through no matter who was backing him up. That held true on 2017’s I Am Satan, the followup to Posture & The Grizzly’s 2014 debut, Busch Hymns — an album I played to death, just like I had with Busch Hymns before it.

In the years after I Am Satan, though, the band seemed to go dormant, and I stopped expecting new material from them. Unfortunately for me, that meant they caught me sleeping with their return to action in the form of 2021’s self-titled third album. It came out last December, but I just discovered it last month, and sure enough, I’ve been playing it to death ever since. As a longtime fan, I can tell you that the band’s songs are thicker, more muscular, sounding more rocked-out than ever — even in spite of the fact that the latest incarnation of the group has slimmed down to a trio. Regardless, they’re still outstanding, with new songs like “Red Light,” “Creepshow,” and “Promise” standing right alongside past classics like “Because I Got High” and “Kill Me.” When they bring these tunes to the stage, it’s sure to be every bit as mindblowing as it was for me to see them eight years ago. I have no idea who else is on this bill — I couldn’t find a damn thing anywhere online about mysterious openers “Marshall’s Law” — but it doesn’t matter. Posture & The Grizzly’s all you need to have a full night of great music.

Friday, June 3, 7 PM
Test Pattern 03, feat. Moor Mother, Ohbliv, Vitche-Boul Ra, justmadnice, Elijah Hall @ VCU’s Institute For Contemporary Art – Free! (Register for event HERE)
Shows at bars and clubs are cool and all, but there’s something really essential about live musical performances that take place at venues like this one — a contemporary art-focused space within an august institution of higher learning. The vibe is much more fearlessly avant-garde when live music is completely disconnected from any expectation of catchy music for bar patrons to down beers to. And if it’s avant-garde you want (and it certainly is what I want, at least some of the time), the ongoing Test Pattern series at VCU’s ICA is a great place to find it. Case in point, this third event in the ongoing series, where Moor Mother will be the headlining performer.

It’s tough to even describe Moor Mother. A project of Philadelphia-based musician/poet Camae Ayewa, Moor Mother presents a multi-disciplinary sound that mixes soul, funk, hip hop, poetry, and musical experimentation in a manner both unpredictable and tremendously pleasing. 2021’s Black Encyclopedia Of The Air is Moor Mother’s latest release, and it’s an excellent and completely unique listening experience. You can expect no less from their performance at ICA this Friday night. They’ll be joined by Ohbliv, the prolific and incredibly talented DJ, producer, and sound artist who has been creating albums of instrumental vibes, moods, and beats at a rapid rate for over a decade now. Indeed, his most recent release is a double LP called Ragged Tranquility Vols. 1 and 2, which pairs his 2009 debut cassette with a brand new selection of work on a similar theme. No matter what era Ohbliv pulls from for his set at ICA, the vibes are sure to be thick enough to spread on a bagel and have a delicious musical meal.

Saturday, June 4, 7 PM
Shehehe, Toxic Moxie, Madison Turner @ Cobra Cabana – $5
Sometimes I miss the old days, when everything surrounding the live music scene felt a little less formal, a little less polished. The days when you got handed a paper flyer outside one show that told you about another one. The days when you couldn’t buy an advance ticket online, you just had to show up and see who else made it in the door. Cobra Cabana is one of a few local venues that have been bringing that pre-social media vibe back in the post-pandemic era, and I for one love to see it. What’s more, this is the kind of show I love to see that mentality being applied to; a show featuring two great local acts you love, plus an out-of-town group you haven’t necessarily heard, but can trust to be great based on who is bringing them to you.

Shehehe, who hail from Athens, Georgia, are the out-of-town band in question for this show, and their 2020 LP Pet Songs is a great listen, full of bouncy energy, driving riffs, and an overall sound that’s somewhere right on the border of power-pop and pop-punk… always a great place to be. These guys won’t actually be headlining — if the flyer’s any indication, they’ll be the second band of three on this bill — but that way, even if you don’t listen to Shehehe’s album yourself, you know there’s something worth showing up on time for, and something else worth sticking around to the end for. Assuming you’ve been around Richmond for longer than 10 minutes, you know exactly that about opener Madison Turner, a punk/folk/indie/ska-informed singer-songwriter with a surefire knack for catchy tunes, entertaining wordplay, and expressions of everyday anxieties that are both witty and relatable. Then there’s Toxic Moxie, the long-running disco-punk quartet who’ve been bringing the maniacal glitter-everywhere party vibes for close to a decade now, and show no signs of slowing down. This is going to be an absolute ripper of a show, and you don’t want to miss a second of it.

Sunday, June 5, 7 PM
Grocer, Lobby Boy, Knifing Around, Trapcry @ The Camel – $12 in advance, $14 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Here’s something you don’t see every day: a show in which both of the top-billed bands are named after anonymous working-class occupations that most people never think about. That’s not all Grocer and Lobby Boy have in common, either. Grocer, who come from Philly, play an energetic, neurotic form of post-punk that focuses on extreme tunefulness even as its songs manage some deceptively complicated musical feats. On their brand new album, Numbers Game, Grocer express a universal lament of our modern alienated economic landscape on single “Calling Out,” declaring, “What’s the point? I don’t wanna fucking do this. I’m calling out!” What’s not to love about that?

Lobby Boy’s own brand new album, Pretty Songs/Pursuits Of Personhood, also brings a strong sense of melody as a primary ingredient of their own postpunk musical melange. Where Grocer are a bit more about guitars, amps, and acoustic drums, Lobby Boy are more likely to mix synths, electro effects, and programmed beats into their sound. Despite — or perhaps even because of — the ways these two groups are sonically distinct from one another, they actually fit together perfectly on this Sunday night bill at The Camel. Both of these groups are going to keep you dancing throughout the evening, and you’ll probably find some opportunities to vent against the many day-to-day stresses that fill all our lives, to boot.

Monday, June 6, 7 PM
Fortezza, TVLPA, Magic Wand @ The Camel – $10 (order tickets HERE)
Mondays are tough, always. The end of the weekend, the beginning of another slog through the week… it’s a bummer. Even if you have the day off. So it’s a lovely development that The Camel is bringing us an excellent show this Monday night, so you can shake the blues off and rock the hell out. Asheville’s Fortezza have a ton of energy and a loose, scratchy punk sound that makes them the perfect band to help chase your cares away. On last year’s Windmill, the group bashed through 14 songs in about 40 minutes, never letting the energy level flag or the mood drop. Isn’t that exactly what we need on a Monday? Rest assured, it’s what Fortezza’s gonna bring.

They’ll be joined on this bill by TVLPA, a band named after the stylized spelling of an occult term meaning “physical being created through spiritual or mental powers.” And if that doesn’t tell you where this band is coming from, the fact that their new album, Walk With Me, features songs like “The Dreamer,” “The Lodge,” and “The Woman With No Face” should certainly offer further hints. Musically, they occupy territory covered by everything from black metal to screamo to post-rock to prog-metal, and their new album is a dynamic and riveting listening experience. So yeah, if you’re as new to TVLPA as I am, now seems like a good time to get familiar with what these folks are up to. Show up on time and catch a set of energetic punk rock from Magic Wand as well — it’ll do you no harm.

Tuesday, June 7, 7:30 PM
Beabadoobee, Drook @ The National – $22.50 (order tickets HERE)
Somehow, it seems, I have gotten through the past three years without writing about Beabadoobee on the RVA Mag website. I don’t know how I managed that, considering how much I’ve loved the last few releases, going back to 2019’s Space Cadet EP, which knocked me out with the lead single, “She Plays Bass.” A tribute to the band’s bassist, Eliana Sewell, who really is as talented as the song implies, it was the first Beabadoobee release which featured bandleader Beatrice Laus backed by a full band, rather than just doing the singer-songwriter thing on her own. That EP and the group’s debut LP, Fake It Flowers, found Beabadoobee doing that sort of guitar-driven alt-rock revival sound that has been in vogue for the past few years (a sound I’m just as much a sucker for this time as I was when it first came around back in the 90s).

It’s been a couple of years since then, and the Beabadoobee sound has diversified on more recent releases. A distinct element from The 1975’s baroque emotional pop seeped into the sound of 2021’s Our Extended Play. Meanwhile, recent single “Talk” has a bit of a shoegaze vibe, and brand-new track “Lovesong” is a moody acoustic ballad with an understated yet devastating emotional tone. These last two are previews for Beabadoobee’s upcoming second LP, Beatopia, and this show will offer fans the chance to get to know all the rest of the new songs before they come to a streaming platform near you. I, for one, am excited.

Email me if you’ve got any tips for me about upcoming shows (that take place after the week this column covers -– this week’s column has obviously already been written): [email protected]

RVA Shows You Must See This Week: April 13 – April 19

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FEATURED SHOW
Monday, April 18, 7 PM
Circle Jerks, 7 Seconds, Negative Approach @ The Broadberry – $35 in advance (order tickets HERE)
Richmond is in for a veritable bonanza of amazing live shows this week, and it all centers around this amazing triple bill of first-wave hardcore bands, all of whom are ready, willing, and able to run rings around millennials half their age and leave The Broadberry in a smoldering heap. It’ll be a blast. You need to be there. But on the off chance you didn’t get handed mixtapes with all three of these bands on them when you were in ninth grade (status quo for teenage punks when I was in high school — which was admittedly over a quarter-century ago) and actually need an explanation, let’s discuss the bands on this bill.

First and foremost, the legendary Circle Jerks. This pioneering California hardcore quartet was formed by Keith Morris (Black Flag/OFF!) and guitarist Greg Hetson (Redd Kross/Bad Religion), who are still at it over 40 years after their classic debut LP, Group Sex, redefined punk rock in terms of speed and energy, helping to define the then-nascent genre of hardcore. In 2022, they’re on tour to celebrate the 40th anniversary reissue of their second LP, 1982’s Wild In The Streets, which just came out on new label Trust Records in a dramatically expanded version. You should definitely order your own copy of that one, but also make sure you show up for this show, because unbelievably, even at the age of 66, Keith Morris is still the energetic maniac we all saw for the first time in 1980 LA punk documentary Decline Of Western Civilization — and you better believe the music still rules. Come ready to skank.

And show up on time, because speaking of amazingly well-preserved frontmen, Negative Approach leader John Brannon is still an absolute hardcore psycho beast, and he and the rest of his band will be bringing their pioneering Detroit hardcore rage to the Broadberry stage to blow all of us away at the start of this show. Not to be outdone, brothers Kevin Seconds and Steve Youth are back together yet again at the head of their legendary melodic hardcore group, 7 Seconds, whose sound an old friend of mine once described as “the aggression of Minor Threat with the hooks of the Misfits” — I can’t argue with that. The point is this: all three of these bands have been incredible and highly worth your time for every second of the past 40-plus years, and they still will be this Monday night. If you don’t already have your ticket, you know what to do.

Wednesday, April 13, 7 PM
Guerilla Toss, Toxic Moxie @ Richmond Music Hall at Capital Ale House – $14 in advance, $16 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Long running postpunk group Guerilla Toss has been through a whole bunch of changes recently, and they’ve put all of them on display on their brand new album, Famously Alive (their first for the legendary Sub Pop label), which was just released into the world at large a few weeks ago. If you dug the driving, off-kilter funk weirdness and hyperkinetic velocity of previous Guerilla Toss releases, rest assured, the band is still going to make you want to dance like a maniac when they take the Richmond Music Hall stage. There’s a decidedly brighter vibe to their new album, which is truly wild since the songs on it were put together in isolation during the pandemic. Hey, stressful situations inspire different things in everybody.

At this point, though, Guerilla Toss are itching to get back into the world and share the music they’ve created with all of us. And considering how much we all are still recovering from a year and a half without any live music of any kind, what they’re bringing to RVA is exactly what this city needs. Better yet, they’re joined on this bill by Toxic Moxie, who should by now need no introduction to the Richmond music faithful. On the off chance you’re new here, though, let me explain: Toxic Moxie bring a melodic, nigh-psychedelic vibe to songs that are fundamentally constructed at the point where disco groove and punk rock bash come together. Honestly, it’s not too different from what Guerilla Toss does, guaranteeing that these two great sounds will sound even greater together. Make it happen, cap’n.

Thursday, April 14, 7 PM
Pom Pom Squad, Chloe Lilac, Lobby Boy @ Richmond Music Hall at Capital Ale House – $15 in advance, $17 day of show (order tickets HERE)
There’s a real renaissance in melodic punk rock happening these days, and I for one am here for it. And honestly, the best examples of the genre’s recent peaks I can think of are all coming from women. Take Pom Pom Squad’s Mia Berrin, for example, who starts the debut full-length from her poppy, punky project with a song talking about wanting to marry “the scariest girl on the cheerleading team.” Who can’t relate to that one? More importantly, who isn’t totally rocked to death by the many excellent songs on Pom Pom Squad’s Death Of A Cheerleader? Look, if you aren’t, you should probably check your pulse. That’s all I’m saying.

Who am I kidding? I’m gonna say more, and we all know it. The first thing I’m gonna say is that Pom Pom Squad rule more than enough to be the sole reason you come out to Richmond Music Hall on a Thursday night. The second thing I’m gonna say is that the opening acts on this bill constitute one heck of a bonus, with New York’s Chloe Lilac bringing some excellent pop music of her own into the mix. She’s got the biting wit of prime-era Courtney Love mixed with the emotional electro-pop sound of Sky Ferreira at her best, and she’s gonna make you feel some feels when she hits the stage, that’s for sure. Harrisonburg’s Lobby Boy, who only a couple weeks ago released an excellent debut full-length, Pretty Songs/Pursuit Of Personhood, will bring their catchy, vaguely retro indie-electro sound to the river city once more. As openers go, they’re a real treat. So yeah: show up on time for this one. It’s in your best interest.

Friday, April 15, 7 PM
Man On Man, Trapcry, Kuni @ Richmond Music Hall at Capital Ale House – $14 in advance, $16 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Over two years after we all locked down for the first time, the ongoing effects of the pandemic on the music world keep showing up, and they’re less predictable all the time. For example, who would have guessed back in April 2020 when all the yuppies on social media were tweeting about their sourdough starter that the pandemic would eventually result in all of us getting to enjoy a new band from Faith No More keyboardist Roddy Bottum and his boyfriend Joey Holman? Probably nobody, but it happened, and it’s the best thing to happen to queer-themed alternative rock in a long damn time.

Man On Man, who make no apologies for the homoerotic content of their music, released their self-titled debut album last summer. Singles like “Daddy” and “It’s So Fun (To Be Gay)” first grab your attention with their titles and lyrics, which make this band the obvious 21st century heirs apparent to groundbreaking 90s punk rockers Pansy Division. However, it’s the sounds created by Man On Man are what will keep you coming back over and over to this truly excellent album of melodic indie tunes. Whether you’re someone looking for more LGBTQ representation in indie music or just a huge Faith No More fan excited for some new music by one of your faves, Man On Man’s performance at Richmond Music Hall this Friday night is sure to delight you. Be there.

Saturday, April 16, 8 PM
The Pack AD, Ten Pound Snail, Celler Dwellers @ The Camel – $12 in advance, $15 day of show (order tickets HERE)
There’s something about the genre of garage rock that makes it the perfect sound for a bassless rock duo to sink their teeth into. From The White Stripes to The Black Keys, there’s a noble tradition of guitar-drum duos rockin’ hard in the garage-rock domain. Canadians The Pack AD have been carving out their own lane within that tradition for over fifteen years now, and, as is traditional for bands in this genre, they manage to work up a particularly heavy groove without adding any bass guitar to the mix. It’s impressive, especially in light of the fact that they’ve kept it up for eight albums without breaking up (a la The White Stripes) or turning into a basic-ass radio rock band (The Black Keys).

The last time we heard new music from The Pack AD was just about two years ago, when they released their killer eighth album, It Was Fun While It Lasted, which showed off a perfect road-trip aesthetic (song titles include “Gas Station Food” and “Check Engine Light”) just in time for all of us to spend a year and a half in lockdown. Now they’re making up for lost time, bringing their heavy rockin’ sound south of the border to rock The Camel and get everybody moving their feet. So yeah, spend your Saturday night with The Pack AD. That Sunday morning bangover will be 100% worth it.

Sunday, April 17, 7 PM
Juan Wauters @ The Camel – $15 (order tickets HERE)
It’s been many years since I last wrote about Uruguay-born, NYC-based punk troubadour Juan Wauters, but he’s returning to RVA this Sunday with a whole new spin on his long-running solo project. For 2021’s Real Life Situations, Wauters fought back against the isolation of the pandemic times we were all living through back then, focusing on collaboration and pulling together a variety of talented folks to work with him on different songs from the album — Mac DeMarco, Air Waves, Cola Boyy, and a whole bunch more. This focus on integrating a variety of different voices worked well with his overall mission on Real Life Situations: at a time when circumstances beyond our control were making a whole lot of choices for all of us, Wauters decided to make an album about the way some of the best options and possibilities in life come about when we surrender control and take things as they come.

Musically speaking, the radio is the best metaphor for all of this, and Wauters’ latest album is a lot like listening to a radio on a crowded street corner, mixing tunes in a variety of genres — everything from catchy acoustic punk to traditional Latin American musical forms — with random voices, snatches from newscasts, street sounds, and all kinds of other stuff. The obvious question is: how will all of this translate to the live environment on Sunday night at The Camel? I admit I have no idea, but part of the thrill in catching Wauters on Sunday night will be in finding out. After all, it’s sure to be interesting, and it’s almost definitely going to be unpredictable. So get on Juan Wauters’ level, and take it as it comes. It’s sure to be the most unusual night you’ve had in a while, and who doesn’t need more of that?

Monday, April 18, 7 PM
Digital Hell, Ducttape Jesus, Raneshounds, Hunting Dog @ The Camel – $10 in advance, $12 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Mysterious, prolific, experimental, electronic — all of these adjectives and more can be applied to the youthful Richmond collective known as Digital Hell. The music they make is bizarre and somewhat unprecedented, simultaneously based in hip hop and extreme noise. They mix programmed beats and atonal screeching into off-kilter grooves over which they drop rhymes and talk shit with the best of them, along with frequent collaborators like Ducttape Jesus.

Recently, Digital Hell and Ducttape Jesus collaborated for an EP entitled KNC, and it’s that EP they’ll be coming together to celebrate at The Camel. The sounds they’ll be bringing to the stage on that evening are unusual and hard to predict or categorize, but if you like seeing musicians push the limits of multiple genres at once, this is a show you should make sure you get to. Beat-producing wunderkind Raneshounds and experimental electronic project Hunting Dog kick this one off. Come out and broaden your musical horizons.

Tuesday, April 19, 7 PM
Delta Sleep, It Looks Sad, Gender Roles, Colin Phils @ The Canal Club – $16 in advance, $18 day of show (order tickets HERE)
When you’re a fan of the wide world of post-hardcore music, it’s easy to ignore the rest of the world and just focus on America. After all, a ton of great bands on that genre spectrum come from right here in the United States. You don’t necessarily need to look outside our borders to find great examples of emo, math rock, screamo, post-rock, and other affiliated genres. That said, you’re really blowing it if you don’t — there are many great bands doing this sort of thing that come from far-flung corners of the world, and if you sleep on them, you might just miss out on some of the best music being played today.

If you’re wondering whether I’m telling you all this just to get you to pay attention to Kent, UK’s Delta Sleep, well, OK, I admit it, you’ve figured me out. Delta Sleep’s fourth album, Spring Island, came out last year, and it is full of amazing tunes that should absolutely appeal to anyone who appreciates the music of Tera Melos, The World Is A Beautiful Place And I Am No Longer Afraid To Die, and pretty much anything inbetween. They’re coming to the Canal Club on Tuesday night, and I mostly have no idea who with; their fellow UK band Gender Roles apparently broke up acrimoniously just before the tour started, and North Carolinians It Looks Sad cancelled their participation in this tour due to lingering concerns over COVID. As far as I know, Richmond’s own Colin Phils will be on the bill, and they rule, so that’s good at least. But here’s what’s most important: Delta Sleep is gonna play, and they’re gonna be awesome. That’s reason enough to be there, even if all the openers bail out. Don’t blow this one.

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Email me if you’ve got any tips for me about upcoming shows (that take place after the week this column covers -– this week’s column has obviously already been written): [email protected]

RVA Shows You Must See This Week: February 23 – March 1

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FEATURED SHOW
Friday, February 25, 9 PM
She, Hotspit, Lobby Boy @ The Camel – $10 in advance, $12 day of show (order tickets HERE)
One of the nice things about doing this column for so long has been the way it allowed me to follow the growth and maturation of local bands. Crazily enough, I started writing this column over eight years ago, and I’ve seen a ton of bands come and go in that time. Somewhere back in that lengthy archive are the first few writeups I did about She (no, I don’t know where they are, imagine how hard that would be to google), at that point still a solo project for singer-songwriter Liza Grishaeva (in fact, weren’t they just called “LIZA” at first? Or am I remembering that wrong?).

Anyway, a lot’s happened since then, and if you haven’t kept up with it all, you can see the full flowering of She’s maturity on their 2020 EP, TRL 2004, which finds the quartet blasting through some fierce, brilliant tunes with tuneful intensity. Liza’s voice in particular is a marvel; she brings the phrase “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” to full technicolor life on “28” in particular, sounding like she’s ready to rip your throat out. I hear elements of Concrete Blonde at times, but at others I can’t help but think of the legendary Thalia Zedek if she were to front a relatively conventional alternative rock band. The point is that She has grown over the past several years into an amazing band, and now that we’re all able to crawl out of our holes and see live music again, you should definitely liven up your Friday night with their set at The Camel.

Of course, we’ve got a couple other excellent Virginia bands on the bill as well. Hotspit’s hazy epics shone in particularly bright fashion on last year’s CC EP, and with an Audiotree session under their belts and a steadily increasing profile online, they’re clearly trending upward. Catch them live now, and get in on the action before the bandwagon gets too crowded. And show up on time so you can catch the opening set from Harrisonburg’s Lobby Boy, who started out as a tuneful alt-pop band on their 2019 EP, Lore!, but have been moving in a decidedly electro-dance direction on their most recent singles. It’ll be great. It’s all gonna be great.

Wednesday, February 23, 7 PM
Sarah and the Safe Word, Dog Park Dissidents, Pelican Johnny @ The Camel – $10 (order tickets HERE)
It’s a tough old world out there, especially if your sexuality or your gender identity isn’t straight down the middle of what society expects. From the terrifying “Don’t Say Gay” bill working its way through the Florida statehouse to the fact that a strong effort is underway here in the Commonwealth to roll back laws intended to protect trans kids in schools, looking at headlines can be a bummer, to say the least. Let me assure you, Sarah And The Safe Word know all about that. And while this’ all-queer sextet’s name might make you think of BDSM-related concepts, what they’re really aiming for is to create a safe space for anyone within the LGBTQ spectrum to come have a good time listening to some good music that supports and affirms you.

Of course, you don’t have to be queer or marginalized to get something out of what Sarah And The Safe Word do, musically speaking. With their use of strings and keys, and their integration of European musical flourishes into a punk rock foundation, Sarah And The Safe Word create what they call “cabaret rock,” and you can bet that if you dig World/Inferno Friendship Society, Gogol Bordello, or the Dresden Dolls, you’ll find something to love in the music of Sarah And The Safe Word. With the straight-up punk rock of queer duo Dog Park Dissidents and the rollicking garage sounds of Pelican Johnny on tap for openers, this will be a night of musical variety and inspiring vitality. Isn’t that what it’s all about?

Thursday, February 24, 8 PM
Tyler Meacham, Victoria Victoria, Moosetrap @ The Camel – $8 in advance, $12 day of show (order tickets HERE)
Well hey, speaking of local artists I’ve watched grow from raw beginnings to strong, assured talents over the course of my years doing this column, here’s another one who fits the bill. Tyler Meacham’s been quietly building her strengths and marshaling her forces here in Richmond for several years now, and all of her singles and EPs that have dropped over the past several years are now culminating with the release of her debut full-length, Into The Fray, coming Friday, February 25.

You don’t even have to wait that long, though — Meacham and a whole posse of her best friends and biggest supporters will be gathering at The Camel on Thursday night to celebrate Into The Fray‘s release with an evening full of excellent performances. Personally, I find that Tyler Meacham’s music shines particularly bright in the live environment, where the production is at a minimum and her strong voice and great songwriting skills can come to the fore. You’re sure to dig this album (I’m already predicting it’ll be one of the top RVA albums of 2022 — you heard it here first), but you’ll fall in love with it even harder after hearing Tyler and her band lay down the songs live. So hey, don’t miss this, OK? If you do, you’ll be kicking yourself later.

Friday, February 25, 7:30 PM
Past Life, Nancy Raygun, Lake Anna @ Garden Grove Brewing – Free!
There have definitely been a few venues whose names I got used to seeing in the rotation pre-pandemic and have missed in the post-pandemic era. Garden Grove Brewing was one of them, and it’s definitely lovely to see them getting back into the mix with the sort of thing that became their live-music stock in trade for a while — free shows featuring up-and-coming locals and the occasional under the radar out-of-town act with an outsized amount of talent to offer the rest of us. Best of all, these shows are usually either cheap or free, and this one featuring a great Philly band and a couple of fun locals is the latter — so you can save your cash for some of that brew they dish out (assuming that’s your thing).

This show bill is topped by Past Life, a Philadelphia quartet with some catchy tuneage in the indie rock vein to lay down for us. There’s a strong element of postpunk quirkiness mixed in here, and their LP from last fall, Window Shopping Economics, is a ton of fun throughout, somehow splitting the difference between Weezer, Gang Of Four, and… maybe They Might Be Giants? I don’t know for sure, I just know I dig it — and you will too. Of course, Nancy Raygun is an alt-psych trio from right here in Richmond, who are young enough not to remember when a club by the same name was a go-to spot for live music here in RVA. That’s OK, we all get old… and it’s the music of the youth that will keep us fresh and vital, so let’s celebrate it while it’s here. I don’t know much about Lake Anna, but the tunes on their bandcamp are catchy in a Surfer Blood-ish way, so I’m up for learning more! And hey — the price is right.

Saturday, February 26, 9 PM
Joy Cleaner, Gnawing, Obscure Son @ Fuzzy Cactus – $8
It didn’t start out this way back in the distant early days of the show column, but for several years now, I’ve used Facebook as my go-to spot on the internet for learning about upcoming shows. The new post-pandemic normal has taught me that this method doesn’t work that well anymore, now that no one but geriatrics (people even older than me!) is on Facebook anymore. Thankfully, cool kids out there shoot me emails about good shows that aren’t being discussed on Facebook — like this one. (You can too! My email’s at the bottom of the page. Hint hint.) And now I know that the undisputed champion of live shows happening in Richmond this Saturday night is happening right down the street from me, at Brookland Park’s own Fuzzy Cactus.

Joy Cleaner come to us from New Jersey, where they’ve been dishing out great punk-infused jangle pop tunes for several years now. They just augmented their two full-length albums, both of which are legit glorious, with a new compilation called Spent Flowers, which was released last month and mixes previously released EP tracks with digital loosies and a few unreleased jams for your listening pleasure. They’re coming through to give that album its proper due with a killer live performance, and you should definitely be there to take it all in. They’ll be ably supported in this endeavor by Richmond’s own Gnawing, who swear they want to be a country band but are way too good at the whole post-Dino Jr/Lemonheads loud-guitar Massachusetts drawl alt-rock for any yeehaw dabblings to make sense. You’re Jovian side project Obscure Son, who are pretty obscure in their own right, will get this one started. Come through.

Sunday, February 27, 7 PM
Komrads, I Ya Toyah, STCLVR, Same Story @ Fallout – $8 in advance, $12 at the door (order tickets HERE)
When it comes to Fallout, you know it’s gonna be some prime pounding industrial goth intensity that awaits you. And Komrads is in no way breaking that pattern, which is great news. But they aren’t just for rivetheads, by any means — on latest LP The Wolf, this Rochester, NY-based solo act lays down some pounding programmed beats overtop of riffs that have a decided metallic punk edge. It’s a little bit Front 242, but honestly, it’s a good deal more like Ministry meets Atari Teenage Riot, or Ghostemane at their most hardcore. Circle pits would not be out of order at this one, by any means.

Three other acts of equally dark vintage will also be on hand to provide entertainment of the spookiest and most intense variety. I Ya Toyah hails from Poland via Chicago, and brings us a moody, atmospheric take on gothic beauty and otherworldly terror. Dancing through the anxiety is definitely on the menu for this set. Then there’s New York’s STCLVR (Saint Clover? Static Lover?), who use harsh electronic noises and equally harsh atonal vocals to create gothic industrial music that, if you squint, could just as easily be noise-punk. Locals Same Story will get this one started off with some relatively accessible industrial sounds, so you can dip your toes in a little before Komrads rips your entire Doc Marten boot off and beats you with it. In a fun way, of course.

Monday, February 28, 7 PM
Destructo Disk, Asylum 213, Mere Exposure Effect, Terminal User Guide @ The Camel – $8 in advance, $10 day of show (order tickets HERE)
That’s right, ladies and gentlemen (and everyone else who doesn’t fit into either of those categories), Winchester, VA’s own Destructo Disk will return to our fair city in a few short days, giving all of us the chance to rock out again to their melodic, frenetic brand of punk rock, which from everything I’m seeing seems to be a big hit with the kids around the ol’ river city. And who can blame them, really? Singles like “Pepperoni Lopez” and “Punk Rock Die” are an absolute blast of catchy fun that makes you want to run around a room waving your arms in the air like a hyperactive eight-year-old. And isn’t that what all the best punk rock does?

Plus, the aforementioned “Pepperoni Lopez” single mentions Amazon Prime in its lyrics, and brand new Amazon Prime Video show Reacher (which ruled, watch it if you haven’t) features a character named after Destructo Disk bassist Molly Gordon. Coincidence? Or an indicator of behind-the-scenes moves toward world domination? Come to this show and find out! You’ll have some more fun with the three Richmond-based bands rounding out this bill, starting with Asylum 213’s melodic shoegaze pop, followed by Mere Exposure Effect’s ambient experimental math-core, and rounded out by Terminal User Guide’s chunky screamo punk. It’s gonna be great all the way through, and you’re sure to sleep soundly after working out all that energy in the Destructo Disk pit. So hey… shake off the Monday blues. Come to this show.

[The Sleigh Bells show I’d planned for Tuesday’s blurb has been moved to mid-August. Go figure. We’ll revisit then. –Drew]

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Email me if you’ve got any tips for me about upcoming shows (that take place after the week this column covers -– this week’s column has obviously already been written): [email protected]

VA Shows You Must See This Week: February 5 – February 11

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FEATURED SHOW
Thursday, February 6, 8 PM
Cary Street Cafe’s 25th Anniversary & Big Ol’ Whoopty Doo feat. Whistler’s Mother, Craigslist Jerry @ Cary Street Cafe – Free!
This column is ostensibly about music, but if you want to get technical about it, it’s really about shows. And sometimes the best, most important show of the week is about way more than just the music. Such is the case with the 25th anniversary “Big Ol’ Whoopty Doo” being thrown by Cary Street Cafe this Friday. Oh, there’ll be music — more on that in a minute — but the most important aspect of this event is just the occasion of celebrating a constant source for live music in Richmond over the past quarter century, and the work of founder Robyn McManis to bring it to us, especially in light of the fact that McManis is in the process of selling the place.

If you’ve been a longtime Cary Street Cafe regular, the music on offer this Thursday night should please you; the two groups that will be performing two sets each represent both the early and recent eras of this venue’s standard fare. Whistler’s Mother were one of the first bands to play the place, and had a Friday night residency in the cafe’s early days that lasted years. Having since evolved into projects like the Harrison Deane Band and the Tin Can Fish Band, they’ll be coming back together to rock Cary Street Cafe once again. Craigslist Jerry, who currently perform during happy hour every Friday at Cary Street Cafe, will offer two sets focusing on the Grateful Dead and Dead-inspired material that has been the place’s stock in trade since day one.

Make no mistake, the music on offer on this night should be a real treat, especially if you’re tastes are inclined to bring you to Cary Street Cafe on a regular basis anyway. But what this evening is really about is giving thanks for a venue that, in a constantly-changing landscape of short-lived venues for live music, has remained a consistent source of live performances since the early 90s — a time before a good many of our readers were even alive! Spend your Thursday night showing your appreciation with a night of celebratory jams.

Wednesday, February 5, 7 PM
Emily Wolfe, Tom West, Righter @ The Camel – $10 in advance/$12 at the door (order tickets HERE)
Let’s rock! Austin-based singer-songwriter Emily Wolfe is coming to town, and while you may be used to hearing that term as a coded signifier for “dignified Americana-folk sounds played on acoustic instruments,” Wolfe is quite a different prospect, using her loud n’ proud electric guitar and her wailing voice to create quite the storm of distorted blues-rock riffology. Her self-titled debut LP, released about a year ago, finds her at the head of a storming power trio that has much more in common with Jack White’s solo work than that of Carole King. Follow-up single “Ghost Limb Gambler,” released last week, has much the same fighting spirit, and thank god for that.

But Wolfe sometimes performs solo as well, letting her guitar, some effects, and her magnificent voice dominate the stage. Which version of her live performances we’ll get when she hits the Camel tonight isn’t something I can predict, but the fact that it’ll be great fun to watch is a sure thing. Wolfe will be joined on this gig by Australian singer-songwriter Tom West, who does hew a bit more closely to that whole folk thing, though “Americana” would surely be a misnomer for a troubadour from the land down under. Local indie-folk project Righter will get this whole evening kicked off, and it certainly should be a blast.

Thursday, February 6, 8 PM
Humungus, Mega Colossus, Children Of The Reptile, Mortal Man @ Wonderland – $10
While they’ve been around for pretty much a decade now, Richmond thrash-metal throwbacks Humungus have never been all that prolific a band — which just makes it that much more exciting when they do release new material. They did so back around Christmastime, bringing their second full-length, Balls, into the world via Killer Metal Records. The fact that most people have already picked their faves of the year by the time December rolls around might have led to this album flying under some people’s radar, but as always with Humungus, missing out on it would be a very big mistake.

This quintet does thrash in a manner not often heard in the modern era, keeping alive not only the incredible leads and galloping riffs of the genre’s prime 80s era, but also the high-pitched vocals and occasional goofy subject matter in a manner that shows how good these metalheads are at deadpan humor. No matter how tongue-in-cheek Humungus are being at any moment, though, their thrashing ability is always serious as a heart attack, and their live performance at Wonderland this Thursday night is sure to get you headbanging with abandon — even if the fans they’re known to bring with them onstage (to get the hair blowing around just so) are still pretty silly. A trio of Raleigh shredders — Mega Colossus, Children Of the Reptile, and Mortal Man — will pack this bill with a ton more metal mastery, but any true Richmond metalhead knows that Humungus is what it’s all about.

Friday, February 7, 8 PM
Leach, Black Dirty, Night Idea @ Poor Boys – $5
It’s always fun to head over to Poor Boys and spend an evening in the Voodoo Room, rocking out in a site that established a noble tradition of great music during previous days under the auspices of Bogart’s, Balliceaux, and Flora. Prsmcat Presents has been bringing some great locally-focused sounds into the place since Poor Boys took it over, and this Friday night is no exception. This evening will be headlined by Leach, who are celebrating the release of their latest EP, A Machine, It Seems, at this event.

If you haven’t checked out what this band, featuring former members of Imaginary Sons, are bringing to the table, the fact that their bandcamp URL labels them “Leach rock band” should be some guide. These guys have a decidedly 90s-style take on rocking, one that reminds me of driving around in my Chevette during my college days blasting Urge Overkill and Dig tapes. They’ll be joined on this bill by Philadelphia’s Black Dirty, who despite the name actually have a pretty clean and delightful math-damaged alt-pop sound. They’re certainly musically simpatico with Night Idea, the Richmond mainstay who rounds out this bill. With the aid of these three excellent bands, you’re sure to have a delightful Friday night.

Saturday, February 8, 7 PM
The Reign Of Kindo, Manatree, Colpa Mia @ Capital Ale House Music Hall – $15 (order tickets HERE)
This one kinda came out of nowhere for me, y’all. A band of at least half a dozen musicians who are big enough to tour on the performance of an early release in its entirety, whom I have also somehow never heard of? Well, in truth, that seems to be The Reign Of Kindo’s whole thing. While they’ve been around for nearly 15 years, this New York band has never had a high profile in the mainstream, instead releasing all of their albums independently and focusing on the internet and social media as their path to success. What’s really wild is that it has worked out so well — for the past few years, they’ve been releasing new songs monthly on Patreon, and have racked up nearly 1000 supporters who contribute over $3000 to them each time they release a new song. Not bad, right?

And so, therefore, The Reign Of Kindo (or just Kindo, depending on where you see their name) are definitely worth looking into if, like me, you’ve never encountered them before. Their music could certainly be described as alternative rock, but between the incredible talent of their entire ensemble and the fact that they bring such a wide variety of influences to bear on their creative process, it seems a woefully inadequate description. Genres like jazz, soul, and prog also have to be part of the conversation, and of course you can’t ignore the way frontman Joseph Secchiaroli’s voice takes the whole thing to another level entirely. Even if you’ve never heard of them — heck, especially if you’ve never heard of them — The Reign Of Kindo is a group you should really dig into. You can start this Saturday night at Capital Ale House.

Saturday, February 8, 8 PM
Daughter Of Swords, The Dead Tongues, Andy Jenkins @ The Camel – $15 (order tickets HERE)
Where live music in Virginia is concerned, y’all, it’s all about Richmond. That fact is driven home to me at times like this week, when I hunt high and low for non-Richmond VA shows to tell you about and can’t even come up with two — and meanwhile, I’m having a hell of a time narrowing the Richmond picks down to eight. This week I threw up my hands and decided to work with what I’ve got, which is why you’re getting this ninth Richmond show instead of a second elsewhere-VA show. I work with what I’ve got, folks, and in the end, you the live music fan are the one who benefits.

For example, there is this Saturday night show at the Camel featuring Daughter of Swords. I almost didn’t manage to get this one in here, which is remarkable in light of how good the latest project from North Carolina folk singer Alexandra Sauser-Moning really is. Last year’s Dawnbreaker demonstrated Sauser-Moning’s flawless ability to come up with a series of heartfelt, memorable tunes and deliver them in the most minimal of settings. But this tour, on which she’s backed by members of Megafaun, Dirty Projectors, and Hiss Golden Messenger, will present her with a more fleshed-out but just as brilliant musical canvas. They’ll come to town in the company of the Dead Tongues, a folk project from the mind of sometime Hiss Golden Messenger sideman Ryan Gustafson. The fact that the two picked Richmond as the place to start their current American tour just proves the point I was making a paragraph ago — where live music in VA is concerned, Richmond is what it’s all about.

Sunday, February 9, 9 PM
Faucet, Zima, Zara @ Bandito’s – Free!
Round out your weekend with this triple bill of noise-punk awesomeness at Bandito’s, featuring a couple of new groups consisting of members whose talents have already been well established. To begin with, there’s Faucet, who land firmly on the noise end of the spectrum, with an out-of-control raging approach that evokes classic 80s reprobates like Flipper and No Trend. Featuring members of Ceremonial Scissors, Gumming, Fat Spirit, and Among The Rocks And Roots, this band’s pedigree alone makes them worth looking into — but rest assured, their sounds are intense enough in their own right to warrant your continued attention.

Then there’s Zima, a band whom I’m guessing are named after a clear malt beverage that was quite the trend when I was coming of age in the 90s and is probably totally forgotten by the younger readers among you. What actually inspired their name isn’t something I can tell you, but I can tell you that this project, which features 4/5 of Richmond punk ragers Haircut on different instruments but going off just as hard, is absolutely worth your time. If you enjoy being devastated by raw, aggressive punk fucking rock, that is — and who doesn’t? The bill is rounded out by Zara, an ambient electronic project with the most history of any of these three — certainly a great way to start a musically delicious evening.

Monday, February 10, 7 PM
Horse Jumper Of Love, Keep, Lobby Boy, HotSpit @ The Camel – $8 in advance/$10 Day of show (order tickets HERE)
Is it me, or are there a lot of horse-themed bands running around these days? Just last week I wrote about Brooklyn’s A Deer A Horse and locals Horse Culture. And now, this week, I find myself discussing Bostonians Horse Jumper Of Love. As any journalist will tell you, three of anything is a trend. But it’s not a strictly musical one, by any means — all three of the mentioned bands have very different sounds.

The one we’re discussing at the moment, Horse Jumper Of Love, have revived the slowcore genre that was all the rage in the 90s, when bands like Red House Painters, Low, and Duster were big on the scene. On Horse Jumper Of Love’s 2019 sophomore album, So Divine, they show themselves as capable inheritors of the tradition, knowing when to keep it quiet and when to flip the dynamic switch to loud and crushing… but throughout, always keeping things slow and moody in a manner making their music a perfect soundtrack for listening late at night with the lights off. You can do exactly that at The Camel this Monday night, and we humbly suggest you do so… no matter how you feel about horses.

Tuesday, February 11, 6:30 PM
Have Mercy, Fredo Disco, Selfish Things, Young Culture @ The Canal Club – $17 (Order tickets HERE)
I must say, I really dug the third Have Mercy album, Make The Best Of It, back when it was released in 2017. That album came just after singer-guitarist Brian Swindle had replaced his entire backing band with a new lineup, and I remember thinking at the time “I wonder if that guy’s hard to work with.” Now, after one more equally excellent album, 2019’s The Love Life, Swindle and co. are calling it quits entirely, which only reinforces my previous wonderings. The music was totally great, though, so regardless of what sort of lingering tension may be present onstage for this Have Mercy farewell tour, it’s still well worth showing up at The Canal Club and seeing them one last time.

Baltimore-based Have Mercy existed in an adjacent space to the emo revival, but their sound was always entirely their own, drawing equally from 90s alt-rock and pastoral indie sounds and creating wonderful, enduring tunes with strong, heartfelt lyrics about real, important aspects of interpersonal relationships. They’re the kind of band that it’s easy to let into your heart, and therefore, it’ll be tough to let them go. Hopefully Brian Swindle keeps making music in some capacity after this, but even if he does, this will be our last opportunity to see Have Mercy play their many classic tunes. I suggest you make the best of it.

Elsewhere Around The State:

Friday, February 7, 9 PM
Pain In The Yeahs, Community Witch, Billy Varela, Black Mass Gathering @ Taphouse Grill (Norfolk) – $?
The Tidewater area of Virginia has always been a good source for dark gothic industrial dance sounds, and with Pain In The Yeahs operating in that area, this will certainly remain true for the foreseeable future. Brand new single “Animal Within An Animal” shows that bandleader James K. Ultra still has a deft touch with the postpunk spookiness he’s established through his and the group’s last several years’ worth of work.

There is a strong undercurrent of the goth sound of the mid-80s UK, with Cure and Sisters Of Mercy vibes undeniable in their music, but the new single shows that Ultra and co. bring a pop sensibility to what they’re doing as well; surprisingly catchy choruses and occasional synth-pop hooks add a darkly gleaming shine to the mood Pain In The Yeahs creates. Fear not, it’ll still lend itself perfectly to storming the dance floor in a velvet cape, black lipstick, and shiny polished Doc Martens, in classic Norfolk tradition. Get gloomy, y’all.

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Email me if you’ve got any tips for me about upcoming shows (that take place after the week this column covers -– this week’s column has obviously already been written): [email protected]

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