Neil Friend* 8=====>----(((Senior Show)))

It's springtime here at SUNY PURCHASE!! and everything is finally in bloom. The quad is covered in blankets and butts, and the tree are full of leaves and birds and shit. It's pretty nice. As a freshman here, I'm really just holding on for the last few weeks. I've got no big obligations besides the occasional essay or w/e and I'm enjoying all of my wonderful free time. However, for seniors, I would assume this is a a time of CRUSHING SIGNIFIGANCE. Senior projects are being presented and showcased LEFT and RIGHT, and the Purchase upperclassman are definitely feeling the CRUNCH of their academic obligations. Recently, Nick and I attended one such Senior recital; that of Neil Fridd's. It was a pretty ornate and luxuruixurious event, and a lot of the Purchase creepers turned out to support Neil, Jesse, and Dan. Neil is technically a sculpture major, but since Purchase is for artsy-fartsy weirdos, his senior recital was basically a Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt Show. TPDR, if you don't know, is a wonky group of guys, truly. Composed mostly on tiny keyboards and with 8-bit drum machines, the music is played live over an iPod, but it's always a big dance party so noone complains. Neil's lyrics are pretty confessional at times, and he has an amusing self-deprecating sense of humor that comes through in a lot of his songs. I've seen TPDR a number of times so I was used to seeing the goofy costumes, semi-abrasive screaming, and hysteric dancing, but some of the parents that showed up for Neil's performance were taking all of this in for the first time. Neil went to extra length's for this show however, and had been working in the Library of the Stood for the week prior to his show preparing to the utmost. Upon entering the redorated library I felt like it was my first week at Purchase back in September; the whole place was totally unrecognizable and awesome, and he even put stuff on the ceiling. Before the show officially started, the "Guitarmy," a collection of guitar players Neil culled throughout the day, played some classic acoustic sing-a-long songs, but not the kind theat make you wretch. The bioluminescent Adam McHeffey, led the assembled showgoers in a moving rendition of that one Third Eyed Blind song, and "Say It Ain't So" by Weezer was played and that was gnarly. Among the guitar army as well was the charming and well-groomed Greg Baldwin, as well as the fishy and funny Alicia Santiago.

Well, when the show started we all filed into the makeshift venue and enjoyed a couple of TPDR's greatest hitss. Then Neil called in the Guitarmy and all assembled there, we played the four chords Neil told us at the appropriate time and it was a smashing success. And then everyone got light up lazerswords. And then we walked by 15 television sets to the outside. And then we danced around with pizza and sparklers. And then we set off fireworks. And then Neil stood on top of a van and thanked us all very much. And then I said "Hey, great job, man." and Neil said "Thank you very much."

DOWNLOAD THESE!

[MP3] - Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt - Fast Forward Regrets

[MP3] - Terror Pigeon Dance Revolt - Snowday!

Twin Sister - Vampires With Dreaming Kids

I need everyone to take a second to listen to Twin Sister. We mentioned these guys in the podcast and even played back a song of theirs but I have to admit I wasn't really familiar with their music until right about now. A few weeks ago I downloaded their EP free from their website/blog but I'm just sinking my teeth into it now and it's incredible. Their news feed is awesome, you can follow shows and they even post lots of downloads of demos and unreleased material, which I'm a huge sucker for. "Ginger" is by far my favorite song on the EP, it's full of barely there acoustic guitars and reverberating drums and nice twangy electric guitar and that oh so important beautiful singer. Check out their news, download the EP, or at least download Ginger, it'll all make you feel good.

Check out this video for "I Want A House," recorded here in SUNY PURCHASE!!'s own Whitson's Memorial Grand Staircase Sanctuary Palace.

[MP3 DOWNLOAD] - Twin Sister - Vampires With Dreaming Kids (EP)

[MP3 DOWNLOAD] - Twin Sister - Ginger

One If By Air, Two if By Blog

That's right everybody, it's almost as if MY SON COOL had lifted its fledgling wings and is now soaring over SUNY PURCHASE!! in an RSS feed. You have given us your beautiful music, Matt and I have carelessly pieced it together into a podcast, and now we're giving it back to you. It's like giving your friends your christmas presents from last year except these are better.

Download it here (or just stream it)

Sounds great, let us know what you think and maybe there'll be more where that came from.

Also check out our new Last.fm in house player down there in the corner. Matt isn't signed up with them yet but I've been obsessing over my charts for about 2 weeks now and now you can check out what I've been trying so hard for everyone to see that I've been listening to (and stream it straight from the blog!).

Fluxus Saturday: Fucks Us- Matt, Anyway

To be clear, Fluxus Saturday was two things:

#1. Rad City

and

#2. A long time ago


Well, I haven't posted anything for a while but who likes apologies? I've been busy with other stuff, but now I'm back and ready to roxx 'n roll! Speaking of roxx, Fluxus Saturday! The matinee show started around five, which was too early for some people, but the devout came out as they properly do to see the incandescant Jesse Cooper Levy play the arcade (?) at the Stood. Jesse sang his songs, some with the accompaniment of a small chord organ, and some simply a cappela. He read some poetry as well- it was very relaxed and fun- *intimate*.


After Jesse some more people showed up and packed the newly refurbished Sellar for Cameron Wisch Upon A Star's inauguratory set. Cameron recently redecorated and/or "fixed up" the Cellar at the Stood, and boy, is it tight. Physically, it's tiny, but it's also awesome, so it's okay. The walls are adorned with blue splatter, and the rafters (mere feet above yr head) are ramshackled with blacklights and a greenlight. Cameron capitalized on the room layout in key areas, and overall, it was a STRATEGIC and DYNAMIC performance! By harnessing the power of the black light through fluorescent paint and stardust, Cameron grew lumiscent, and came to know the meaning of AWESOME POWER! And he shared that knowledge with us- through math rock!! Also note: Cameron was recently part of the insane Gamehenge '09 collaboration, which is a reimagining of Phish through the eyes of over 100 musicians. Needless to say: check it out!


After we had all been enlightened, Cameron ushered us all over to the Whitson's Grand Cathedral where a pyschadelic performance was soon to be undertaken by the Pete McAwesome, with the help of a few of his dearest friends. There were three drummers; two were playing conventional drum kits and a third was banging soup cans and stuff. It was a really big production with some upperclassman whizkid running projections and about 10 people on the stage. The songs were really great and unlike anything I had heard from Pete before. Pete's music is really diverse; I've seen him singing sorrowful, alcohol-soaked acoustic ballads, and I've seen him as the frontman of huge musical enterprises, such as the one on Saturday. It was really impressive to see that many people coordinated together for the sake of one really epic jam. But all jams end, no matter how epic, and so too did Pee's set :(



But onwards and bloodwards to Landlords! I've seen them a bunch lately, but not always with the whole band intact. That wasn't the case for Fluxus and the vibes were as weird as ever. They too played in the Sellar, though they chose to forgo the blacklights, opting instead for a single green bulb. A trumpet made a short cameo, and it was totally overblown and distorted and sickk.


I saw Landlords this past Thursday on SUNY PURCHASE!!'s television channel PTV 69. They played WhaleHammer, a really gnarly/laffs talkshow on at 11 PM e'ry Thursday (sans singer). It was awesome though. Whalehammer is awesome.

*Sigh* Back 2 Fluxus :/


Well, Ghost Mall played in the Sellar too, and they were a cool electro-rocky band that got everyone singing along, even tho it was their first show ever! Great job guyzz <3> I only saw two-thirds of their three song set, but it was pleasant enuff.


There were also tons of awesome art installations as well. There was some artwork by Luke Anderson, a SUNY Purchase college student recently featured in the Submission. I especially enjoyed his stuff, which is really rich in iconic American imagery and stuff.

Now here: Tonz of videos pertaining to the evening.

Cameron Wisch


Elemeno Pete (FROM FLUXUS)


Landlords (FROM FLUXUS)


WhaleHammer

Christianity::Skinnerbox from Benjamin Korman on Vimeo.

Ghost Mall (FROM FLUXUS)

Open Mic Wednesdays At The STOOD

First of all, everybody be sure to come to SOUTHSIDE tonight around 7 for Part II of the Culture Shock Battle of the Bands and bring lots of animals and virgins to sacrifice to Jeff Levine so that Weird Korea at least makes it to the finals tomorrow night.  Here's tonight's lineup:

The Boomerangs
Bums and Drass
The City Strikes Back
Elemeno Pete
For Every Judas

Hey Hi Hello! (that might not really be the band but holy shit look at that guy)

In Tents
Major Potential
Olken
Silence the Feedback
Trails
Typhoon the Goon
Weird Korea
Wyldlife

Pretty awesome.

Myspace search really sucks. You're going to check out all of those links before tonight right? I did.

But more importantly, WEDNESDAY NIGHTS and the STOOD have transformed from quiet acoustic nights to well... quiet acoustic nights with INTERMITTENT BANDS! Thats right, now you and your fledgling band can come play at Whitson's under the tender care of Pete McAwesome and a new array of Stood gear, including a house drum set and amps and plenty of new mics.  Weird Korea has played the past two weeks in a row and if everyone would just forget how we sounded the first week we'd be totally comfortable making this a weekly thing and you should too.  The musixc starts around 9 on Wednesdays in Whitson's, so pick two songs and get there early to sign up if you're interested in playing.

See everybody tonight, come support SUNY PURCHASE!!! bands.

BONUS

We had a little extra time yesterday after making our videos so we decided to throw a little something together.

New Videos

With the help of my generous roommate Cam Kafura, we have created two new videos showing the individual music we make when we're not writing this blog.

Here's Matt's video, accurately portraying the dark, winding, reverberating staircase of his oedipus complex. For more, check out Weird Korea.

Also:

My video is essentially an ode to Take Away Shows, I played a one-shot take of one of my songs in the rain outside the music building. For more of my music, click here.

Weird Korea Tour Dates Posted!

In the name of shameless self promotion, check out Weird Korea at Whitson's on April 23rd. We'll also be playing a slot at the Culture Shock Battle of the Bands on April 9th, 10th, and 11th, so come sell your body to Jeff Levin in the name of our music.

More Honorable Mentions

This school is filled with awesome bands and really great music, so lumping everything into a list of 5 would do no justice to our community here.  Here are my honorable mentions, bands definitely worth checking out.

MOVING MOUNTAINS

These guys have such a huge, developed and carefully constructed sound.  They fill up rooms completely with both instrumental ambience and an army of an audience bobbing in unison from the hip.

MOKAAD AND THE FLEX POINTS

Funk isn't really my thing but this band is by far made up of some of the best musicians on campus and they really know what they're doing.  They definitely put on a good show and get people to come out, yet they are apparently too funky to be found anywhere at all on the internet.

ZONA MEXICANA

I remember the first time I saw these guys it was at a Crossroads open mic and they were the first math band I've ever witnessed.  Since then I've seen them numerous times and they grow on me more and more every time.  These guys are touring this July and currently have more shows on their myspace than any band I can think of.

ELEMENO PETE

Pete's one of my favorite guys in the music department and he's involved in a lot of different projects so that should be all the more incentive to check them all out.  Matt and I actually just saw Pete play earlier tonight at the Stood open mic with what I think was an entirely new band that was very loud and abrasive and great.  Check out Pete's BLOG for news and updates and videos and lots of great stuff.  Matt caught these guys last Saturday while I was setting up for my show a the CO-OP, so expect a more detailed post on their show sometime soon.

DATA DOG

First SUNY PURCHASE!!! band I ever heard.  Data Dog mixes elements of acoustic indie and synth-heavy electro pop with a top coat of layers harmonies and samples.  The cool thing about these guys is that they reproduce their sound very well in a live setting.  Come see for yourself on this Saturday, April 4th, (at what appears to be an undisclosed location on campus) for their first CD release.