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Music
View galleryThe British folk rock foursome swept into the Susquehanna Bank Center with high-energy songs and soaring harmonies that kept the audience on its feet and singing along for the whole show.
You can add “master of ceremonies” to Marsha Ambrosius’ already-impressive résumé. The soul singer-songwriter, perhaps best known for being the decidedly melodic half of 2000s duo Floetry, pulled out all stops on Monday night during a show that built beautiful crescendos out of the Philadelphia (by way of Liverpool and Atlanta) songstress’ candid narrations of love, sex and loss.
Philly club staple DJ Aktive kicked things off and got the crowd rocking to R&B and hip-hop classics from the past two decades — they even did “The Butt” (this reporter did not) before ceding the stage to Motown-signed quartet MPrynt. With the obvious echos of Boyz II Men in their sound, this group of Philly boys broke it down a cappella before a passionate, knees-on-floor and hearts-on-chiseled-arms-under-sleeves rendition of Adele’s “Someone Like You.” They get a lot of Twitter love from Ambrosius, and it’s easy to see why — few people can make someone else’s smash hit all their own the way they did.
Permanent Wave Philly — West Philly's feminist arts/music/activism collective — continues the Create Chaos! multimedia art and performance series with a full evening of lady performers. I'm just getting into grungey drone-gazer Avataria, but you should do some clicking and see who you wanna see:
Featured performers:
Tonight, Fri., Feb. 15, 7:30 p.m., Eris Temple Arts, 
602 S. 52nd St., more info here.
K. Ross Hoffman had some long sentences to say about the band formerly known as Reading Rainbow in today's paper:
Two minutes into the gently epic opening cut of Yeah Right (Kanine) — album number three from the local fuzz-pop lovelies formerly known as Reading Rainbow — the drums kick in, the pace ratchets up a few notches and there’s a shift from warm organ-drone and sweetly harmonized boy-girl vocals to a growling, pummeling guitar-smear evoking a certain other noise-obsessed band with a blood-related (and seasonally appropriate) moniker who, hey hey, also happened to release their third album last week! That feels like the moment, symbolically, when the band becomes Bleeding Rainbow, transforming from a vaguely cuddly neighborhood duo named for a PBS show to a sharp, aspirational four-piece with an unmitigated allegiance to the turn-of-the-’90s shoegaze-to-grunge continuum. From there on out, it’s a hearty, good-natured assault playing both sides of the noise/pop dichotomy, with Sarah Everton’s charmingly plain-Jane vocals channeling indie everywomen from Bilinda Butcher to Georgia Hubley to Frankie Rose.
But to complete your mental picture, you really gotta watch the video and hear the song at the top of this post. "Waking Dream" is a damn fine rock song. Play it for someone you like.
Bleeding Rainbow plays tonight, Thu., Feb. 14, 9 p.m., $10, with Pet Milk and Ghost Light, Johnny Brenda’s, 1201 N. Frankford Ave., 215-739-9684, johnnybrendas.com.
Yesterday I posted a letter we got about City Paper's use/misuse of the word "punk." Among the allegations: That we don't know/cover West Philly rock 'n' roll trio Bucket Flush. Guilty as charged. So here's a really well-made documentary on the band uploaded to YouTube in December, 2011. Parts of this might gross some people out, but I have a feeling the Bucket Flush guys will charm you. (And please watch the whole thing before alleging that we're endangering their squatters' lifestyle by posting it.)
Last Thursday we ran a cover story on local band Pissed Jeans by Elliott Sharp. Yesterday we got a letter objecting to our use of the word "punk." Presented without comment. Click here for a larger version.
You've seen artist Steve "ESPO" Powers' giant love letters around town, and you saw him on the cover of City Paper just last month. And you know Kurt Vile, Philly's constant rock hitmaker and no stranger to our cover, either. Well, as you might have heard, the former did the cover of the latter's latest record. On a wall. This is Matador Records' promo video for all that.
I have to stop getting surprised by bands with warm, pastoral three-part harmonies and deliriously catchy guitar hooks being from Philadelphia. I’m not in Kansas anymore (or ever), but instead in an East Coast city with enough Americana heart in its native musicians to make Kansas City (yeah, I know, not actually Kansas) tip-toe home with its tail between its legs. Nobody at The Great Unknown’s vinyl release show on Saturday at Johnny Brenda’s, myself included, will ever forget that again.
Said to be a traditional band from Puglia, Canzoniere Grecanico Salentino certainly builds upon the old styles. Pulsing compositions use the traditional instruments in arrangements rather than the jam style, with layers of voices entering and exiting. The official video of “Nu Te Fermare” gives us a clue of what to expect. We see a decrepit building, a handsome young man resting amid the refuse pondering. Cue the music, follow it around the corridor to an arts be-in complete with sculpting and painting on canvas and faces, juggling and of course, dancing -trad and trance- to the sound of the tartantella. It could be two separate songs alternating within one, the parts contrast so strongly, both supported by accordion, bouzouki, violin and bass over ceaseless frame drumming. Your people don’t have to be from the boot of Italy for this to grip your imagination; anybody who loves new acoustic music will get this.
Sun., Feb. 3, 8 p.m., $10, World Café Live, 3025 Walnut St., 215-222-1400, worldcafelive.com.
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