Dro Kenji & midwxst
Dro Kenji’s rise is a testament to the power of the internet. Just a couple years ago, the 20-year-old artist was a senior in high school in South Carolina, releasing a string of captivating singles and mixtapes on his SoundCloud. Now that he’s released his debut album on Mira Touch/ Internet Money Records/ 10K Projects, collaborating closely with the label’s team of platinum-certified producers, he’s hoping to earn some plaques of his own. A true child of the digital age, raised on video games and the lo-fi sounds of rap’s online underground, he has a remarkable ability to capture both the apathy and aspiration of his generation in his songs and a spellbinding voice with which to tell these stories.Raised in Summerville, South Carolina, a town outside of Charleston, Dro Kenji mostly kept to himself. “There’s not really a lot going on,” he says of his hometown. “Up until I started making music at the end of 10th grade, I really didn’t do shit but play video games and listen to music.” His parents put him on to classic ’90s-era hip-hop and R&B, but some of his earliest music fandom came from an unlikely combination of his two main hobbies: the video game Rock Band. While playing, he heard songs by Weezer, Radiohead, and Soundgarden, bands whose lead singers would go on to influence his own soaring melodies.In high school, inspired by the DIY recordings he found on SoundCloud from XXXTentacion among others, Dro Kenji decided to start making music of his own. “When I wanted to make a song, I didn’t know how to do anything,” he remembers. “I didn’t have a mic; I just had a shitty laptop.” At first, he downloaded an app that allowed him to use his iPhone 6 as a microphone plugged into his computer but, eventually, his process evolved and so too did the songs he was crafting, reflecting a sound that was more melodic and off-kilter like the music he had always been drawn to online.After graduating from high school and building a steadily growing SoundCloud fanbase with mixtapes like Introvert and standout tracks like the buoyant anthem “Finnished,” Dro Kenji got a DM on Instagram an Internet Money A&R. A month later, he was in Los Angeles, recording at the Internet Money headquarters recording breakout tracks like “SAVE ME” and “HOUDINI” produced by Internet Money’s resident hitmaker Nick Mira. Mira quickly saw the promise that Kenji carried as an artist, and made him the first signing to MiraTouch, his imprint via 10K Projects. Dro Kenji went on to release a string of successful projects including EAT YOUR HEART OUT and F*CK YOUR FEELINGS, which yielded seminal tracks like “KILL CUPID” ft. $NOT and “SUPERSTAR.” These tapes led him to his first headlining tour with stops at some of the game’s biggest festivals including Rolling Loud, Lyrical Lemonade’s Summer Smash, and SXSW.Fast forward to 2022, and Dro Kenji is beginning to emerge as one of the most promising young voices in his genre, continuing his ascent to the highest echelons of the rap game. He established himself as a force with the release of his official debut album, WITH OR WITHOUT YOU in January, which featured hit singles like “VANISH” and “FINDERS KEEPERS” ft. Scorey and Internet Money, and netted over 25M global streams across streaming platforms. He’s now putting the finishing touches on his second studio album, ANYWHERE BUT HERE, due out later this summer, which aims to build on the success of his debut and continue to push the boundaries of his creative process and musical potential.Instagram | Twitter | TikTok | Spotify | YouTube | Soundcloud
Sing Out NC – A Concert for Reproductive Rights! Hosted by Tift Merritt
On November 6, a collective of Triangle artists will host Sing Out NC, an election-time concert advocating for reproductive rights in North Carolina, outdoors at Cat’s Cradle. All Proceeds Go To Protecting Abortion Access in NC.Hosted by Tift Merritt, guests and performers include Alice Gerrard, HC McEntire, Kamara Thomas, Kate Rhudy, Kym Register, Libby Rodenbough, Rissi Palmer, Shana Tucker, Charly Lowry, Dawn Landes, Florence Dore, Sinclair Palmer & Blair CoppageProduced and performed by people targeted by anti-abortion, anti-choice, and anti-LGBTQIA laws and restrictions and in partnership with reproductive rights and health and social justice organizations, this concert aims to raise awareness of how our rights are being impacted in North Carolina, and how we can collectively build a world that insures reproductive rights for all. Please consider a donation as we raise money for organizations doing critical work to protect abortion access in NC. Benefiting organizations include ProChoice NC; Equality NC, Common Cause NC; Planned Parenthood South Atlantic; ACLU-NC; and El Pueblo.
JULIA., By George
JULIA. is a funk four piece from Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Their sound harkens back to the funk of the mid seventies, with a modern flair of soul/rap mixed in for good measure. Made up of members Danlee Gildersleeve, Torin Alston, Sean Meehan, and Todd Davis.Influences include Parliament-Funkadelic, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Sly and the Family Stone, Kendrick Lamar, Childish Gambino, Anderson Paak., and Grand Central Station. Website | Bandcamp | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | Spotify | YouTube
Hoodoo Gurus
The legendary Hoodoo Gurus. By any measure, one of Australia’s greatest, best loved, most enduring rock bands of all time. 2012 marks an extraordinary milestone for the Hoodoo Gurus; 30 years since the release of the band’s debut single, “Leilani”. To celebrate, the Gurus have compiled all their biggest hits and fan favourites onto a brand new best-of set, aptly-titled GOLD WATCH: 20 GOLDEN GREATS. “What’s My Scene?”, “I Want You Back”, “Miss Freelove ’69”, “Like Wow – Wipeout!”, “The Right Time”, “Bittersweet”, “Come Anytime”, “My Girl”, “1000 Miles Away”, “Waking Up Tired” – these tracks represent the unmistakable sound of the irrepressible Hoodoo Gurus, but it’s merely a sample from their canon of instantly identifiable songs that have helped provide a soundtrack to Australian life going all the way back to the 1980s. With tongue planted firmly in cheek, exactly where it’s been for much of their career, GOLD WATCH also features a brand new single, a thumping and grinding rocker entitled “Use-By Date”. GOLD WATCH? “Use-By Date”? Is there a hidden message here? Is this truly the end of the road for the Gurus? Don’t bet on it. “We’re kind of playing with the idea of being veterans and giving ourselves a gold watch, retirement age,” explains head Gurus, Dave Faulkner. “I guess it’s a case pointing out your flaws before someone else does it for you. “We always like to have a slight edge. It’s unknown territory, bands being as vintage as us, even though there’s a couple of examples in the international world, like AC/DC and the Rolling Stones. There’s a reason why there’s so few of us, because it’s damn difficult to do. We’ve basically been to the new ice age and we remember the days of the old jungle.” Hoodoo Gurus learned the hard way exactly how difficult it is to keep the old band together. Back in 1998, still at the peak of their prowess and popularity, Faulkner and his fellow Gurus – guitarist Brad Shepherd, bassist Rick Grossman and drummer Mark Kingsmill – decided it was time to call it a day and broke up the band. They all went off to perform and record with other people, but soon missed each other so much that they formed a new band together, the Persian Rugs, which they insisted for years had nothing to do with the Hoodoo Gurus, except that the two bands coincidentally shared exactly the same line-up for a time. Thankfully, in 2003, they put an end to that charade and reformed as the Hoodoo Gurus. “The real wake up call for me was when the band broke up for six years,” says singer Dave Faulkner. “I had never questioned what it was like being in the Hoodoo Gurus because I always was. After about four years, we did a one-off show at the Homebake festival in Sydney. We went up on stage and played and there was that exact same chemistry there – a more powerful entity than just the four of us on stage, a shared identity that was larger than all of us. The champion team versus the team of champions. None of us are the greatest musicians on Earth individually. It’s just when we get together, we add something to each other and harmonise in certain ways.” Since reforming, the Gurus have recorded two more critically-acclaimed studio albums, Mach Schau [2004] and Purity Of Essence [2010], which now sit seamlessly alongside the band’s pre-split classic recordings: Stoneage Romeos [1984]; Mars Needs Guitars! [1985]; Blow Your Cool! [1987]; Magnum Cum Louder [1989]; Kinky [1991]; Crank [1994] and In Blue Cave [1996]. And now comes this brilliant all-new summary of an extraordinary career thus far, the best-of companion, GOLD WATCH. Website | Facebook | Spotify | YouTube | Apple Music
Baked Shrimp
In five short years, high-octane power funk trio Baked Shrimp has become a top up-and-coming artist in the jam scene. The high energy young talents Jared Cowen (Guitar/Vocals), Scott Reill (Bass/Vocals), and Jager Soss (Drums/Vocals) from Long Island, NY keep it fresh from night to night with their repertoire of over one-hundred original songs and have performed over two-hundred concerts on their many extensive tours throughout the east coast and mid-west. Baked Shrimp has provided direct support for artists such as Aqueous, Mihali (from Twiddle), Kung Fu, Freekbass, and more. In the past year they have also become a well-known name in the festival circuit. Highlighted festivals include Adirondack Independence Music Festival, Catskill Mountain Jubilee, Great South Bay Music Festival, Memorial Meltdown, Some Kind of Jam, Karnival of the Arts, and their very own hosted LonCon festival.Baked Shrimp founded LonCon in 2021 following the passing of their most loyal supporter and ambassador, Lon “Conscious” Gellman. The initial festival was announced during a virtual music festival live stream called “Live for Lon” which featured a live Baked Shrimp set in addition to performances submitted by members of Twiddle, Brandon “Taz” Niederauer, Andy Frasco, and more. The event raised $2,700 for White Light Foundation. The inaugural LonCon festival took place in August of 2021 at legendary Arrowhead Ranch in Parksville, NY. In 2022, Baked Shrimp will bring the festival to Yasgur Farm in Bethel, NY and feature artists such as lespecial, Cabinet, Dogs in a Pile, members of Trey Anastasio Band, Goose, the Disco Biscuits, and more, with two headlining performances by Baked Shrimp.Despite Baked Shrimp’s very intense touring schedule, the trio has managed to find time to release five official albums in the timespan of five years. The band’s 2021 release of Conscious received high praise by media outlets such as LiveForLiveMusic, Grateful Web, The Sound Podcast with Ira Haberman, and more. After a quick release of a three-disc live album The Prawno Tapes, Vol. 1, Baked Shrimp went back into the studio to finish their early-2022 release Pork Etiquette. Pork Etiquette was featured on JamBase’s Release Day Picks which highlighted five other albums, four of which were by Vulfpeck, The Weeknd, Lotus, and Cory Wong. Baked Shrimp celebrated the release of Pork Etiquette with a virtual release party in New York City at Relix Studio. The performance was live streamed on Relix’s Twitch Channel to their 40k followers, and featured The Horn Section (members of Turkuaz).With a goal of 100 shows in 2022, Baked Shrimp prepares to head out on the road for a 50+ date Summer Tour. The band is already well on their way to achieving their goal after starting the year with a 30-date Winter/Spring Tour in which the young trio performed at well-known venues such as Brooklyn Bowl, Cafe Wha?, and The Westcott Theater. Baked Shrimp is constantly turning heads and has moved from “Long Island’s best kept secret” to the hardest working band in the business, a secret impossible to keep.Website | Instagram | Facebook | Spotify | YouTube
Crazy Chester: A Very Carrboro Tribute to The Band and The Last Waltz
Formed in early 2020 for a series of one-off events, Crazy Chester is a homegrown tribute act to The Band, consisting of Carrboro musicians Jones Bell (Mellow Swells, Ravary), Charles Cleaver (Big Star’s Third, Tripp), Rob DiMauro (Heat Preacher, Mixtape Grab Bag), Justin Ellis (Slow Teeth, Ravary), and Rafael Green (Little Raven, Ravary), respectively recreating and playing the parts of Richard Manuel, Garth Hudson, Levon Helm, Rick Danko, and Robbie Robertson.For this special Black Friday concert, Crazy Chester will be performing most of The Band’s legendary farewell performance from Thanksgiving Day 1976, immortalized in the 1978 Martin Scorsese film “The Last Waltz” – complete with additional musicians and special local guests to play the songs originally performed in the film by Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and many more. Join for an unforgettable live performance of a Thanksgiving tradition, live at the Cat’s Cradle.Featuring guest performances from Danny Grewen, Owen Matthew FitzGerald, Charles Latham, Brad Porter, Jeremy Haire, Jodi Jones, Brendan Macie, Glenn Jones, Paul Messinger, Georgia Moon, Christian Cail, and more. Come early for a special opening set from the School of Rock Chapel Hill House Band!
Covet
Covet started in 2014 as a bedroom project by guitarist Yvette Young, who at the time, was balancing writing music part time with working as an art teacher. Over the years, the project has certainly grown beyond its “Bay Area garage band” roots and has been fortunate enough to reach people all over the world- enough so that Young eventually left her teaching job to pursue making music with a band full-time.With a background in visual art, art therapy/education, and classical piano/violin, Young aims to write emotive songs that capture colorful imagery, uplift, and tell stories. Their sound can be described as “instrumental progressive rock” but the music draws influence from many genres like Midwest emo and shoegaze and doesn’t try to adhere to one main sound. Young’s fluid and polyphonic fingerstyle approach to guitar is often described as very piano-like, and although her playing at surface level is technical and intricate, the music still aims to make people feel something and make people want to dance.The band has released an EP Currents, an acoustic EP, and 2 full length albums Effloresce and Technicolor. Over time the sound has really transformed from its twinkly mathrock origins to a more evolved, fuller, more melodically complex sound that incorporates a myriad of tones and textures. There is currently one new album in the works, which the band will be playing songs from.Website | Bandcamp | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | Spotify
Magic City Hippies
Website | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | Spotify | YouTube | Soundcloud
Hand of Doom, Speed Stick
North Carolina’s Premier Black Sabbath Cover Band.Hand of Doom Links: Facebook Speed Stick Links: Bandcamp | Facebook
Don’t Lie To Me! Celebrating The 50th Anniversary of Big Star’s #1 Record
Big Star’s #1 Record is now widely-regarded as a seminal work. It is included in Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. Rolling Stone also ranked the song “Thirteen” in its 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.In a celebration of the 50th anniversary of its release, the album will be played in its entirety, by a great electric band: Jody Stephens and Jon Auer (Big Star), Mike Mills (R.E.M.), Chris Stamey (dB’s), Mitch Easter (Let’s Active), & Brett Harris. This will be followed by a second set of equally classic material from Radio City and a selection of songs from the legendary Third album and Chris Bell solo recordings, as well. Special Guests will include Django Haskins, Skylar Gudasz, and Charles Cleaver.About #1 Record (from wikipedia):Six years earlier in 1966, when their hometown of Memphis, Tennessee became a tour stop for The Beatles, primary songwriters Alex Chilton and Chris Bell were fifteen years old. Heavily influenced by the UK band, the pair—Bell in particular—wanted to model their songwriting on the Lennon-McCartney partnership, with the result that they credited as many songs as possible on Big Star’s debut album to “Bell/Chilton”. In practice, they developed material incrementally in the studio, each making changes to the other’s recordings. Drummer Jody Stephens recalled, “Alex would come in and put down something rough and edgy and Chris would come in and add some sweet-sounding background vocals to it.” Chilton once offered the following on Chris Bell’s unique vocal contributions: “Chris and I did all the harmony vocals, and he had a brilliant mind that worked in a sort of contrapuntal way. It wasn’t based so much on ‘Oh you’re singing the root. I should be singing the 3rd above,’ he would just sing along with the line I was singing. He was a brilliant, instinctual maker of counterpoint.”The pair also each contributed songs to the album that were individually composed before Big Star was formed. Chris Bell brought the songs “Feel”, “My Life Is Right”, and “Try Again” to the recording sessions, which he had previously recorded with a band called ‘Rock City’ (which featured Big Star drummer Jody Stephens and Steve Rhea), and Chilton brought “The Ballad of El Goodo”, “In the Street”, and the acoustic ballads “Thirteen” and “Watch the Sunrise”. “The India Song” was written and composed by Andy Hummel. Bell had a major hand in the record through songwriting, vocals, guitar work and the album’s production. Producer John Fry: “When Chris Bell was still in the band, he took more interest than anybody in the production and technology end of things. Bassist Andy Hummel : “Chris [Bell] was in charge. I would pretty well credit him with recording and producing that LP [#1 Record]. Of course, he had a lot of artistic help from Alex [Chilton] but Chris was the technical brains behind it. He was the only one of us at that time who knew how to record.” Alex Chilton would also acknowledge Bell’s heavy role in the studio production: “Chris was really into recording. He didn’t want the rest of us fooling around in the studio, that was his business.” Chilton would also give producer John Fry credit for achieving the album’s high level of production quality: “John Fry was a genius in his way of mixdowns. We didn’t put things on tape much differently than was the standard method of doing things, but he just had such finesse and great ears, and he was just a great meticulous mixdown engineer and producer. […] He’s the one responsible for making those records sound so fucking great.”
