Rosali.

Johnny Brenda's, April 2024.

Soulside 2023-12-10 Johnny Brenda's Philadelphia, PA

Cindy Lee – Johnny Brenda’s – Philadelphia, PA – November 17, 2022

Photos by Cecilia Orlando © 2022

i went on a trip to philadelphia and here's lots of bits of paper that i encountered while there

If this shirt had been available in a size other than "uncomfortably too large" I would have grabbed one. Now I'm waiting for their store to restock

Speedy Ortiz, Washer & Hurry – Johnny Brenda’s – Philadelphia, PA – September 5, 2023

On Tuesday night, Johnny Brenda’s in Philadelphia welcomed Philly based band Speedy Ortiz to the stage. Joined by Hurry and Washer, Speedy Ortiz put on a special performance celebrating their latest album, Rabbit Rabbit, released on September 1. Fans of the band gathered eagerly in the venue, excited to hear the album played in full.

Up first was Philadelphia-based band, Hurry. They began the show with a lot of energy, sharing how often they visit Johnny Brenda’s. The band connected with the crowd well, joking with audience members throughout their set. They opened with their songs “Didn’t Have To Try,” “When I’m With You,” and “Parallel Haunting.” They wrapped up their set with a cover of Teenage Fanclub’s “Don’t Look Back,” and their song “The Punchline.”

Next to take the stage was Washer, as they opened their set with “King Insignificant,” “The Waning Moon,” and “Threadbare.” As the pair stood on a dimly lit stage, their strong vocals and unique guitar riffs filled the venue. They continued with “Not Like You,” “Dog Go Bark,” and “Death of an Empire.” It was clear that the audience enjoyed their performance as the end of each song was met with cheers and whistles. Washer wrapped up their set with “Bass 2,” “Fail Big,” and finally, “Porky.”

Last, but certainly not least, it was time for Speedy Ortiz to take the stage! The crowd cheered as the show began, and Speedy Ortiz announced that they would be playing their brand-new album Rabbit Rabbit, from start to finish, for the first time. They began with “Kim Cattrall,” “You SO2,” and my personal favorite on the album, “Scabs.” Smiles could be seen all throughout the crowd as Speedy Ortiz’s smooth vocals and funky instrumentals filled the room.

They continued their set with “Plus One,” “Cry Cry Cry,” “Ballad of Y & S,” and “Kitty.” Speedy Ortiz talked about how excited they were to be playing this venue and shared their love for Johnny Brenda’s. They stated that they frequently spend their nights there, and that it was exciting for them to be on the performing end. After playing the 13-track album in full, they rounded out their set with a few bonus songs, “Raising the Skate,” “Buck Me Off,” and “Plough.”

This show as a whole was a lot of fun, with a lineup full of talent! Speedy Ortiz will be on tour through the beginning of December, so make sure to get out and see a show.

Emma Fox

Copyright ©2023 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: September 6, 2023.

Photos by Emma Fox © 2023. All rights reserved.

Year-End Poll #11: 1960

More information about this blog here

To quote a song from a certain John Waters adaptation, "Welcome to the 60's." And to mark the occasion, here's some songs from that decade of sex, drugs, and rock and roll! Woo!

So our modern perceptions of any given decade are rarely exhibited by the Billboard Hot 100 charts, especially when the decade is only just starting. I have my own thoughts on when the 60's truly comes into its own, but we'll get to that later. In the meantime, the top hits of 1960 wouldn't seem that out of place in the 1950s. Compositions, traditional pop, and doo-wop. Elvis is back on the charts after his time in the military.

However, there is one song featured in this poll that was truly a sign of where pop music was heading. If anyone can't figure out which one it is, don't worry. The same song will return in a future 1960s poll.

Before FaoI's second show in Niigata (from guillaume_cizeron's ig stories)

I think about you all the time. But we say it's just pretend. Fuck work, you're here. Every day's the weekend.

ALEX LAHEY Every Day’s the Weekend live at Johnny Brenda’s 

I wanna be as dangerous as a dancing dragon

Or a steam engine, a loaded gun

Being loved for my hazard and a will to destruct

“And isn't that just love, a will to destruct”

brenda living her best life

Pet Shop Boys Box Set Review: Smash: The Singles 1985-2020

(Parlophone)

BY JORDAN MAINZER

“It’s in the music / It’s in the song,” sings Neil Tennant on Pet Shop Boys’ “Vocal”, a 2010s club banger about the power of a communal groove. It’s a simple, but appropriate summation of their new box set Smash: The Singles 1985-2020. A collection of 55 remastered tracks, from the band’s “Imperial Phase” to their surprising late-career critical success, Smash makes the case for the London synth pop duo as some of the most concisely affecting pop songwriters of all time. Though each track sounds crisp and timeless, the set’s improved audio quality is secondary to the strength of the collection as a whole, one that puts the the band’s idiosyncratic, lesser-known songs on the same pedestal as their massive hits. 

The casual music fan and non-PSB-diehard is likely familiar with, at the very least, the ever-relevant “West End Girls”. A perfect slice of deadpanned, Thatcher-era pop, it’s a predecessor to Pulp’s “Common People”, a satire of our penchant to fetishize those of a different socioeconomic status. That the band’s tone isn’t obvious is perhaps their greatest trick--from the get-go, they fully embraced commercialism while singing about the suburban hellscapes brought upon by capitalism (“Suburbia”) and society’s swindlers (“Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots of Money)”. To Tennant and Chris Lowe, though, this wasn’t hypocrisy: It was the perfect melding of the minds, the former’s pop songwriting chops with the latter’s artistic, experimental edge. Take “Love Comes Quickly”, which wouldn’t hit as hard without its Reichian choral background, panning synths, and Tennant’s croon-to-falsetto from which you can trace a direct line to the likes of Hot Chip’s Alexis Taylor. Ditto the band’s inspired disco-ifed covers of songs from other genres: Brenda Lee’s “Always On My Mind”, the whistling synths emulating pedal steel guitar, or U2 and Boys Town Gang mashup “Where The Streets Have No Name/I Can’t Take My Eyes Off You”.

What you perhaps come to appreciate most about Pet Shop Boys from Smash is how many of their club-conquering songs take place in intimate settings. For every horn-inflected, Latin pop jam like “Domino Dancing”, there’s the unspoken infidelity of “So Hard” or the paranoid obsession of “Jealousy”, lovers waiting for the other to come home from being out. On the surface, “Se a Vida É (That’s the Way Life Is)” sounds basic, but it’s a thoughtful reflection on the complications of life and how they change as you age, all atop a brass section, strummed guitars, and percussive drums from SheBoom. And even on a certain dance song like “I Wouldn’t Normally Do This Kind of Thing”, the narrator spends most of the time in their own head, thinking about their journey from getting out of their comfort zone to letting loose on the floor.

Of course, at the heart of the band’s introspection is an unavoidable societal context. Pet Shop Boys came to fruition in an age of state-sanctioned homophobia, governmental response to AIDS met with, at best, a shrug, and at worst, demonization. Tennant came out as gay in a 1994 interview in Attitude magazine, and before that, his references to his sexual orientation in song were somewhat veiled. On early religious satire “It’s a Sin”, Tennant laments being blamed “for everything I long to do / No matter when or where or who”. The stunning, whispered eulogy “Being Boring” is about a friend of his who died from AIDS; sullen, he sings, “All the people I was kissing / Some are here and some are missing.” You can hear the difference in songs with similar themes after Tennant came out; on “I Don’t Know What You Want But I Can’t Give It Anymore”, he theatrically leans into the jealousy, chanting over wailing backing vocals, “Is he better than me? Was it your place or his? Who was there?” And while the famously understated Lowe has never publicly come out, it’s long been speculated that his added verse on “Paninaro ‘95″ refers to an ex lover who passed from AIDS. The band’s inclusion of this version over the original on Smash speaks volumes, given the disgusting rise of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation today.

Ultimately, what allowed Pet Shop Boys to continue succeeding, as society’s attitudes and tastes changed, is their adaptation. A diss track like “Yesterday, When I Was Mad” represents Tennant at his most bitter, chiding critics. “You have a certain quality, which really is unique / Expressionless, such irony, although your voice is weak,” he sings, putting himself in the mindset of a stuffy journalist unamused by a track like, say, “Left to My Own Devices”. Over two decades later, on “The Pop Kids”, Tennant adopts a different mindset rife with humility thinking about the band’s early days: “We were young but imagined we were so sophisticated / Telling everyone we know that rock was overrated.” It’s those very rock-oriented elements that, ironically, comprised their best later-career tunes. Ali McLeod’s guitar and BJ Cole’s pedal steel stand out on “You Only Tell Me You Love Me When You’re Drunk”, a moment inspiring to polymaths like Death Cab For Cutie guitarist Dave Depper. The Smiths’ Johnny Marr provides guitar on “Home And Dry”, whose additional snares and seaside synths fit alongside Tennant’s autotuned vocals on the band’s most wistful track. And acoustic guitar from Tennant himself buoys “I Get Along” and the Xenomania-produced “Did You See Me Coming?” They’re the type of songs that make you think were age truly nothing but a number, you’d be looking at a second collection of eternal songs in another 35 years.

trauma ray 2023-09-20 Johnny Brenda's Philadelphia, PA

Preoccupations & Cindy Lee – Johnny Brenda’s – Philadelphia, PA – November 17, 2022

Photos by Cecilia Orlando © 2022

New Audio: Sweeping Promises Shares Synth Punk Ripper "You Shatter"

New Audio: Sweeping Promises Shares Synth Punk Ripper "You Shatter" @swpromises @subpop @subpoplicity

Sweeping Promises — Lira Mondal (vocals, bass, production) and Caufield Schnug (guitar, drums, production — can trace their origins to a chance meeting in Arkansas, which led to a decade of playing together in an eclectic assortment of projects. Their relentless practice has made perfect: Meticulously controlling every aspect of their craft, from the first note they write together, through…

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Dick Clark 20 Years Of Rock N’ Roll (1973)

Contains 20 Original Hits Electronically reproduced for Stereo

Gatefold; includes 24 page "Yearbook" and the pictured flexi-disc, "Inside Stories," containing Dick Clark's recount of 'first time' broadcast appearances by artists on his show over the years.

Buddha Records