Live: MiniBoone with Pretty & Nice at Mercury Lounge 1.11.13

While the love from JS-NYC for Mercury Lounge is both longstanding and unabashed, an early show on a Friday night at 217 Houston is frosting on the rock and roll beater. It's always a pleasure not to have to ride over the bridge to Brooklyn in winter months, but more importantly, I like me some MiniBoone and the drummer has moved his sartorial and tonsorial tendencies from Let It Be to House Of The Holy, making it that much easier to look at him/attend his shows. The band has a new face in the bass slot and has a lot of potential goodness in the breach for 2013, including a new record with the good folk of Ernest Jennings.

I rolled up and got some quality beer time in with said MB skinsman and estimable drummer about town Jim Wood before we caught the Pretty & Nice set. The gents are from Boston and have a sort of Talking Heads/Modern Lovers thing going on that didn't really rock my world, but I am old and cranky and they definitely drew, so take that with a grain of salt. The lovely Marta de The Meaning Of Live showed and indulged me a healthy amount of bass nerdery and we all posted up front and center for the MiniBoone extravaganza. The set was tight as per usual, yet surprising bereft of side kicking from the crew, but asses were a-shaking and good times seem to be had by most. I'm excited to hear what the discriminating rockers about this fair country think about the boys. I understand there is a fairly ambitious touring schedule in the offing, including SXSW, so look out for the record and this merry band of miscreants in a town near you very soon.

Keep track of Mini-Boone here.

R

Live: Swearin' at Mercury Lounge 9.10.12

photo stolen with apologies and not from Mercury

Looks like Swearin' are blowing up, as the interwebs tell me they have transcended the blogosphere and good old word of mouth and are currently getting space in the New York Times about their new release. Kudos to them, even if they have upped and moved to Philly on us. Oddly enough, that move has precipitated an inordinate number of local shows of late. This gig was the opening slot of an early show and at Mercury, a perfect storm of awesome for this old man that had me gladly paying full price to leave after the first band.

Between the first EP and their new full-length, Swearin' have the perfect set for an opener and made the most of it, blazing through a half hour or so of the best of those releases. The better than usual PA gave a little more shine to Kyle's songs this time around, but everything about this set was pretty great. The touring is definitely paying off, at least when it comes to the foursome getting tight as all hell. Swearin' is obviously a band firing on all cylinders. See them with Tenement later this month in Brooklyn, at Cameo the week after, and look for them out with Japandroids in November.

R

Live: Cory Branan with Audra Mae @ Mercury Lounge 6.22.12

Cory Branan's been putting in work lately. There's been the aces new record Mutt he's dropped on Bloodshot and now we've got the companion tour. He returned to the Merc with Audra Mae opening for him this time around. I only caught the last couple songs of her set, but she definitely seems to be killing it in the Neko/Kelly Hogan end of things. Her solo set was well received by the crowd and definitely seemed to have some of her fans in attendance. Check her out here.

The Branan set wasn't too much different from his last couple swings through town, although a new song did pop up in the set. For some reason Cory had the guy from Sad & French get up and did a couple songs in the middle of things that were decent enough (and the same as the duo set at American Trash in April) save for the fact they could have been Branan tunes and there was a hard out given a late show. A good time regardless, and one that will no doubt be repeated a couple times in the upcoming months of Mutt promotion. Grab a copy and keep track of all things Branan (including his impending nuptials) here.

R

Live: Cory Branan @ Mercury Lounge 12.11.11

Cory Branan is JS-NYC favorite, a proud son of Mississippi current residing in Austin. He has a couple full-lengths under his belt, with his most recent release being a 2009 split with the great Jon Snodgrass. Record number three has been rumored for some time, and was even alluded to again at this show, but at this point appears to be the Chinese Democracy of the singer-songwriter set.

This tour was with Dave Hause and Laura Stevenson and had Cory in the midcard slot. I showed up early to find that things were about an hour and a half behind schedule, prompting a return to the couch that resulted in my missing Laura Stevenson and presumably The Cans as well. I swanned into a not-especially full room and Cory was up in short order. He played solo, opening with the great Survivor Blues and romping through 40 minutes or so of his back catalog, including Prettiest Waitress In Memphis and Tall Green Grass. All in all, a pretty good showing for a long-hair. I recorded the Branan set, so if you'd like a copy, hit me up via the e-mail and I'll mail you a link. I didn't stay for Hause, as I much prefer my own and its companion couchery.

R

Art Brut NYC Residency!!

Hey Kids:

Block out some time from June 1st through the 5th, cause the mighty Art Brut are coming to town and playing Mercury. They gots themselves a new record called Art Brut -vs- Satan coming out on 5/12 on Downtown Records. Produced by Black Francis even!

This bodes well for a good night, although perhaps not the same kind of next morning. See you all there!

R