If It's Too Loud...

Photo by Ken Sears Despite David Wax Museum being a favorite around here, it had somehow been four years since I had seen them. Obviously the last two years were what they were, but four years is a long, long time to go without seeing one of my favorite bands. When I saw they were swinging through New England and playing my new favorite local venue, I knew I had to head up to the seacoast of New Hampshire. For this tour, David Wax Museum are playing as a trio with multi-instrumentalist Alec Spiegelman. He's produced the last two David Wax Museum, has played with the band in the past, and is a member of Cuddle Magic. The experience of David Wax Museum playing as a trio is between a duo house concert and a full band club gig. It's still a laid back experience, but with a little more energy than a living room show. While there were spots of higher energy, it was a more subdued, laid back performance. Of all the times I've seen the band, it's always a completely different e...

Saturday was a ridiculous day filled with live shows in the Boston area. No matter what I chose, I was going to have some level of FOMO. But, I've been hoping to get back to The Word Barn before they close up their meadow stage for the season, and with a dual bill of Pete Bernhard of The Devil Makes Three and The Huntress and Holder of Hands playing solo, I truly couldn't pass that up.  During the show, MorganEve Swain mentioned that she hates playing solo since it was all her and any mistakes couldn't be covered up. I was personally curious how The Huntress and Holder of Hands songs would work solo seeing that her music is quite noisy. Sure, it's primarily folk but with elements of indie rock and even metal it can get quite loud and discordant. Stripped down to just guitar and vocals her music was at its most bare bones. Swain played a good amount of new songs that were just being played live for the first few times, including last year's "Doctrine." If t...

As I begin my foray into seeing live music again, an outdoor show in a field sounds like a perfect way to reintroduce myself. That's pretty much the only thing my anxiety could handle at this point, and, you know... baby steps. Back in the Fall, I saw that The Word Barn was putting on shows in their meadow. I would have gone then, but nothing worked out with my schedule. When they started booking meadow shows this spring, no bands I knew worked out with my schedule, so I started checking out artists I had never heard of. That's how I discovered Carsie Blanton. This show was originally supposed to be Blanton solo, but she brought along her band which consists of a bass player and a keyboard player. As expected, both the crowd and musicians were especially pumped to be there. This particular show had been rescheduled multiple times, which added to the excitement that it was actually happening. Especially since the rain held out (almost) long enough to not affect this evening. May...