If It's Too Loud...

Photo by Ken Sears I've seen Walter Sickert & The Army of Broken Toys a lot over the last nine or so years. In fact, I just saw them a little over a month ago, so you'd think I'd be able to skip a performance so soon. But when it was announced that the Toys would be playing a special acoustic set at the Bradley Rosaceous Collection at the Arnold Arboretum as part of the A.R.T. Arboretum Experience, I knew I would be dragging my family into the city for an afternoon of nature and live music! The show wasn't entirely acoustic. Brother Bones was playing an electric guitar. Aside from that, the only amplification was for vocals. Even drummer Matt Zappa was stripped down and playing a single drum and cymbal. It was about as far off from a standard Toys show as you could get, but that's what helped make this such a unique and special experience. The band brought as much noise as they possibly could, and still had their intensity. Not being plugged into anything allowe...

Photo by Cara Totman Everything is looking pretty good right now. Things aren't great, and the vaccine roll out is going slower than we hoped (at least in Massachusetts where signing up is a nightmare), but it is happening. All reports show a return to somewhat normal sometime over the summer, maybe late fall. That means live music should be returning this year! (Hopefully...) It's hard to not get our hopes up, especially when our beloved indie gods Dinosaur Jr just announced a huge fall East coas/Midwest tour! They've also announced dates for this year's Camp Fuzz! Taking place July 27-20 in Big Indian, NY, it's an all inclusive retreat that features performances, master classes, arts & crafts, and more! The tour kicks off September 7 in Montreal at Corona Theatre and ends November 27 in Boston at the House of Blues. Those on the West coast will have to wait until February. Pretty much all of February 2022 sees J, Lou, and Murph all over the coast from Pioneert...