If It's Too Loud...

With TT the Bear's closing forever this Saturday, I wanted to share some of my favorite memories of the iconic Cambridge rock club. Some of my most cherished musical memories took place within its walls. It is going to be missed greatly. This was one of those stacked bills that can only happen at a TT the Bear's benefit show. It also included local heroes The Gravel Pit along with The Sterlings and Boy Wonder, who were both great forgotten late 90s Boston bands. Happening back in my college radio days, I mentioned I was going to see Sloan to my contact at whatever company was promoting them back in 1998. He told me he was going to put me on the list, and I said I didn't mind paying since it was a benefit. He insisted, so I figured I'd do the free show thing, which is really what college radio is about. After driving an hour into Cambridge, I got to TT's to find out there wasn't a list since it was a benefit show. I pleaded my case obnoxiously for at least ...

Via Facebook For anyone who doesn't know, last week is was announced that Cambridge, MA club TT the Bear's was closing this summer after over 40 years. This might be the first club closing to truly upset me. By the time I was regularly going to shows (1996?), The Rat was catering to mostly punk and hardcore bands, and Avalon and Axis were always the bigger, corporate clubs (even though they've been replaced by the even more corporate and gigantic House of Blues). TT's had an equal love of national and local bands, and felt like a home base to bands like Letters to Cleo and Lady Lamb the Beekeeper even as they got too big to play a 325 person club. For an example of how great this place was in the late 90s, check out the ad to the left. Jennifer Trynin, Allstonians, Velvet Crush, Boss Hog, Bikini Kill, and a Squirrel Nut Zippers/Magnetic Fields double bill in less than 2 weeks??? Plus, it was the site of the legendary Pixies/Lemonheads pairing on "nu muzik"...

I hope you like indie rock, because there's a lot of indie rock out this week. Karen O - Crush Songs : Karen O essentially branches out solo to share what sound like basement tapes of song fragments. While "Singalong" is close to a complete piece, this is really not an interesting record unless you're really into Karen O and/or The Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Interpol - El Pintor : Interpol fell off my radar somewhere around a decade ago. Nothing significantly against them, it's more that they didn't feel like anything new or fresh was coming, and, frankly, I thought Editors started doing Interpol better. So El Pintor is being described by some as a return to form, and, well, I can at least say that I'm enjoying this particular Interpol record more than the previous ones I've listened to. It feels dark and mysterious in ways their first couple albums did, but, at least on first listen, it lacks that killer track like "Obstacle 1" or "Evil....