On June 21st, Kaiti dragged me to see a show at Cafe D'Amore. I was getting second thoughts, feeling anxious, and all of that silliness. I almost didn't go. I'm glad that Kaiti is so excited to go out and see music because this show was great!

I had never been to Cafe D'Amore before, but it's just up the street from our house. It's a cozy spot that has coffee and small snacks. Large sculptures adorned the walls of the room where the musicians were to perform; I think these pieces were made of paper. I also appreciated the various elements of the store that promoted environmental care. When we got to the store, I had to do a U-turn to grab money from an ATM.


When I got back, our friend Ky Vöss had started their set. Ky Vöss is an electronic artist who lives here in Pittsburgh. They've been getting pretty popular lately, and I can see why. Ky's musick is exciting and spacey with tuneful vocals and the cool air of synthesizers. It's vocal-driven synthpop that reminds me of early Madonna or Japanese city pop. Kaiti says Ky is a like a gothic Purity Ring or Grimes I'm sure that hardcore fans of this kind of stuff have some better points of comparison. My partner and I really like the song about being an astronaut.


Philadelphia's Son Step is also electronic, going for an indie rock/ambient/funk sound circa 2008. Geometric patterns cavorted behind the pair as they projected their bright sounds upon the audience. There were some really great bits of soft, white noise, but it's sort of a pastoral sound overall. Son Step reminded me of a Pittsburgh band from years back, Sundog Peacehouse, though it's not a one-for-one sound.


Sneeze Awfull was a more experimental version of Son Step. Eric Weidenhof played cello, and Jay Eff Winkelins channeled found sounds and keyboard creations. The songs were wobbly, ghostly VHS-vocalled, micro-symphonies part mystery and part comedy. This, again, reminded me of Sundog Peacehouse and the Fantastic Voyagers event that happened a few times. Those were some of my earliest show experiences in Pittsburgh, so I felt nostalgic.

It was good to see this show and be reminded of the creative things I saw around years ago before, during, and for some time after the Roup House days. Neither then or now is perfect, but there are interesting things all around all of the time somewhere. You just have to look around you.
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Desperate Times are a band from Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. I've never been there or anywhere near there. Some members of this band are in a Facebook group I'm in called Warehouse of Strangers and were looking for a review of their new album Peace at Last.


The cover art to Peace at Last is very metal, though Desperate Times isn't a metal band. There's the grim reaper holding a destroyed world and standing over skulls. The background is an assortment of scratches and chains and stuff. It's kind of roughly done, but it fits the album well even if it isn't perfectly rendered.


"Enough" starts the album off with screeching feedback into full-speed fury. What I can understand of the lyrics is cool - "I've had enough!". I like the short and discordant guitar solo. "Peering" is a grim thought about the "abyss of our future". I've been worrying a lot about this same thing in the last few months due to losing my job, government issues, and the state of the environment. The song brings a similar anxious quality, and I like the breakdowns that provide a state of clarity that clearly states these types of worries. It's an interesting juxtaposition. "Class War" is the last song on the first side. The guitar sounds great. This song has some extra sonic space which I appreciate.

"Prison" starts with an intro like a sci-fi film, but it's reality about prisons; we don't even need a dystopian future for this monologue. I was less impressed as it started, the vocals being a repeated "and they are" about the state of prison cruelty, but there are some other things here too. I like the idea of minimalist lyrics and the like, but I felt like the phrase "and they are" doesn't stand on its own like it should for something of this nature. "False Till True" has a cool chord progression, and the lyrics go off like a chant. The last song is a cover of "Some of Us Scream, Some of Use Shout" by Flux of Pink Indians, a band that I have not listened to enough. This song was a bit poppier than the others, except perhaps "Class War", though I wouldn't call either of these pop songs. To respond to the song, I don't think that it's too late for us to change. It's a tough fight though.

Peace at Last is a screechy and hard punk album along the lines of Crass and the like. I enjoyed it overall, though these types of things aren't my favorite. If you like peace punk/anarcho-punk, you'll probably dig this one.

 Peace at Last receives a Good.

This review was originally written for a class I took about jazz music. The writing is a bit different on this one because of that. I had a lot of fun writing it, so I wanted to post it up here. This event was also a totally different experience for me, one that I hope to replicate sometime. Maybe you will too.

Earlier tonight, May 19th, I attended a recurring event, Off Minor Jazz, at Alphabet City in Pittsburgh (not the Alphabet City in New York City). Alphabet City is part of City of Asylum, an organization that works with writers from countries that have limited their freedom of speech. Tonight’s performance was part of their monthly jazz performances and entitled “4 on 6” after the piece by guitarist Wes Montgomery. Appropriately, this concert was centered around jazz guitar. The performance featured three trios and one sextet. Thomas Wendt and Tony DePaolis played brushed drums and pizzicato upright bass respectively for each group; the difference was the guitar player.

The first guitarist was Eric Susoeff, a professor of jazz guitar at Duquesne University. Susoeff moved to Pittsburgh from California in the 1970s. His first piece was his composition “The Do-Over”, a Latin jazz piece based on Brazilian samba with a theme of redemption. The first chorus was by Susoeff, the next by DePaolis, and them Wendt and Susoeff traded fours. Susoeff’s second piece was another of his compositions, “Promise”. Susoeff mentioned that this piece originated from a discussion with a previous girlfriend. The piece again had a Latin influence. Susoeff again took the first chorus and DePaolis the second, but Susoeff again took the third. The last piece was the jazz standard “Without a Song”. This is a classic AABA form of 16 bars, for the A parts, and 8 bars, for the B parts. Susoeff’s version of the song went into a Latin direction as was done with the earlier pieces. The drums were very exciting. Here, the choruses were taken by Susoeff, DePaolis, and then Wendt. This order continued for the most part throughout the night.

The next trio to step forth was led by Pittsburgh native, Mark Strickland. Strickland had a few funny anecdotes to tell about George Benson and Chad Evans. Strickland used the Wes Montgomery thumb-style for his pieces. He did not give a name for the first piece but mentioned that it was a blues song. “With the blues, you cannot lose,” Strickland remarked. The song was a 12-bar AAB form. Strickland took the first chorus, DePaolis the second, and Wendt the third. Strickland remarked how it was tough to follow Susoeff, said that George Benson was always out for blood, and then went into his second piece, “Easy to Love”. This was another blues-influenced AAB piece. Strickland took the first chorus, and DePaolis took the second. Wendt and Strickland traded fours for the last section. Strickland’s final song was another unentitled one, this time in a post-bop style. For this piece, he played all of the choruses.

The last trio of the night was led by John Shannon. Shannon is much younger than Susoeff or Strickland. Shannon graduated from Berklee and lived in New York City for a time. His set began with an original composition, “Fresh Water Prayer”. Shannon did some fast-picking during his set with tremolo lines cutting through the mix. There was a feeling of mystery in the air. The piece was hard-bop and featured the usual guitar, bass, and drums chronology of choruses. Shannon mentioned a new jazz club he was opening in Pittsburgh’s Shadyside neighborhood before he began his second song, McCoy Tyner’s “Passion Dance”. This is another post-bop number in a 32-bar AAB form. DePaolis created a very swinging, walking bass. Shannon went a bit overboard for part of his initial chorus, but the song was good. Wendt provided the second chorus with his own degree of showmanship, and Shannon finished with the last one. I really liked Shannon’s guitar parts; the sound was again very mysterious. The final song that Shannon’s trio played was “Isfahan” by Pittsburgh legend Billy Strayhorn. It uses a 32-bar ABAC form as a sultry ballad. Shannon took the first and third choruses with DePaolis taking the middle. When Shannon finished, there was a special treat to close out the night.


The last band was a sextet composed of all of the previous players and a student at Duquesne University named Greg Jones. There were four guitar players in this band! They played Wes Montgomery’s “4 on 6” first. Jones took the first chorus, then Susoeff, Shannon, and Strickland. During the fifth chorus the group took turns trading fours with Wendt. Some of the guitarists did not play during all of the sections. Strickland provided excellent rhythm guitar the whole time, however. This song went in a swing direction with Strickland and Jones provided great blues licks. The last song was Kenny Burrell’s “Chitlins Con Carne”. Wendt mentioned that Burrell was suffering from a serious disease and had a GoFundMe up to support him at the moment. He encouraged those who could to donate. The sextet played the AAB 12-bar blues form excellently. The first chorus was taken soulfully by Strickland. Susoeff followed with a more trebly, angular chorus, and Shannon continued swinging with the third chorus from there. Jones took the last chorus with his own swing style.

It was a great show all around. My favorite piece was “Chitlins Con Carne”. As a person more familiar with rock and blues, I loved Jones’ and Strickland’s solos. I don’t believe that any of the pieces had much improvisation. Shannon was certainly the most idiosyncratic with his playing, reaching far out at times. Strickland reminded me of myself a lot, so he was very endearing to me. Susoeff’s Latin style was very interesting to hear live. All of the players were very good, and I would love to see them again. I spoke to Greg Jones a bit after the performance, and he expressed excitement about sharing the stage with such great players. He mentioned that each guitarist had chosen their own pieces, though Thomas Wendt had chosen the final two. Jones was somewhat sarcastic and self-consciously walled, but he was overall friendly. I intend to make a new habit of seeing live jazz. There are tons of jazz shows happening in Pittsburgh every week, and many of them, this one included, are free. With many young and old artists playing together, the music is sure to be interesting.

I talked with Zachary Corsa last week to say that I would get a review out about a new album by his project Nonconnah. Nonconnah is a duo of Zachary and his wife Denny. I booked a related project of their's, Lost Trail, a few years ago. I remember that show going well but not many details of it, and Lost Trails golden drones made me lose sense of reality, for moments entering an other world of Faerie or something similar. While I looked at this album, Dead Roses, Digged Up Zombies, Broken Pieces Of Diamonds, Live Cats, I felt small compared to its vastness. "I got scared; I put my phone back in place." After some deliberation and resolve, I have decided to face such a dawn as this. Here we go into the void.


Oh yeah, wait, I still have to talk about the album cover. The cover art for Dead Roses, Digged Up Zombies, Broken Pieces Of Diamonds, Live Cats was created by Zachary's mother, E.M. Corsa, which is pretty cool. It is a nice, neutral cardboard color. I usually don't like this, but it works well here with what I see as a friendly dog creature in a soft environment. Perhaps it is a spirit fox of Japanese myth levitating above a bed instead. That's kind of scary; I might start hiding again. How about those cute dogs and comfy beds?

 The album starts with "Rainbow Over Pegasus Field" which has a nice rising tone, a glitchy sunrise that slowly evolves over three minutes into bells and bats and the soft calls of night. "This Faded Glow Of Ours" is soft with post-rock strings creeping in through the static rivers of phonographic noise. "To Pass Through The Walls And Vanish" has some warbling ghost voices, coughing campfire rattles and chokes, and a tittering snare. "Path Of Tonality/Rapture Drugs" raises the noise levels into a harsh realm. Creatures howl as others moan and chant and the world dissolves. On the fifth track, I learned that "The Light Of A Dead Star Is Not Something To Fuck Around With" as a choir comes thru nearly overwhelming static-stics like nine-year-old me watching anime on the Sci-Fi channel through multicolored snow. The radio sounds at the end were pleasant. "All Those Days, As If Spent In A Fugue State" is eerie and off-putting, a cold slab in a morgue. Strings circle around, flies and gnats drowsy and drifting, drooping after downing dried fermented honey. Or perhaps, this is the view from the corner in the room as seen from those who are between worlds, the scene of the NDE. "Treading Unhallowed Ground" doesn't sound like it would be so bad at first. It sounds kind of dreamy here, but the odd voices that warble at the edges of the sonic landscape seem foreboding of something unwell though not altogether sinister.

"Hill Country Harbinger" is calming after all of the oddness in the last few tracks. I enjoyed the sound like stepping through a thin veil of water. Some people celebrate at the end. "Ceremonial Magic & Wicked Wires" sounds like what that celebration may turn into with the joyful fair reverberating thru alleys and townhouses. "Ego Death At Houston Levee" goes back to cold air eerieness. I have to say that even when Nonconnah sounds kind of creepy, there's something calming about it. Many of these tracks have a relaxed and religious tone to their sound. The end of "Ego Death At Houston Levee" has an interesting little tune too. "Ceiling To Ceiling Transmission Antenna" is another calm piece with another buzzing insect flitting about. The listener pushes through majestic clouds, guided by clarinet and a faucet of pure noise. "Flickering At The Borders Of The Frame" is a scary name for a similarly grim tone. Countless somethings writhe in a black somewhere overtaking the slight synth sounds that cross the air. Eventually, everything kind of coalesces into one and the new sound creator seems like they might be getting used to their condition, but it is hard for me to say. "When You Begin To Blur" is some swamp sound Bad Moon Rising interlude. It's another haunted track. I swear that an orb appeared while I was listening to it and possessed me to write this word. That's some heavy stuff. Speaking of heavy, "We Love Our Rotting Industrial Dystopia" is a heavy name, and I wonder if this one is partially serious and partially satirical. I know that Zachary Corsa takes a lot of pfotos of destroyed buildings and the like, but the name also comes off as a message about America's misguided goals and dreams.

"Half-Built Future Homes" is more droney celestialisms, an organ-esque sound on a sea of light. "Last And Languid Waves" is not the last track, but does sound like the closing track to a film. It's an interstellar drum pileup. "Sorrow Mountain And Assorted Haunting" continues a bit where the last track tapered off but in a spookier way. Instead of a heavenly celebration, it's more like poltergeist activity. The drums beat around in the magnetic resonance of ghosts. Perhaps the "Void Heirlooms Beneath The Floorboards" created the assorted haunting. It's another windy world, this time with a long monologue of lost words. "A Shimmering Veil Pulled Taut Against The Sky" is more warbly wind. "Erasing Spells/Magnet Dragged Over VHS" sounds pretty cool, but these last tracks seem a bit extraneous to me. However, I am not one of the creators of Dead Roses, Digged Up Zombies, Broken Pieces Of Diamonds, Live Cats. The last track is good for sure: "Black Construction Paper Ghosts With Red Glitter Eyes" brings more melody and charm to the album to close it out. "Can we have the lights dimmed to black?"

Dead Roses, Digged Up Zombies, Broken Pieces Of Diamonds, Live Cats is a long journey through the sound of light and the things found along the starlit path. I enjoyed the album overall, but it feels quite long for something of this type. Many of these tracks are formless windy meanderings; the lack of pop structure is both a positive and negative. I felt a bit overwhelmed and lost, though the album also presents something alien to most people making it particularly unique. The odd sounds, guest stars, and care given across the album are what sets this above, even if it could be a little shorter. I will definitely listen more to Dead Roses, Digged Up Zombies, Broken Pieces Of Diamonds, Live Cats and see what cosmic knowledge can be gained from such things. I hope that you will at least give it a chance.

Dead Roses, Digged Up Zombies, Broken Pieces Of Diamonds, Live Cats receives a Good.

I've mentioned this previously, but the last month and a little earlier was a mess for me. I was covered by a veil embroidered with anxiety about death and the fate of the world. In my despair and confusion, the soundtrack full of lofi hip-hop beats from YouTube, I read about an artist called SPELLLING and her own dreams of alien life and other words. Her new album is called Mazy Fly, named after a seemingly gentle spirit of the air. The album resonates with my recent feelings. Let me tell you about it.


The cover art shows SPELLLING glowing amongst an audience of curious cattle, seemingly referencing the correlation between alien visitations and livestock. Her glow gives her an otherworldly quality that the cattle are picking up on. There's also a contrast to The Beach Boys famous Pet Sounds akin to The Clash's London Calling contrasting with Elvis' self-titled album. There's the same kind of text formatting and song list, but while The Beach Boys were standing up feeding the animals, SPELLLING is on the floor amongst them while simultaneously also wearing a cowboy hat. Does technological progress make us the cowboy or put us out to pasture?

The first track, "Red" starts out warbling, vinyl grain, before transferring into a psychedelic, hypnotic Bowie/Yoko Ono pseudo-R&B murmuring. "Haunted Water" comes in with a fantasy journey of synthesizers and drum machines, a song of the Lady of the Lake. The rhythm of the vocals reminds me of "Bridge Over Troubled Water" by Simon & Garfunkel, though that's just a shadow on the surface of something that runs deeper. The various instrumental layers create something that comes from one side of the night, somewhere under the stairs or in a dark closet, something that you hear through walls covered in static. On "Hard to Please" I hear the haunting voices of sirens in a cavern that is mostly submerged. That beat that runs across the surface has a nice solid 'thump' to it. "Golden Numbers" is beautiful, swooning, off-kilter post-war pop. "Melted Wings" is eerie stuff, synthesizer wind painted on by dark strings. "Under the Sun" finishes Side A with a vision of the future in spacy ambiance and near-electro. SPELLLING's techno-prayer inspires me with confidence against my own fears of cosmic voids.

A damp wah-soaked guitar drips down my sight as "Real Fun" starts. This one is explicitly about aliens, musical organs rising up to signal the new age as the air stirs and kids cry out. The song elevates into a dramatic Stooges crescendo before turning in to something like The X-Files. "Hard to Please (Reprise)" opens with a Prince-ish pseudo-pop cheer, a call to the aliens to take her with them (like when the purple one himself sang "Take Me With U" to Apollonia). Prince himself sang about the afterlife on "Let's Go Crazy", and the next song is about just that. This one has more of the Stooges melodrama with saxophones and droning guitars. This song speaks to me after all of the reading I've been doing about metaphysics, religion, and quantum mechanics. "The cavities in my brain are growing a garden," has so many meanings after all of my studying. "Afterlife" is airy, spacey, and mixed with heavenly vocals.

I think "Afterlife" would have made a good ending, but the album keeps going, as we do. "Dirty Desert Dreams" has a more melodic Nico and maybe a bit of Nancy Sinatra. SPELLLING's vocals cross the skies before the song erupts into a funk jam that fades out. The calm "Secret Thread" goes more into the afterlife visions of "the sky at night" and speaks about the "Mazy Fly" who lives up in the clouds. This is what ties the whole thing together, soft chambers to distorted strings and more. And at the end, "Falling Asleep" combines heavy club beats with childhood chimes. Are we butterflies dreaming of being humans?

Mazy Fly is a truly experimental album combining funk, 60s pop, electro, ambient, and New Age in the spirit of Prince or David Bowie. The stories told here about aliens, technology, and the search for lands beyond, both metaphorical and physical and maybe even metaphysical, are as old as time, but SPELLLING has brought new meaning and life to them on Mazy Fly.

Mazy Fly receives a Good.

On February 23rd, Kim Phuc was set to play at The Funhouse at Mr. Smalls. I've mentioned this place before; it's a smaller, cozier, and overall cooler venue than the huge former church that is the main building. I like going to shows here, and Kaiti and I were excited to go to this one.

We missed the first band like true lame-os because we left the house late. Autoreplicant sounded okay from downstairs. I'm sure I'll see them some other time


We did see Limousine Beach, a band that I had heard of before but never seen. They reminded me of Carousel, having the same frontman and a similar cheesy rock sound. Limousine Beach is playing up this kind of Kung Fury 80s neon aesthetic, at least from what I can tell, but sort of in a 70s hard rock, Kiss way. Some of the songs had the inane comedy of stuff like The Replacements' "Tommy Gets His Tonsils Out". It was fun, and it made a lot of sense to watch them play under the little points of light of the back, black wall at The Funhouse.


The second band for goobers that missed the first band (but the third band overall) was Microwaves. It was really loud for that space, that pulsing energy of Flying Lutenbachers/Melvins/Devo/Voivod elements that I have come to know. There is not much I can say about it that hasn't already been said. It's mathy noise rock, and it is good.


Kim Phuc was last, and they seemed in top form. I hadn't seen this band for at least five years, though they did play Skull Fest last year and maybe some other shows. Again, they were pretty loud for what really makes sense for that room, but it was heavy and wild, a camera roll of Iggy Pop in motion. The guitars had an excellent wobbling slashy sound from start to finish. The audience wanted an encore at the end, but there was none.

It was good to see Kim Phuc thrash out again. I was okay with the crowd not trying to kill me and each other too, though some might see that as boring. I think Rob, the frontman, supplied enough writhing for the whole building.
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I discovered Wahono, an electronic producer from Jakarta, Indonesia, only recently. He's been releasing music for a few years now with his own label DIVISI 62 and thru Brooklyn label, Madjazz. I just heard  this new single earlier today.


The cover art to the single shows what looks like almost like an eye in maroon on a brown paper background. Various subtle designs are incorporated throughout the image. There's not much to look at here, but the colors make me think of the sounds contained within these files.

"Prambanan" opens with clicking and a gong. The song features various percussive elements in a discordant eerieness. I feel like I am being chased through the dark of the Other World. The layers of ghostly voices, bells, and drums creates a new reality for the listener.

Going to the other side, "Mabad" opens with a loop of voices as more metallic, percussive sounds enter the world. This track features more eerie vocals, though I do not know what they are saying. Slight oscillations in the air bring about an uneasiness, while various instruments enter and exit in unusual patterns.

"Prambanan" and "Mabad" are both stellar tracks that incorporate dance, electronica, and found sounds to make something that is almost otherworldly. Just check it out. It's great.

Prambanan / Mabad receives a Good.
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