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Zvoov: Rock Variety at Howlers

The first show this year that I went to was on January 5th.  My friends Triangle & Rhino and Thin Sketch were both playing.  I was really excited to see Thin Sketch again because I hadn't seen them in a year or more.


I missed the first band, Lonely Ghost Parade, who apparently had made a big deal about playing early.  Triangle & Rhino was up next, but Jake Lexso's guitar was making some weird sounds; I didn't notice a huge problem, but it did seem off.  They fiddled with it for a while before deciding to just play with drums and synths.  It was pretty similar to the set they did at Little Italy Days, but with less guitars and less weird guys.  Jake picked up his guitar about halfway through and played some messy stuff that sounded like hurricane force winds.


The touring guys from Brooklyn, Zvoov, played after Triangle & Rhino.  They were really technical with lots of tapping and jazzy parts.  Everything was super composed and they never got really crazy with the db's.  Most of their songs involved the guitarist playing tightly coiled solos over top the concise rhythm.  Just check it out here.  Buy some of their albums and stuff too cause they were nice guys.


Thin Sketch was the last band, but they kind of blew it.  Davon Magwood's vocals seemed off on their better songs like "Heartbreaker" and his outfit didn't portray the cool playboy look that he seems to embody.  Greg Cislon and Jordan Weeks were both fine though, with the bass maybe a little too controlled/quiet.  I don't think that their set was really even bad, it just seemed less exciting than most of the previous Thin Sketch sets that I had seen, presumably due to the same setlist from before.  Hopefully they'll get some new, and hopefully noisy, songs and do it right again.