Tag Archive for: underground music

Ep 148 – ‘Bottom Surfing’ With music by: Bonny Dagger, Carpal Tullar, Harriers of Discord, Sallies, Mink’s Miracle Medicine, Sei Still, The Tortoise and My Hair

Ep 148 – ‘Bottom Surfing’ With music by: Bonny Dagger, Carpal Tullar, Harriers of Discord, Sallies, Mink’s Miracle Medicine, Sei Still, The Tortoise and My Hair

Best of the underground, week of Mar 9, 2021: A couple of new terms for music hunters, John’s surefire/painful method for getting your music noticed, other talking, AND great, excellent music. (All podcasts and reviews are on www.hlycrp.com, and you can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.)

Bonny Dagger “Nothing To See Here” –Carpul Tullar “TSA” –Harriers of Discord “The Gunslinger “Roland Go And Get Your Gun”Sallie “TV Dinner”Mink’s Miracle Medicine “At The Fair”Sei Still “Television” (listen on Spotify)

Tortoise and The Hair “I Tried To Drink From Buttercups”

Ep 143 – ‘Metaphors’ With music by: Bad Molly, Tucker Riggleman and the Cheap Dates, Das Kapitans, Rhinestone Pickup Truck, Killer Kin, The Beavers, Withdrew

Ep 143 – ‘Metaphors’ With music by: Bad Molly, Tucker Riggleman and the Cheap Dates, Das Kapitans, Rhinestone Pickup Truck, Killer Kin, The Beavers, Withdrew

Best of the underground, week of Feb 2, 2021: Metaphors. Tom Cruise. John waxes nostalgic, and also rips off a band aid. AND great, excellent music. (All podcasts and reviews are on www.hlycrp.com, and you can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.)

This week we featured:

Bad Molly “Big Valley”

The Beavers “Just One Chance”

Das Kapitans “Ton Cruise”

Tucker Riggleman & The Cheap Dates “Alive & Dying Fast”


Rhinestone Pickup Truck “End FM”

Killer Kin “Narrow Mind”

Withdrew “Pain”

Blog 55: Band Management, Social Media Mismanagement, and Booking Shows…

Blog 55: Band Management, Social Media Mismanagement, and Booking Shows…

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So here’s the story, I think. I was filming and traveling all last week – and I got kicked off FB. I made a FB page called PAnon which was a parody of the QAnon movement – please please FB don’t take down this page too – I’m just trying to explain what I think happened here. It was funny for a minute – and then not so funny. All my FB content has been taken down permanently. Oh man, do I have to be a wise-ass all the time?
It’s a pain because Egg Eaters have a show this Saturday night at Seven Sisters Tap Room Black Mountain, NC at 7pm – with the amazing Amber Grace Joyner – and FB really is a good way to post an event and get the word out. Please wear a mask and socially distance – we love music venues and we want them to stay open.
I will now try to fix my karma: people ask me about booking and so this is my guarded insight into booking a show. Be very real. Be very real in creating new and interesting music, that really reflects your inner light or your inner darkness. Take your heart out and show it. Be very real when you play a show – and be grateful to the booker and the sound guy. Be very real with the other bands – scream and shout and dance and really get into their shows. Be more than words. However you spend your time shows exactly what you value. Go out to other shows. Be real. Fall in love with other bands. Adore another band’s music. Tell them. Fall in love with the music venues. Make your favorite experience a night at a small music venue watching loud bands. Bring your friends. The people who run the underground music venues do this because they are real. They really love music. They have dedicated their life to this music. They curate an authentic sound of this underground art. If you are doing the same then you will be in the same revolution. Your relationships with other bands and with music venues will be real – and then it will be easy to book shows.
I want to take a step back for a moment. I work in video/film. I have watched very successful reporters and directors charm an interviewee and then when they get the answer or soundbite – then they are done. I try to love everyone I film. I think every story is the coolest. Every life is an amazing narrative. I try to really connect and raise them up as heroes. We, Holy Crap Records Podcast and our crew and friends, we really try to be authentic with every piece of music we play. We fall in love with your songs every week. It is October and the nights are getting darker. Pandemic levels are rising again. It is hard to be real and vulnerable now. But now is the time to be smart and go out to those live shows and wear masks and socially distance and tip your music venue. Now is the time to be real with your friends. To tell the other bands and musicians in the scene how much you adore them – and not fake but real. Now is the time to be real with the music we create. What we do know will be remembered. Give and give and give until it bleeds.

Ep 127 – ‘Banshee!’ With music by: Riverghost, Neutrals, Oh Sees, Rhinestone Pickup Truck, Cherry Parke, Crying, Rich Hopkins and the Luminarios

Ep 127 – ‘Banshee!’ With music by: Riverghost, Neutrals, Oh Sees, Rhinestone Pickup Truck, Cherry Parke, Crying, Rich Hopkins and the Luminarios

Best of the underground, week of Oct 13, 2020: Natural-born performer Summer McClinton offers advice on how to become a natural-born performer. Also TWO big hlycrp announcements. Also, great great music. (All podcasts and reviews are on www.hlycrp.com, and you can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.)

 

This week we played:

    • Moonbird by Riverghost

    • Olde World by Crying

    • Captain Bullseye by Cherry Parke

    • Real Cool Time by Rich Hopkins and the Luminarios

    • Personal Computing by Neutrals

    • The Fizz by The Oh Sees

    • Lie by Rhinestone Pickup Truck

Blog 54: Band Management: Phoenix or Crows…

Blog 54: Band Management: Phoenix or Crows…

I’d been writing a weekly blog about seeing how far I could take the Egg Eaters, make them famous, manipulate the levers of power, all the ways to be charming and pushy and brave and game the system. Radio. Label. Press. It kind of worked. But it didn’t work. On February 28th of this year I wrote a blog post labelled “band mismanagement.” A lesson in being domineering. Then everything closed down. Music venues. Recording studios. Darkness descended. It hasn’t been a pleasant time. I have lost friends and I have witnessed friends fall apart. We lost someone recently. I didn’t sleep. Each night I waited for dawn in a stiff plank of anxiety, searching for something to push against, something to fight. I don’t know – searching for a metaphor – whether music was at the bottom of the well or that music is the rope that leads back up into the light. I do know that I have been making remote music, sneaking into dark basement jams, managing online music shows, making some porch music, listening and listening, talking and talking, texting and texting about music. It has taken on a greater importance. A lot of collaborations. And there is no better feeling than to collaborate with someone, share a song with someone, and have them respond through their art. That is like becoming brothers. I don’t like the weight necessarily. That music can lift me so high, laughing as I play – and then other moments when I feel excluded… I am sure it is not just me. I try to let everyone know, who shares music with me, who collaborates, that everything is gentle and kind and easy. A phoenix is the bird that rises from the ashes. A crow, a raven, is the bird that feeds on carrion, that spiritually can travel between the underworld and our world, that can fly into the darkness and return to the light.
Oh hell – this post went dark – and then stayed dark. I just want to write dance music. Nothing is worth writing unless you can dance to it. So how do you do it? How do you write dance music?

Ep 125 – ‘The Kennedys Fix Halloween’ With music by: Deaf Preachers, Garett Hatch, Ghost Funk Orchestra, KARKARA, The In-Fuzzed, Violent Mae

Ep 125 – ‘The Kennedys Fix Halloween’ With music by: Deaf Preachers, Garett Hatch, Ghost Funk Orchestra, KARKARA, The In-Fuzzed, Violent Mae


Best of the underground, week of Sept 29, 2020: Gookie apple (the game), John’s weird spirituality, and we really do solve the Halloween problem. Also, great great music. (All podcasts and reviews are on www.hlycrp.com, and you can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.)

This week we played:

    • Cut Loose Baby by Deaf Preachers

    • Sagamore Drifter by Garett Hatch

    • Fuzzy Logic by Ghost Funk Orchestra

    • Proxima Centaury by KARKARA

    • Lost Time Rock & Roll by the In-Fuzzed

    • In The Sun by Violent Mae

    • We Want More by Gak

Ep 123 – ‘To Band or Not to Band’ With music by: Stephen Britt, Los Chousettes, Three Minute Riot, Shred Flintstone, John Kirby & the New Seniors, Impossible Colors, Nicholas Mallis

Ep 123 – ‘To Band or Not to Band’ With music by: Stephen Britt, Los Chousettes, Three Minute Riot, Shred Flintstone, John Kirby & the New Seniors, Impossible Colors, Nicholas Mallis

Best of the underground, week of Sept 15, 2020: Drummers, nunchucks, aliens, male politicians, and John’s secret revenge fantasies. Also, great great music. (All podcasts and reviews are on www.hlycrp.com, and you can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.)

This week we played:

    • Left the Party by Steven Britt (prerelease)
    • Ha Ha Happiness by Les Chousettes

    • Atreyu by Three Minute Riot

    • Shitlist by Shred Flintstone

    • Puppers & Uppers by John Kirby and the New Seniors

    • Different Frames by Impossible Colors

    • Impregnating Male Politicians by Nicholas Mallis

GARETT HATCH, “Moment Undone”

GARETT HATCH, “Moment Undone”

I couldn’t be a bigger fan. This feels like a song that has been around forever, in these mountains, along these rivers, and through this land. This is today and a decade ago and fifty years ago and muttered at hearths, around campfires, someone’s back room. in the back of a dive bar and up on stage of a speakeasy. Life unravels and you can only stand in your own space and tell your own truth. Unhurried blues groove and a world weary voice that murmurs the ultimate truth. 

Want to hear us talk about this song? Check out episode #110 of our podcast at hlycrp.com.

TOP NACHOS, “Frens”

TOP NACHOS, “Frens”

Sure they have a fun name and fun live shows and their band photos are splattered in nacho sauce – but I’m gonna make a pitch here that Top Nachos are some of the best songwriters in the underground music scene. “Frens” is on “Best of BTR Vol 1” by King Pizza Records. The start is ragged grunge influence, then it’s garage style fun and adrenalin, momentum, moving into into classic rock and punk sounds. The chorus is just so phenomenal – the primary reason that Holy Crap Records Podcast exists – because this couldn’t be catchier: “Your friends are watching, your friends are watching what you do! Your friends are watching, your friends are watching what you say!” So gold. Just the most massive sing-along chorus.

Want to hear us talk about this song? Check out episode #110 of our podcast at hlycrp.com.