Sad Philly Boy Music/Coachella Band Preview?

It’s been a while since I last blogged. It almost feels like I actually did go to Coachella since this is what usually happens. I write Coachella blogs until I leave for Coachella then stop until I return from being out in the desert for a few weeks. At this point I should have no excuse for not writing. I’m home. The problem was I couldn’t figure out what to write about. There’s a few upcoming albums I plan to review, but until then I haven’t really discovered anything new I like, until Saturday.

I’ve been talking to my friend Kelsey for most of quarantine. We’re quarantine buddies for sure and we’ve agreed that it feels a lot like being in high school since we’re both with our families. Kick in the nostalgia. We often talk about bands we grew up listening to like Brand New and Taking Back Sunday. We were both emo/punk/alternative kids. Lately though, quarantine has brought in some deep cut local bands and musicians that were a part of our teen scenes. I started talking about Title Fight and how my friends and I watched them play small venues in our area as they grew bigger in their scene. She sent me a picture of her and her prom date Alex and then told me how he’s now in a band that sells out large venues. That’s when I first heard of (Sandy) Alex G.

According to Kelsey, (Sandy) Alex G, aka her high school friend Alex Giannascoli, really started when he was in high school. He was in a pop punk band called The Skin Cells with several of their other friends. Kelsey even sent me one of their songs Saturday night. It was great. She said Alex was super dedicated to music and would record his own stuff in his room, put it on CD, and personally decorate the CD. She said it felt like he did this at least once a month. He was good too. She always thought he would be famous one day and she wasn’t lying. He’s now an indie recording artist.

He began self-releasing music on Bandcamp between 2010-2012. His music spread by word of mouth and music blogs and eventually lead to his signing with Orchid Tapes who he released his debut album DSU under in 2014. At that time he was just Alex G. In 2015 he signed with Domino Recording Company and began releasing records under that label. He released three albums with Domino in 2015, Rules, Trick, and Beach Music.

In 2017, Alex G announced that he would be changing his name from Alex G to (Sandy) Alex G shortly before the release of his album Rocket. The album ranked on many indie publications’ lists as being in the Top 50 of the year. In September, Alex released his latest album House of Sugar, which again received similar accolades

(Sandy) Alex G is a typical indie artist. His music also bridges into that post-punk/pop-punk/alternative scene that bands like Turnover and Tigers Jaw are a part of. He’s also from suburban Philly. Based on his style, he probably attracts a large following of “sad Philly boy” fans, which is a term I’ve heard referring to the new indie scene of young urban outfitter wearing 20-somethings that originated in Philly. Regardless of what your style is, if you’re an indie music fan, you’d dig what (Sandy) Alex G has been putting out.

Normally, at this point of the year Coachella would already have passed and we would be looking forward to next year. Unfortunately at this point, 2020 hasn’t happened and no one’s really sure if it will. That being said who knows what happens to the 2020 lineup? If it happens this year, will the same artists be playing? If it doesn’t, do they play next year? I’m sure Goldenvoice has already started booking a 2021 lineup that looks much different than this year, but I bet if Coachella 2020 doesn’t happen in the fall there may be some smaller acts booked for the following spring. The reason I’m even talking about this is because (Sandy) Alex G was supposed to be on the lineup this year! He was slated to play Sunday. Even though everything is very TBD right now, I’m hoping he still plays in October and if not, I’m hoping he’s on the 2021 lineup. I’d love to see him out on the polo fields and I now have plenty of time to listen to his music. So big shoutout to Kelsey for the introduction and big shoutout to Alex for putting out this great music since high school.

 

 

 

When You Say “Best Friends” Means Friends Forever

It started with a girl. Last weekend I went to a punk show in Philadelphia. Rancid, Pennywise, and Suicidal Tendencies are all on tour together with a few other bands and they played a well known Philly venue that we all still refer to as the Electric Factory. I was supposed to attend with my friend Ashley and her friend Kelsey, but when Ashley took an offer to sell merch for Rancid, that left me and Kelsey to attend together. I just met Kelsey earlier this month so going to Rancid together really gave us the chance to hang out and get to know each other. We started talking about music and eventually got into talking about Brand New and Taking Back Sunday. They were two of my favorite bands in high school and Kelsey’s all time favorite bands. Since my Rancid hang with Kelsey, I’ve listened to both bands a couple times and for nostalgia’s sake, started reminiscing about how wild it is for someone to love both bands so much given their history.

Again it started with a girl. Jesse Lacey of Brand New and John Nolan of Taking Back Sunday were childhood best friends. They both were part of the famed Long Island music scene in the early 2000’s. As rumor has it, at some point in their friendship there was a girl that got in the way. No one knows the exact story of what happened. From what I know, it was something along the lines of Jesse was with a girl that cheated on him with John. It incited a well-known emo music feud between both bands. Songs from both bands’ first albums pointed anger and hatred towards each other (Brand New’s “Seventy Times Seven” and Taking Back Sunday’s “There’s No “I” in Team”). There was even band merch that did the same (“Because mics are for singing not swinging”, a dig at TBS frontman Adam Lazzara’s mic swinging style and “Proudly Swinging Since 1999”). Yet, while listening to these bands in high school, I loved both of them. Sure, I favored Brand New over Taking Back Sunday, but I definitely loved both and listened to each during certain periods of high school. Most of my friends did too. In fact, I’m not sure I’ve ever met anyone who has chosen one and hated the other? Do those people even exist?

That’s what got me thinking about it this week. It’s crazy that we loved both of these bands. The songs they wrote that took aim at each other had some incredibly violent lyrics. “And you can think of me when you forget your seatbelt and again when your head goes through the windshield!” or “Best friends means I pulled the trigger. Best friends means you get what you deserve!” I mean come on! These are intense words. They’re actually threats! But when you’re in high school in the mid-2000’s, you don’t think of it that way. You just love the music and you relate to the lyrics.

I will say though “Seventy Times Seven” was the fuel for a lot of my own teen angst towards friendships. In fact, I think both of these bands taught me about friendships through their songs. I realized the importance of calling someone a best friend and what that meant. Of course, actions speak louder than words, but…words can be powerful. You don’t want to waste words on lower cases and capitals. You want them to mean something. So in high school, I started using the term “best friend” sparingly because in my mind “best friends” meant friends forever. I learned that from Brand New. It’s still something I hold with me to this day. I actually took those words for granted recently and I needed to remind myself to not do that again after it happened so again I looked towards “Seventy Times Seven”. This is why it’s still relevant 15 years later.

Sadly though, in recent years, a lot of people began to have mixed feelings about Brand New. In late 2017, Jesse Lacey was accused of sexual misconduct and a lot of fans were upset by the allegations. Mostly, I think people realized that Jesse Lacey wasn’t who they thought he was. Before that happened, Brand New released one final album, Science Fiction, before calling it quits last year. Taking Back Sunday however is still touring. They’re embarking on a 20 year anniversary tour this fall. John Nolan is still part of the band even though he took a brief break from the group in the mid-2000’s to form Straylight Run. On the tour they’re playing their first album Tell All Your Friends in full. It’s definitely going to bring up a lot of feelings for fans and maybe even for the band. Who knows maybe we’ll find out exactly what happened between Brand New and Taking Back Sunday? Maybe not though. I will say I think the feud might have been blown up out of proportion and there’s evidence of that as well (cue the video of Jesse and John playing with Say Anything). It was still enough that we never got a Brand New/Taking Back Sunday tour. Despite everything surrounding both bands, I’m glad they gave us the music that they did. It was the soundtrack to my youth. Even if I no longer feel like a failure by design or a wishful thinker with the worst intentions, their music is still relevant to me at times and I still love connecting with people over it.

 

Say That You’re Into Me

Yesterday while checking out the Discover Weekly playlist on Spotify, I made an amazing, mind blowing discovery. It was the coolest music discovery I’ve made in quite some time. For you to understand it though, I need to flashback to 9 years ago. *cue cloudy flashback transition*

It was the summer of 2006. I just finished my junior year of high school. I was into the punk rock, pop punk, emo, and alternative music genres. My favorite bands were Brand New, Dashboard Confessional, Taking Back Sunday, Something Corporate, and The Format. I attended my second Vans Warped Tour in August that summer. I saw Cartel, The Academy Is, Gym Class Heroes, Motion City Soundtrack, Less Than Jake, and Hellogoodbye play sets that day. All of those bands fit my style of music at the time too. My favorite set of the day was Hellogoodbye’s. They played all my favorite songs and had people run around the stage dressed in random costumes. It was absolute mayhem. Hellogoodbye even played a surprise Blink-182 cover set that day on a different stage which I also attended. It turned out to be a surprisingly great day despite the fact that I didn’t anticipate a great day. *cue transition to current day*

As I was looking at the Discover Weekly playlist, I noticed there was a song by Hellogoodbye listed. I was surprised because usually music on the Discover Weekly playlist isn’t the kind of pop punk, powerpop music that Hellogoodbye played when I listened to them. However, I didn’t recognize the title of the song. It was safe to say they had released some new music since I last listened to them. I was super curious to see what it sounded like so of course I hit play on the song. Out of the speakers on my iPad came the most mind blowing revelation. Hellogoodbye sounded like a band I would listen to now. They weren’t those same guys who got up on stage at Warped Tour dressed in random costumes. They were like current day hipsters playing music I would listen to on vinyl in my apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn while wearing my v-neck t-shirt. They progressed in their music style like I progressed in my music style. How freaking cool is that?! Usually I hate when bands change their sound because it seems like most of the time they get popular and try to fit the mold of popular bands. This wasn’t the case. They progressed alternatively.

Hellogoodbye hails from Huntington Beach, California and was formed in 2001 by front-man Forrest Kline. They were part of the Drive-Thru Records label from 2003-2010 which housed some of my favorite bands from high school like Dashboard Confessional, Something Corporate, New Found Glory, The Starting Line, Midtown, The Early November, and Senses Fail. They released their first full-length, Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs!, in 2006 (I bought it at Warped Tour that summer). I knew of and listened to them before that though because of their self-titled EP. Between the release of their first and second album, Would It Kill You?, which was released in 2010, the single “Here (In Your Arms)” gained some major radio airplay. It reached the number 14 spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 and went platinum in the U.S.

After the second album, the band went through a few transitions. Band members dropped out and were replaced. The band parted with Drive-Thru and signed with a new label. They also released an EP during that time and re-released their second album. It wasn’t until 2013 that they their third full-length album, Everything Is Debatable, came out after signing with another label, Old Friend Records. Following the release of the album, they toured and opened for Paramore. They probably should’ve been touring with a band like The Kooks or Generationals because their newest album gives off an entirely new indie pop sound. They really do sound like a mixture between those two bands with a hint of MGMT and Belle & Sebastian thrown in. There’s still a little bit of that old school Hellogoodbye essence heard in some songs as well. It’s incredible. If you can’t already tell, I was and am still amazed by it. As far as song recommendations go, it’s probably best to split it up between old Hellogoodbye and new Hellogoodbye, so here goes:

Song recommendations (Old):

**And remember these are definitely pop punk/powerpop style songs, so if you’re not into that, skip ahead**

1. Call & Return
2. Touchdown Turnaround
3. Bonnie Taylor Shakedown
4. Here (In Your Arms)
5. All of Your Love

Song recommendations (New):

1. (Everything Is) Debatable
2. Just Don’t Let Go Just Don’t
3. The Magic Hour Is Now
4. Swear You’re In Love
5.  And Everything Becomes A Blur

Hellogoodbye performing at the Vans Warped Tour in 2006 during their Blink-182 cover set.