Lights That Shine in the Evening: John Davis of Title Tracks @ Smithsonian's "Luce Unplugged" Series

I shot the Luce Unplugged December performance yesterday at the Smithsonian Museum of American Art. "Luce Unplugged" is a monthly series that has a local musician come play for an hour after chatting about one of the paintings in the area of his/her choice. It's a great idea, one that showcases the two things DC has a lot of: local musicians and free Smithsonian events.

The performer for December was Title Tracks frontman John Davis, who performed some great covers, as well as tracks of his own. My piece for the Washington City Paper is live here, and you can see additional photos from the performance here.

Lights That Flash in the Evening: Jens Lekman @ Sixth & I Synagogue, Washington, DC (10-5-2011)

Singer/songwriter Jens Lekman may, at first listen, seem like a strange Swede. His songs, like "I Broke Up a Fight" and "Waiting for Kirsten," a song about waiting to see Kirsten Dunst at her hotel in his hometown, seem, well, odd. Lekman's songs initially appear as silly musical stories about nothing. But then he brings out a line that just nails how it feels when go through one of the deep situations we all endure at some point while on this mortal coil, and your perception is immediately changed. Lekman covers them all, heartache/hope/love/longing, and in the end, be it from his silly stories or his perfectly capturing the human emotion in verse, you don't feel serious or melancholy, you feel uplifted .

My Washington City Paper piece will be up here later today. See more photos from the set here.

Lights That Flash in the Evening (Err...Day): Nicole Atkins In-Store @ Som Records, Washington, DC (8-7-2011)

Nicole Atkins was in DC over the weekend to play The Birchmere but she came by Som Records for an in-store (or on-sidewalk as it was). Atkins was supposed to be plugged in, but no proper cable could be found, so what we got instead was her lovely voice and an acoustic guitar-I think we made out better in the end. If you don't know her, she's well worth investigating: her songs are observant and witty, with a voice like the blues covered in honey.

I shot Atkins' set for The Vinyl District-DC, which you can check out over here.

Lights That Flash in the Evening: Archers of Loaf @ Black Cat, Washington, DC (8-5-2011)

The late 90s were quite a time to be in the North Carolina Triangle if you were a music nerd. One of the Triangle's bigger-name bands, Archers of Loaf,went on its hiatus around the time of my arrival for graduate school in '98, so they were one I never got to see live. Which I think is why I wasn't so much into them then. On record, I didn't catch the melody and the hooks enough to dig further than Icky Mettle, and on that, I definitely preferred the more accessible tracks like "Web in Front" and "Plumbline.

Friday night at the Black Cat changed my mind on that. Oh, what a dumb little girl I have been.

Archers live is full of powerful bravado and a drum-and-bass combo that is a visceral call to arms. After they started, bass player Matt Gentling asked us in the first row, "Hey, if you see my amps start to topple over, can you let me know?" Amps tend to do that when you have someone pogoing in front of them for 90 straight minutes (thankfully, they stayed in place). The melodies and hooks that alluded me on record jackhammered my eardrums over the set's 21 songs and it was glorious. Archers of Loaf on record is one thing, but Archers of Loaf live was how rock music should be played.







Other photos from the set can be seen here.

Check out my piece in the Washington City Paper about the show here.