MONDAY: MEGA RAN AND E-DUBBLE & 27 LIGHTS
Random, aka Mega Ran, or Random Beats. Teacher, Rapper, Hero. If you put video games, the 80′s, hip-hop, soul music, jazz and standup comedy into a blender and hit “puree,” you’d have something close to The Mega Ran Experience. The Penn State graduate and self-proclaimed “TeacherRapperHero” made waves by going way left of his backpack roots by combining 8-bit video game sounds and hard hitting hip-hop tracks, and has become a trailblazer in the budding genres of chiptune and nerdcore hip-hop, while maintaining a career as a middle school teacher. e-dubble is an honest, independent artist; with a cognitive, lyrical style of awareness and progressive instrumental sound. Gaining popularity through his “Freestyle Friday,” where he released a song every Friday for 54 consecutive weeks. This led to e-dubble’s debut album, Hip-Hop is Good, which was completely written, recorded and produced by e-dubble over the course of a year.
Recommended If You Like:
Optimus Rhyme, Supercommuter, Dyme Def, On Cue, MC Chris
WEDNESDAY: GORDON GLOBE CD Release Show
Three good chords in three minutes, that’s Gordon Globe; and Wednesday is their CD release show. Join this Minneapolis based post-punk band for their debut. Recently Gordon Globe stated in a cryptic Facebook status that they might be releasing their record via USB.
Recommended If You Like:
The Beautiful South, The Smiths, The Pixies, BNLX
THURSDAY: ARE YOU LOCAL?
“Are You Local?” will be showcasing five bands as they battle it out in The Entry for your support and a spot on our behalf at SXSW! Show your support for your friends and local music at The Entry on Thursday. Artist featured in The Entry are:
Black Diet: A garage/indie/soul band with a sartorial flair. Indebted to Stax records, they put on shows that look like Baptist church services held at punk houses.
Botzy: He’s a consummate Minneapolis rap hustler, recognizing that work ethic extends into every facet of his musical journey. You’ll see it on stage and off, the hungry approach to both his craft and his movement, and the passion behind his art from all sides culminates in an impressive final product.
Jillian Rae: The band’s namesake is its multi-talented violinist, lead vocalist, and songwriter, Jillian Rae. Her creative and dynamic style of violin playing along with her lifelong experience as a performer, lend her an assured stage presence. She has an innate ability to create hook-laden tunes affirming the positives of life in the face of struggle and disappointment. With the overarching joy she takes in all things musical, it was inevitable that Jillian should form her own band… and not too surprising that it should be in her own name. The only surprise is that we’ve had to wait this long!
Step Rockets: It didn’t take long for Step Rockets to make waves. Just a mere 13 days after they posted “Kisser” on SoundCloud, the track found itself #1 on Hype Machine, and boasts over 100,000 soundcloud plays. The Minneapolis four-piece likes to twist psychedelic and modern pop notes into their four-on-the-floor indie rock, which launches the group into uncharted waters. The Flaming Lips are there, The Clash are there, but band’s fresh take on a moveable sound marks them uniquely dynamic and fun.
Teammates: Formed in February 2012, when former drummer Adam Teirab left a band called Human Bear Trap. Following this departure, remaining members Alan Skamser-O’Neil, Brady Mielke, and Dan Kasper scrapped most of the project and focused all work on a few new songs instead. Lacking a drummer, they turned what was before a dominantly guitar-driven sound into one built from drum loops and synth experiments. Energy was low and tentative while the band transitioned, and the few shows they booked under the new name during this period would have been better off in someone else’s hands.
FRIDAY: CAYUCAS
Cayucas: Pronounced “ky-yook-us”, is the monikered homage to a sleepy little seaside town in San Luis Obispo County, California. That town, Cayucos, has hardly changed in the last 50 years, a far cry from the gentrified tourist traps parading showily down the nearby coastline. In the early 1960s, the surfing craze hit. There was one bar around which local kids congregated back then, the site of helpless crushes and fights and games of pool, a place whose jukebox soundtracked innumerable teenage years as breezy summers rolled into mild winters and back around again. Opening for Cayucas is Bonzie, the moniker for 18-year-old Chicagoan Nina Ferraro — isn’t a traditional confessional singer-songwriter. She’s more of an observer and commentator who is drawn to expressing the concerns of her generational cohort (the bond between independence and interdependence, not wanting to be manipulated, view of one’s self beyond society) with unwavering honesty, and delivering them with powerful abandon.
Recommended If You Like:
Surfer Blood, Thao & The Get Down Stay Down, Brazos, Wampire
SATURDAY: SAINTSENECA
Saintseneca is a young band from Columbus, Ohio led by singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Zac Little. Following in the footsteps of heartland bands who have sought to twist the music of the old weird America into new shapes, Saintseneca perform songs that sound familiar and uniquely original, all at once.
Recommended If You Like:
Taken By Trees, Ty Segall, No Age, Ra Ra Riot, Freelance Whales
