Fall 2015 JUMP: The Exposed Issue

ISSUE #19

FALL 2015

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LITHUANIA:

TEN YEARS MAKING

IN THE

EXPOSED: THIN LIPS, GROUND UP, BEACH SLANG, MINKA, THE HUMBLE, JOSEPH CONYERS, RECPHILLY & MUCH MORE

CONTENTS | Issue #19

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FALL 2015

THE JUMP OFF Thin Lips, Air is Human, Ground Up (right), The Pretty Greens, Posers, Max Swan, Driftwood Soldier, The Cats, The Holy Mess, Celeste DiNucci, Le Yikes Surf Club, Beach Slang, band vehicles and RECphilly.

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THIS PLACE ROCKS We spoke to people about the new venue, The Fillmore, and visited Spice House Sound and Rittenhouse Soundworks. Also, Heritage gives jazz a new home.

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MUSIC & POLITICS Melissa Murray Bailey faces long odds but she wants to be the next mayor of Philadelphia.

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MUSIC & EDUCATION The Curtis Institute of Music is among the most selective schools in the world. Joseph Conyers graduated from the school and now teaches there.

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COVER stories Lithuania seems like a side project for a trio of friends who have been involved with numerous successful projects. But the band originated more than a decade ago. They just finally made their first album.

Minka shows are weird and loud and often feature nudity, with the band having as much fun as anyone watching them.

The band formerly known as Mo Lowda & The Humble dropped an album that was really well received. As they prepare to release their sophomore effort, they've cut the Mo. Now, they are just The Humble.

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FOOD THAT ROCKS Franky Bradley's offers a wide-range of music and entertainment, as well as dining options, in the heart of Center City.

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INSIDE VOICES Philly legend Kenny Gamble talks about The Jackson 5, Jay-Z, civil rights and the need to control your world with Southwest Philly artist Mont Brown.

FRONT COVER: Lithuania, by Michael Bucher. BACK COVER: Joseph Conyers, by xST / Shawn Theodore. CONTENTS PAGE: (top to bottom) Ground Up, by Morgan Smith; The Humble, by Chris Fascenelli; Franky Bradley's, by Charles Shan Cerrone.

JUMPphilly.com

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DARLENE CAVALIER

The Science of Cheerleading is an interactive book designed to help cheerleaders achieve a greater understanding of how and why certain movements work through science, technology, engineering, and math. Made possible with support from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, this highlyengaging and informative ebook is available for free at the iTunes store.

JUMPphilly.com Find out more

at sciencecheerleader.com

The Burroughs Wellcome Fund is a private foundation located in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. Find out more at bwfund.org 5

publisher G.W. MILLER III managing editor CHRIS MALO deputy editors MICHAEL BUCHER, BETH ANN DOWNEY contributing editors CHARLES SHAN CERRONE, JESSICA FLYNN, TYLER HORST, BRIANNA SPAUSE contributors LISSA ALICIA, KYLE BAGENSTOSE, RACHEL BARRISH, VINCE BELLINO, CHRIS BROWN, JUMAH CHAGUAN, GABI CHEPURNY (LA OFFICE), ASHLEY COLEMAN, RICH COLEMAN, KEVIN COOK, DARRAGH DANDURAND, CHESNEY DAVIS, RACHEL DEL SORDO, GRACE DICKINSON, JUSTIN DOWDALL, MEREDITH EDLOW, LAURA FANCIULLACCI, CHRIS FASCENELLI, DUSTIN FENSTERMACHER, ERIC FITZSIMMONS, CHIP FRENETTE, JEFF FUSCO, JENNIFER GRANATO, JESSICA GRIFFIN, JARED GRUENWALD, DAN HALMA, BRAE HOWARD, PAUL IMBURGIA, GRETA IVERSON, EVAN KAUCHER, JENNY KERRIGAN, KARA KHAN, ERIN MARHEFKA, MINA LEE, MATTHEW LEISTER, MORGAN JAMES, JENELLE JANCI, SEAN KANE, RICK KAUFFMAN, DONTE KIRBY, MEGAN MATUZAK, HANNAH KUBIK, TERESA McCULLOUGH, JASON MELCHER, NIESHA MILLER, TIESHA MILLER, DAVE MINIACI, BRENDAN MENAPACE, ELIAS MORRIS, SAMANTHA MOSS, TIM MULHERN, BRIAN MYSZKOWSKI, TIM O'DONNELL, URSZULA PRUCHNIEWSKA, EMILY SCOTT, ROSIE SIMMONS, CHAD SIMS, MORGAN SMITH, KEVIN STAIRIKER, xST / SHAWN THEODORE, JARED WHALEN, BRIAN WILENSKY WE PRINT 10,000 FULL-COLOR ISSUES FOUR TIMES PER YEAR, IN MARCH, JUNE, SEPTEMBER AND NOVEMBER. WE DISTRIBUTE THEM FREE AT PHILLY AREA MUSIC VENUES, STUDIOS, RESTAURANTS, RECORD SHOPS, BARS, CLOTHING BOUTIQUES, GYMS, BOOK STORES, COFFEE SHOPS, UNIVERSITIES, CLUBS AND OTHER PLACES WHERE MUSIC LOVERS HANG OUT. IF YOU WANT MAGS AT YOUR LOCATION, EMAIL US AT JUMPPHILLY@GMAIL.COM. JUMP is an independent magazine published by Mookieland Inc. We have no money. Please don't sue us.

Nobody actually reads the stuff in this section so rather than craft some earnest bullshit, here are some great lyrics: "Ain't No Stoppin Us Now! We're on the move! Ain't No Stoppin Us Now! We've got the groove!"

Man. How awesome was Philadelphia International? I feel like dancing.

This is a full-on, DIY, community effort. If you want to get involved, if you have story ideas or if you just have something to say, email us at jumpphilly@gmail.com, tweet us @JUMPphilly and find us at facebook.com/jumpphilly.

Philly rocks. Spread the word. facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Publisher's Note

Reality Bites

My friend Rob called me and said I needed to listen to this band, The Libertines. Having been friends for nearly 18 years by then and having worked together as teenagers at the Sam Goody's music store in the Concord Mall, he knew I liked my music loud and full of angst.

So, on October 17, 2004, we saw the band (along with our friend Dave). And it was amazing, even though the show was without Pete Doherty, one of the frontmen who suffered from various addictions.

After the show, my friends and I were chatting outside the TLA when Caral Barat, Pete's bandmate, walked out. So we began speaking with him as well. He invited us next door to The Blarney Stone pub and we had drinks alongside the band.

That show was momentous for me for a few reasons.

First, my friends and I had not hung out regularly much by then.

We were in our early 30s, with real jobs. Most of us were attached and some were starting families. Drinking with the boys late on a Sunday was a luxury we could ill afford. Or so we thought.

Second, I had forgotten how much I loved live music. The Libertines were so raw and fun, the way music was meant to be played.

And finally, I became obsessed with the idea of Pete Doherty, the troubador whose lyrics referenced literary giants and the ghosts of English lore, even though he was drowning in a haze of drugs. For me, he epitomized the romantic notion of the troubled artist.

After that show, my friends and I vowed to get together at least once per month to see live shows and enjoy each others' company.

That lasted for a few years, before Rob was elevated in his job and his family expanded even more. Pete Doherty eventually drifted into a heroin oblivion, making appearances every now and then, offering hope that he'll craft more great music, but then he disappears again.

The reality of his issues goes so far beyond the overly romanicized ideas of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.

Me? I launched this magazine in 2011 and I've seen a gazillion shows since. In March, we'll celebrate our five year anniversary with a massive blowout concert/party (details to come ...).

During the past five years, I've had the chance to see beyond those romanticized ideas of the artist. It's been a privilege not only to get backstage but to go into rehearsal spaces, studios and homes of our creative people. It's not always glamorous, as you'll learn by flipping through the pages of this issue, the theme of which is EXPOSED. Being a musician is often a struggle, especially today, in an age when the Internet has changed the way we do everything (and I mean everything).

Just like running a music magazine means I spend 75 percent of my time doing the boring, tedious and sometimes annoying business stuff, being a musician means so much more than hitting the stage and entertaining crowds.

That makes me want to appreciate the musicians even more.

- G.W. Miller III JUMPphilly.com

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The JUMP Off INSIDE: THIN LIPS p. 10 / AIR IS HUMAN p. 11 / GROUND UP p. 12 / PRETTY GREENS p. 13 / POSERS p. 14 / MAX SWAN p. 16 / DRIFTWOOD SOLDIERS p. 17 / THE CATS p. 18 / THE HOLY MESS p. 19 / CELESTE DiNUCCI p. 20 / LE YIKES SURF CLUB p. 20 /

Photo by Michael Bucher.

BEACH SLANG p. 21 / TOUR VANS p. 22 / RECPHILLY p. 24 /

JUMPphilly.com

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Photo by Michael Bucher.

The JUMP Off

The Right Riffage Thin Lips features longtime friends in new roles and everything is falling into place for the new band.

Think of Thin Lips as a punk rock modern family.

Band break-ups, forged musical friendships, forgiveness and new beginnings have all been a part of this four-person unit, and frontwoman Chrissy Tashjian is the obvious matriarch. She’s the nurturing, creative core of the project, unabashedly requesting that someone roll up the sleeves of her T-shirt when she emerges from the shower after band practice in preparation for a show this evening at Everybody Hits, near Northern Liberties. On the walk over from their practice space in Big Mama’s Warehouse, she can also be seen wiping the schmutz away from her younger brother and fellow bandmate’s eye.

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Thin Lips formed from the ashes of Dangerous Ponies, which called it quits after six years in 2013, the note on their Facebook page announcing the split stating, “Chrissy I’m sure will start a new project soon.”

“What happens after I get out of every band is like, ‘I’m done,’” Chrissy reminisces. “I get all heartbroken, and I’m like, ‘I’m not doing this any more, this is dumb.’ Then I make it three weeks, I go to five shows and I’m like, ‘I hate this, I miss playing guitar so hard.’”

In true matriarch fashion, Chrissy kept her musical allies from that band by her side in Thin Lips, with DP bassist Kyle Pulley and drummer Mikey Tashjian (her younger brother) joining her to fill out the original line-up.

“In [Dangerous Ponies], Chrissy and I argued with everybody but each other,” says Pulley, who is also well known as one half of the creative duo behind The Headroom studio. “We’re just on the same page from an aesthetic point of view, and what we want out of music and how we want to approach music. We spend a lot of time honing and making quality over quantity – just focusing our efforts on a few songs and polishing them.”

These focused efforts resulted in Divorce Year, the band’s debut EP that was facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Air is Human photo by Kara Khan/Pop Up Polaroid.

released this past May to much acclaim. A sibling dispute led Mikey Tashjian (who also drums in The Superweaks, formerly known as The Weaks, with exDangerous Ponies bandmates Chris Baglivo and Evan Bernard) to leave the band before the album was recorded. Chrissy pulled in Pat Brier, drummer for Three Man Cannon and Queen Jesus, with whom she’d had success jamming.

Commentary on Divorce Year strongly noted the palpable tenseness and sadness embedded in the album’s music and lyrics.

“Right after Dangerous Ponies split up, my partner of six years and I split up,” Chrissy says. “Then two weeks later, my youngest brother died. Then I got mugged. Then [due to a workrelated accident] I had to wear an eye patch for a week. Just all of these shitty, shitty things happened. So Divorce Year is a processing of a lot of that, and my next record is an extension of the processing of a lot of that.”

Laying it all out for the listener proved opportune for Thin Lips as friends in bands like Cayetana and Hop Along came banging down their door to take them out on tour this summer after the Divorce Year release. But before the band agreed to the Hop Along Painted Shut record release tour, they brought on Chris Diehm (Quit, 1994, Year of Glad) as a second guitarist. The addition added another element to the “riffage,” as Chrissy puts it, and squelched the feelings that were making her unhappy with performing at the time - mainly about whether or not she wanted to continue to be the frontwoman or just play guitar.

“We brought in somebody else to try and sing but it felt weird,” she says. “It was like karaoke or something, and trying to teach somebody to emote your own lyrics is super weird. I was like, ‘We have to figure this out because this is really import to me. This is my music. This is something me, Kyle and Mikey have been working on for a long time.”

Chrissy says Diehm learned all of the band’s songs in two days and that the dynamic clicked automatically. Not only did he help fill out the band’s live sound but Chrissy says the writing process for the next record is going much faster. This is because she’s historically written songs alone and tracked everything herself - from drums to bass to vocals - then sent it out to the band for input. Now, she just sends it out with her playing guitar.

“I think that really helps because it doesn’t lock itself into an idea,” she says.

“Then the four of us kind of process it together. It’s just processing so much faster.”

Pulley says Diehm has also become the “tie-breaker” on many decisions that these three longtime bandmates would otherwise be feuding about.

“I feel like when there is a point of contention, I can just quietly sit there and be like, ‘Hey, why don’t we try all those things and then use the one that sounds the best?’” Diehm says with a laugh. “But yeah, I feel like it’s a different role than I’ve ever played in a band before because I’m usually the primary songwriter.”

The members of Thin Lips look forward to what’s ahead. Chrissy says the band has signed to Lame-O Records and the label will put out Divorce Year on 7-inch in February, as well as their full-length at a to-be-determined date.

APA Entertainment just signed the band, which will alleviate some of the stress of booking their own tours and all of the other time-consuming tasks a DIY band becomes responsible for.

“Kyle is a record engineer. He works crazy, 13 hour days,” Chrissy says. “I’m a carpenter. I work insane hours. Chris gets as many waiting shifts in as he can.

Mikey is a mover. We’re all on a hustle just so that we can write records and tour. That’s every musician’s kind of struggle.”

But for now, the daily struggle is an afterthought as the band turns their attention back to tonight’s performance. They’re not upset - maybe even a little relieved that there are several other shows going on tonight that make for a more intimate atmosphere.

“It’s Friday night in Philly,” Diehm says matter-of-factly.

“Philly is killing it,” Chrissy adds.

- Beth Ann Downey JUMPphilly.com

A Duo With Depth Air is Human's latest project has them creating music as the seasons change.

As with most great relationships, Air is Human met each other through a Craigslist ad. Frontman Jeff Lucci, 28, put up an ad requesting various musicians that lined up with his interests including far-­ranging bands from Radiohead to Mahavishnu Orchestra. Drummer Josh Aptner, 27, was the only one to respond. Five years later, the duo consistently hypnotizes the city with their complex musical arrangements.

“Thank God I didn’t know shit about the city then,” Lucci says with a laugh. “If I would have wrote that today, I would have thought, 'Goddamn, no one is going to respond to this.’”

It’s clear that the relationship is a successful one. The two live in Fishtown currently but are hoping to move to a nearby warehouse that is more conducive to store massive amounts of equipment.

To make up for the fullness that a two-­piece sometimes lacks, Lucci’s setup includes both a keyboard and guitar fit with varied pedals. Their live sound is intense, with layered keyboards and looped guitars maniacally set against Aptner’s driving, almost dance-­like percussion. All the while, both musicians face each other onstage so that any experimentation or delineation can be communicated with a simple head nod.

“Their music has great depth and it triggers visuals in my imagination,” says Joel DeMartino, lead singer of Moonstriker, a band that Air is Human have shared many show bills with over the years. “They always keep it fresh.”

That freshness has been put to the test this year as the band worked harder than ever to release four EPs in sequence with the changing of seasons. Each equinox and solstice brought along a new group of material that Aptner describes as “stressful but cool.”

“The original concept came from wanting a deadline,” says Lucci. “If we didn’t have a deadline, it wouldn’t get done. Our first album came out in 2011, so there’s a lot of procrastination. I want to tweak it ‘til it’s right.”

Each EP has managed to fit the theme of the season in some small way.

“Throwing Knives at the Sun,” off the collection of songs predicating the summer solstice, rushes forward in a way that’s perfect for a long highway drive towards the horizon. The spring equinox is represented well by tracks like “Kierkegaard’s Last Words,” a spare, almost ghostly piano track that manages to be both wistful and trance­like at the same time. The winter equinox, which is the band’s final seasonal EP, is scheduled for December 22.

Air is Human are regulars at venues across the city and have been able to sustain residencies at Boot & Saddle, Bourbon & Branch and for the second time, a full month at Ortlieb’s.

“The thought process behind the residencies is that we can share the love with another band and that people can at least make one show,” says Lucci.

“If you’re actually maintaining your relationships and interacting with people, it becomes easier because it’s more of like, ‘Dude, you’re my friend, wanna come hang?'” adds Aptner.

The band will likely celebrate the end of the year­-long project with some shows and then take some time off.

“I’d like to put this last [EP] out and then take a break from playing shows,” says Aptner. “And then come back when we have a new set ready.”

Until then, the two moving parts of Air is Human will continue on their trail, uncompromising with the music that they make.

“The reason we do this is definitely because we’re compelled to do this, and I think that’s why other shit falls by the wayside,” says Aptner. “I’m not compelled to be on social media. I’m compelled to make awesome music.”

- Kevin Stairiker

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The JUMP Off Photo by Morgan Smith.

that I think people are definitely going to notice the difference between our previous releases.

Azar: Also, we released 12 of our last projects within a five to six year span.

We’re putting the brakes on the amount of music released and focusing on what gets released and the quality of the music.

What's the significance of the title of your upcoming release, Seventeen Eleven?

Azar: 1711 is the house where we first started making music together. It’s in North Philadelphia [on] Montgomery Avenue, right off of Temple’s campus.

It’s not necessarily where we all met, but it’s where Ground Up basically came to fruition. We all became best friends and brothers under that roof. Having all of that creativity and drive under one roof was so inspirational. As an artist to feed off of all of our friends’ excitement… it was just a magical time.

After listening to your recent single, “Right Now,” the production is distinctly different than your previous work.

Bij: Production wise, Seventeen Eleven is very different. There’s a new dynamic people are going to hear out of my production. I want people to see where I’m at right now. I want them to see where we’re at and how we’re working together differently. There are also a couple songs where I’m singing on the chorus and doing backing vocals. I think that’s going to be something new people haven’t heard from me yet. Usually my voice is in the music. It’s not really in the lyrics.

How do you manage to keep the creative juices flowing? Stay inspired?

Azar: We take a lot of pride in the fact that my neighbor is my merchandiser.

My roommate’s my producer. My best friends are my managers and they live down the street. That all helps.

Staying on Mission

How important is the visual aspect of your art?

Ground Up is at one of their favorite local haunts, Fishtown’s Loco Pez. But alas, it seems as if it’s everyone’s favorite taco spot this day.

The two-thirds of Ground Up present - MC Al Azar and DJ/producer Bij Lincs, head across the street to the outdoor patio of another favorite of theirs, Cedar Point Bar and Kitchen. The remaining member, MC Malakai McDowell, couldn’t make it to the eatery. So, between mouthfuls of chicken and waffles, the rest of the group discuss what’s changed and what’s remained the same since they last appeared in this magazine and their upcoming album, Seventeen Eleven..

Azar: I can’t underestimate how important it is. Particularly in 2015, it may be more important to our fans than our actual music to be quite frank. That hurts as a lyricist to say that. We’re in such an image-driven world right now where shock value and shock videos can make you famous overnight because of it.

You can’t ignore the power of the visual aspects of this game we’re playing. We try very hard not to ignore or neglect it. It’s why we’ve made countless videos that haven’t seen the light of day because we take so much pride in our visual aesthetic. We’ve taken losses on money because it doesn’t meet the standard we’ve set for ourselves. The whole package is what is going to get us to the promise land.

The last time JUMP featured Ground Up it was the year 2012. Is this the same Ground Up as then?

Bij: At the same time, sometimes you can’t think about it too much, the visual stuff. You just have to be yourself, almost, and really embrace who you are to make something interesting that people will want to also be as well. I feel like we do that very well.

Azar: Yes and no. We’ve all grown as people and musicians. Our music has evolved. We have evolved. I think our outlooks on the world have become more mature. Our perspectives have changed on certain things and I think our music reflects that. But with that being said, I think at heart we’re all the same good-willed happy people we got into this game as. We’re just a little older, a little wiser, a little hungrier.

You are prolific artists to say the least. How many musical projects has it been?

Azar: This would make it lucky number 13 in the fall with Seventeen Eleven. Crazy.

Bij: We’ve been working very hard to get to this moment where we can confidently not call it a mixtape. I think we’ve been working on something

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Bij: 1711 was a very good business formula for us. Even though we don’t live there anymore, we still do everything the same as we did at 1711. We still all live together. We still have the beat studio, the recording studio, all of those elements. A lot of friends coming in and out all day. Nothing’s changed in that regard. It’s all about everyone working together to help and support each other.

How does Ground Up stay grounded?

Azar: It’s not always easy. But it’s not hard when you’re surrounded by your best friends every day. Every day we wake up we work on music. If we’re not working on music…

Bij - We’re watching “Naked and Afraid.”

Azar: (laughs) Yeah that’s true. We stay grounded by being with good people.

I call my mom every day. Or try to. And we work very hard. We’re not often - Morgan James distracted by things that aren’t the mission. facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Photo by Rosie Simmons.

Greens to The Front The Pretty Greens make vintage-sounding music with a powerful message.

Julia Green wears a gold-painted ring that reads “Coffee,” which fits well in the setting of Grindcore House coffee shop in South Philly. She also wears a Wacky Wacko brand graphic T-shirt that pays tribute to women of punk, like Kleenex and Bratmobile.

She and Carly Green, along with guitarist Kool Schmool (all go by stage names), make up The Pretty Greens – a punk trio with a message of equality and social justice.

Carly, who works as an IT technician by day, was a radio DJ for more than 15 years in Ontario, where she grew up. She booked shows in her spare time and became involved in the punk and Riot Grrrl scenes of the ’90s while in her teens.

She moved to Philadelphia in 2005 and met Julia at a non-profit organization where they worked.

Carly lent Julia the book Girls to the Front by Sara Marcus, which fostered her interest in the feminist and social justice scenes.

“I came to the punk/feminist/social justice JUMPphilly.com

scenes so much later,” says Julia Green. “I am really happy I found it when I did because I needed it.”

The duo released their first EP, Ghost World, in August 2013, featuring just drum and bass.

Soon after, Carly and Julia met Kool Schmool, whose name derived from a Bratmobile track, when they played as a duo at the Nut Hut Saloon in Fishtown. Kool, a guitar player, joined the band and learned all of their songs in a month.

The Pretty Greens work closely with Pussy Division, a feminist activist group in Philly that raises awareness of political issues geared toward LGBTQ rights and gender equality.

Kool notes that the track “Elevator Eyes,” off their latest EP, Lonely Hearts Club, stems from being tired of dealing with harassment every time she walks out the door.

“This specifically happened,” Kool says. “I just woke up, got my shit together, left and literally opened the door to leave and was harassed on my stoop, the corner and the bus stop.”

Their music is an outlet to raise awareness of topics that otherwise wouldn’t be discussed, she adds.

“You look out into the crowd and see that people are relating and appreciative of that because people aren’t really doing that kind of stuff around here,” Kool says.

The Pretty Greens signed to Raleigh, North Carolina-based Negative Fun Records in early 2015 and released Lonely Hearts Club on cassette through the label in February.

With the band’s vintage sound, the opportunity

to put their music on tapes feels much like creating a collectible item.

“There is something sweetly nostalgic about it and the image of someone hitting play that old school way,” Julia says. “It’s a really intimate relationship with our music.”

The trio also has their own zine, “The Pretty Signals,” of which they’ve produced three issues over the last three years.

Kool and Carly complement each other by adding their own interests to the zine. The guitarist contributes fashion aspects, while the drummer interviews local bands.

“The last issue was about what makes you strong and what makes you vulnerable in your community,” Carly says.

The Pretty Greens performed at the March to End Rape Culture in October. Carly Green organized Treat Y’rself Fest, which took place in August at PhilaMOCA, to raise money for the march. The festival included locals like Kississippi and Ghost Gum on the line-up.

“It was mostly about fostering a community and having us work with other groups that we wanted to work with,” Carly says.

The Pretty Greens hope to release a seven-inch and embark on another tour in the near future, while continuing their activism.

“In Philly, I just like that there is lots of opportunity to play different places and do it in a way that you can keep separate parts of yourself,” Julia says.

- Emily Scott

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Influence, Not Identity The members of Posers understand what it means to be a poser in the punk world. You can't just dress the part. "Usually, the realest punks don't look punk at all," says guitarist Rory Cain.

"Poser" is a word you hear often when growing up in a certain scene.

Everyone has a different definition of what makes someone a poser but there's a common idea that a poser is someone who pretends to represent things of which they truly have no understanding.

Posers, the band, are made up of self-proclaimed outsiders of the Philadelphia punk scene, consisting of musicians who are straightforward in discussing what being a poser means to them.

“It's kind of a jab at the current state of the scene,” bassist Johnny Mick says

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of the band's choice of name.

Mick and guitarist Rory Cain are both from southern New Jersey, growing up in the suburbs of the city but always embracing the punk scene over the bridge as their own. Singer Jade Baisa is a native of St. Louis who moved to Philadelphia in 2013. Drummer Brian Bullock has been a staple in the punk scene for years, easily spotted at countless shows, churning out plenty of music aside from Posers.

Although they have yet to release any physical albums (they do have plans for a fall release and regional tour), Posers have already garnered a reputation for being nonconformist and outspoken.

“To some people, not being from the city makes you a poser by default,” says Mick. “Everybody is content to be doing the same thing, falling under a nostalgia thing where it's like they’re all playing the same music and most of it sounds like metal. And I'm not knocking anyone. Everyone has their thing that they're into but I didn't get into this because I wanted to be like everybody else." facebook.com/JUMPphilly

The JUMP Off

Their music is void of cliches and stereotypes usually associated with modern punk. The songs on their Bandcamp give a sample of the band’s sound - the self-titled online demo is full of unexpected guitar solos and intricately structured songs.

The music separates them from other punks who claim not knowing to play as a point of pride.

“You can't be into punk without realizing that you’re doing something a little ridiculous,” Mick says. “No one is born wearing a leather jacket. It’s influence. You take it from everybody.

The problem now is that people are mistaking influence with identity. You can't just live somebody else’s life. You have to take your own individual influences and be an actual person and not just a caricature of what a punk should be.”

"If punks were genuinely all original and all creative, like they’re supposed to be, none of us would look remotely the same,” adds Cain, expanding more on the band’s poser stance. “But we come out in droves in JUMPphilly.com

the same thing. The punkest-looking people are the biggest posers. They're the ones who are full of shit. Usually, the realest punks don't look punk at all.”

Despite having heavy opinions on social and musical trends, the band does not rely on that to sell their tunes. They are musicians who extend their talents beyond the limited frames of punk rock, absorbing influences from protopunk, glam, powerpop and a variety of more melodic and skillful acts gearing towards the ’77 side of punk rock without full-on imitation. They effortlessly deliver a sound that serves as both new and refreshing, and they're quick to call their music rock 'n' roll before anything else.

Allowing themselves to deviate from straight punk comes with the territory their name suggests. Posers aren’t trying to gain any punk points or fall into any hierarchy.

“It's so that we're free musically to do whatever we want,” Mick says. “If one of our songs is too catchy or poppy or not screaming enough or not hating the government enough, then we already warned you that we're Posers."

- Elias Morris. Photo by Michael Bucher.

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The JUMP Off Photo by Samantha Moss.

Beyond The Sexy Sax Guy Saxophone player Max Swan is writing songs and singing, not just blowing his horn.

It's a late Thursday night and Max Swan is feeling it in mSOUNd Recording Studios, tucked above Adventurers Indoor Mini Golf in a converted warehouse behind IKEA on Columbus Boulevard.

The 26-year-old Manayunk resident is watching drummer Lionel Forrester through the control room glass. The song they're working on, like the rest of Swan's soon-to-be-released album, For Thought of Others, is nearly complete. It's 99 percent done. What they're working on is the gravy.

Forrester comes in a little early on one take, and looks to Swan for some direction. Swan asks studio co-owner and stand-in engineer Domenic Prizivalli to press the button that beams his voice through to Forrester.

“Just play man,” Swan says, encouragingly.

Forrester opens up on the next take with extra oomph on the kicks and flourishing fills made up on the spot. One crescendo brings a huge smile to Swan's face. Swan then raises his hands triumphantly, nodding to Forrester through the glass.

The whole process is an accumulation of the skills Swan has picked up since his graduation from the University of the Arts four years ago.

A prodigal saxophone player since the age of 9, Swan has toured with the jazz-funk Dirk Quinn Band and made inroads into the city's hip-hop scene, doing musical production for artists like Kuf Knotz.

“This album is a time when I feel I'm coming into my own as an artist,” Swan says. “I'm singing, producing, writing, playing instruments.”

Swan's challenge is in getting the science right. He's passionate about the saxophone and writing thoroughly composed music, bucking the verse-bridge-chorus-repeat formula most popular music follows in favor of longer pieces with multiple movements. But he realizes neither really fit into what's popular these days.

“The whole effort of my career so far is bringing the saxophone back to a seriously effective thing that people enjoy,” Swan says. “Not to dispel the 'sexy sax guy' idea but because of things like that, it's a challenge to create a legitimate chunk of music that people can take seriously.”

But Swan has seen encouraging signs. He says assumptions about the saxophone and nineminute songs usually fade away in front of live audiences. And he's discovered that vocals - at which Swan proves more than capable - help to make the connection.

“I'm not fixated on making the saxophone a popular thing again,” Swan says. “I'm fixated on making it part of my music. Whether it's the secret weapon or fixture of the show, it's going to be there. And I've learned that singing really plays a huge part in people's approval of the material.

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When they hear lyrics on one tune, they'll listen to a 15-minute instrumental shred.”

Josh Nussbaum, who is playing guitar for the album's recording and has known Swan since the two met at UArts about six years ago, says that the challenge of making the music work is what draws him to the effort.

“When I first met Max, I really liked his saxophone playing,” Nussbaum says. “That's really what made me want to play with him. There weren't a lot of people taking risks with instruments like saxophone and trumpet. Most jazz school people are into old school bebop.”

That's not to say Swan can't play the old ways.

In the past year, he's played at both the Center City Jazz Festival and Welcome America! festival.

Swan credits a long line of influential teachers for his prowess on the instrument, including John Thompson of PhillyBloco and Lenny Pickett, the band director of "Saturday Night Live," whose signature sax opens up each show. Normally unreachable, Swan says he had to use a bit of misdirection to reach Pickett.

“I had been trying to get in touch with him for the longest time. He was the white whale,” Swan

says, remembering the time he faked a call to NYU, where Pickett teaches, and received an email address after claiming to have lost it. “I hit him up and he responded, like, right away. I could not believe it.”

Now, Swan drives to New York once a year for private lessons from Pickett, whom he says is a zen master of the sax.

“I go study with him and there's like eight months worth of personal development I have to do before going back,” Swan says.

Perhaps Pickett sees something in Swan, or at least those like him. In order to keep the saxophone relevant to the mainstream, it's going to take such artists who can successfully interweave the instrument into music that includes elements of hip-hop, soul and rock. Swan, for one, is looking forward to dropping the album in November and seeing how listeners respond to the accumulation of his skills so far.

“I'm really excited about it,” Swan says. “I definitely have way more personal confidence when asking myself, 'Did I do my job on it? Did I meet the aspirations I wanted?'

- Kyle Bagenstose

facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Photo by Mina Lee.

Under Construction The members of Driftwood Soldier do everything themselves, including building their own place to perform.

The floorboards creak with each step. Plastic tarp covers certain walls. There are boxes and tools strewn around.

Owen Lyman-Schmidt sits back in his chair, sips iced coffee and chuckles about the state of his West Philly house.

“I liked the idea of doing all the renovations myself,” he says.

The house is coming together nicely for the Driftwood Soldier singer but is still very much a work in progress.

And the same could be said of the band itself.

Born out of the desire to write more music and play as a band rather than solo, Driftwood Soldier was formed when Lyman-Schmidt, originally from D.C., met bassist Bobby Szafranski at a party in Philly. Lyman-Schmidt was traveling and playing solo as Owen and His Checkered Past and Szafranski had been playing in the band Mountjoy.

But each wanted more and that’s when they met. It’s been a process.

“As a band, we’re growing, for sure, in a live setting,” Szafranski says. “I don’t know whether it’s we’re getting more comfortable with each other or just playing songs faster than we intended.”

From the start, the duo did everything themselves. They both believe strongly in the DIY culture.

Their debut album, Scavenger’s Joy, was recorded fairly quickly and the band’s record release party, true to their nature, took place in a warehouse that Szafranski helped renovate with a friend.

“The DIY is for us an aesthetic choice and also about staying in control of your music and keeping the music for people making music,” Lyman-Schmidt says.

The band’s sound - a mix of blues, jazz and alt-country - comes off as a good workingman series of songs, featuring Lyman-Schmidt’s deep, whiskeysoaked voice.

Lyman-Schmidt’s instrument of choice, the mandolin, is of course self-taught.

The band utilizes interesting foot percussion during shows, creating their own take on bass drums by using items including a suitcase and bottle caps.

And with that passion, the band hopes to help the Philly DIY music scene JUMPphilly.com

with the old warehouse they helped convert. The 7th and Thompson venue, Bond Villain, was created with the idea that it could bridge the gap for bands to perform to an intimate and interested crowd while still maintaining their artistic sensibilities, something that isn’t always guaranteed at a larger venue.

Logan Welde owns the space. He recruited Szafranski to help renovate it.

They gutted the first floor and built a stage. The first show was a Driftwood Soldier show and it went better than expected.

“I actually was expecting like 20 or 30 people and we had over 100,” says Welde. “It was incredible. It was freezing cold, too. It was February and there is no heat in the building, so people were wearing coats. But everyone was dancing and having fun.”

It was that show that made Welde realize the full potential of the space and continue to book shows as Bond Villain, a space where artists can roam free and keep all the profits.

“They do everything, down to making their own shirts,” Welde says, praising Driftwood Soldier for their part in the DIY scene.

There are spaces that really put love into their sound and have great sound crews to work with the musicians. But acoustics aren’t the only ingredient for a good show at Bond Villain. It isn’t even the bottom dollar. It’s having a fun and memorable show.

“We let the musicians have a good place to play and they can bring their friends and they can make money without having to pay the venue,” Szafranski says.

“It’s all part of giving back to a community of people who make it possible for folks who don’t have a flashy website but are playing good music and can play a show for the first time,” Lyman-Schmidt adds.

He goes on to point out that word-of-mouth publicity is still a valuable commodity in the scene, referring to a point in time when certain venues were known just for being a place to hear good music.

“We’ve encountered that on the road, where it’s this place that people from three counties comes out on a Friday just to see whoever is playing that night,” says Lyman-Schmidt. “And if it’s us, we appreciate the hell out of that.”

While they say they have enough material to record another album, the duo wants to take it slow and continue to refine Driftwood Soldier’s sound.

And for a man who started out on the road, it sounds like Lyman-Schmidt has found his home.

“I love Philly,” Lyman-Schmidt says, motioning to the home-renovation surroundings. “As you can see, I plan on staying for awhile.”

“Unless the roof collapses on us,” jokes Szafranski.

- Dave Miniaci

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Photo by Michael Bucher.

The JUMP Off

Make Music.

Drink Beer.

The members of The Cats aren't into the music for fame or fortune. Their goals are much more simplistic.

Sitting outside Titan House in the glow of a South Philly sunset, The Cats are drinking together before their set later tonight. There’s a case of Miller Lite retro cans and blue and orange bottles of MD 20/20, something the company calls a fortified wine. Drinking, The Cats agree, is consistently a part of their writing, recording and performing, and it works. When asked what they wanted from the band, Brett Green put it simply – “a good time.”

“I think the beer drinking has intensified since Brett – particularly Brett – and I joined the band,” says Greg Fowler.

The Cats are a group of friends who have known each other from a lifetime in the DIY music scene.

Their ages range from 30 to 40, and none are caught up with worrying about making music to make money.

They just like playing shows and making records and getting drunk together.

Vocalist Manon Gordan and guitarists Ben Schorr and Colin (who doesn’t like associating his last name with the band because of “tin-hat type paranoia”) have only gone on tour once after their first album, Big America, was released in 2013.

In the last year, the band added Fowler and Green, friends of different band members since high school. Fowler proudly explains how he got the former drummer to leave by convincing him it was negatively impacting his free time.

Schorr remembers Green being similarly enthusiastic to join. When he asked Green if he wanted to play bass for them, he gave a simple but definitive, “Yup.” This June, the band put out a new EP called Grave Desacrator + 4 that falls right in line with the lofi early ’90s indie sound the band first emulated when they started as a Guided By Voices cover band in 2012. The fuzzy guitars and Manon’s muffled vocals feel like the damp, dark, South Philly basement shows they naturally gravitate toward. They had cassettes made because it would have taken too long to get them pressed before a four-day tour in October, stopping in Huntington, West Virginia, Richmond, Virginia, Pittsburgh and Allentown, Pennsylvania.

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Extended tours are difficult, though, for the maturing band members.

“We all have jobs and I have kids,” says Colin, who’s wearing pink framed sunglasses and a matching bandana tied around his forehead. “It’s hard to explain to my wife, ‘Honey, watch the kids for a week. I’m gonna go make no money in a van with my beer drinking buddies.’”

As hard of a sell as that might be to his wife, the band sees that scenario as a picture of success.

“We all kinda grew up in the DIY punk scene and we were always kind of disillusioned with the officialness of stuff,” says Fowler. “I think in the back of everyone’s mind was ‘Ah, I think this would be great to do this as a job.’”

Schorr and Fowler had a taste of officialness when they were in an experimental hardcore band together called Towers, but the taste was more foul than the MD 20/20 they’re drinking.

“Towers did a record with a label that had distribution, but all that amounted to was a review in a big magazine that trashed the record,” says Schorr. “It was stupid.”

So now the band doesn’t count on anything like that. They produced Relax on Everyone in

2014 with their own money and sent it around to anyone they thought might like it. The album was mentioned in a few year-end lists, including Best Reasons to Write Fuckin Record Reviews, Dusted in Exile and Philadelphia City Paper. Long-time friend of the band and WFMU DJ Thomas Storck featured The Cats on his eclectic noise/industrial/ electronic radio show.

“The Cats aren’t like a lot of other stuff I play on the show but I still think it works,” says Storck, who was a DJ with Schorr at Drexel’s WKDU and was quick to pay attention to the band after first hearing them. “In terms of accessibility, I think they have potential to have a really broad fan base.”

The accolades and kind words still don’t change the band’s outlook. After they finish playing their set in the basement, drenched in sweat, they quickly begin packing up. Colin has a spare shirt in the car because he has work that night in New York City.

“Was it badass?” Schorr asks the band, in his best South Philly Italian accent.

“Oh, it was badassss,” the bandmates reply, content as can be.

- Michael Bucher facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Photos by Jessica Flynn.

Sitting on the Cusp of the Trash Age The Holy Mess have a dismal outlook for the world and its future. But they're having fun for now.

Jeff Riddle is on the steps leading to his South Philly home when the other members of The Holy Mess - SteveO and Keith Yosco - show up.

In the basket of his bike, SteveO has a forty and a Smirnoff Ice, which he hands to Riddle.

Riddle has been “iced.”

It’s a well-known tradition— upon being presented with the drink, the receiver has to chug it. Riddle, the band’s guitarist and one of its vocalists, complains he wanted to sip the drink and enjoy it with a cigarette, but he will have no such luck. Dutifully, he gets down on one knee and chugs it.

“Tastes like Sprite,” he says, laughing.

The Holy Mess has made a reputation for the shenanigans its members like to be a part of, but the trio has also worked hard to build the respect they now hold both in the local punk community and in national and international circles.

The band formed in 2006 and has seen several different amalgamations in its almost 10-year history. Bassist and vocalist SteveO and drummer Yosco, the remaining original members, became friends as teenagers and have been playing music together since. With the addition of Riddle in 2012, the current lineup became solidified.

This past summer, the band headed to Brooklyn’s Converse Rubber Tracks Studio to record the follow up to their 2014 full-length, Comfort In the Discord.

The new EP, Trash Age, deals with the dismal outlook for the world and its future.

“There was the Renaissance, the bronze age, the ice age,” says SteveO. “The next one coming is the trash age. We’re sitting at the cusp of the trash age. If you just look around, not only is it actual, physical trash in the ocean – like there is an island of trash in the Pacific Ocean – but it’s the things being said, the things being touted, the things you see on television, the things you hear on the radio.

It’s all really trash. There isn't a lot of substance anymore, in the way we feel. …

We’re pretty much referencing this faux culture we live in.”

The Holy Mess will be self-releasing Trash Age, just as they did with their last full-length.

“It just boils down to what makes the band work the best,” Yosco says. “We can take what we earn as a band and recycle it back into the various projects we’re involved in.”

“We do our mail ordering ourselves, we book our own shows and release our own records,” says SteveO. “We do everything ourselves. After being around for as long as we have, we’ve learned a lot of what not to do. By doing things ourselves, it’s just way more direct.”

The members of The Holy Mess have been playing music for decades between the three of them.

Having had the opportunity to play many places in the U.S., a European tour with The Menzingers and recently Groezrock Festival in Belgium, The Holy Mess takes all of their opportunities in stride.

“We’re afforded a lot of cool fucking opportunities, for sure,” Yosco says, adding that many of the places he’s been able to go in the world were because of music.

“We don’t take anything for granted. We appreciate everything this band has - Vince Bellino allowed us to do, see and feel.”

JUMPphilly.com

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The JUMP Off

Celeste DiNucci won a lot of money and has been giving it to the arts.

She made a name for herself on the stage of "Jeopardy!" but back home in Philadelphia, Celeste DiNucci has focused her efforts to helping others put their art on the stage.

DiNucci achieved a measure of fame in 2006, when she appeared on "Jeopardy!" and went on a five-game winning streak. But her reputation as quiz show ace was cemented the following year. She returned for the Tournament of Champions and won, walking out with $250,000 in cash winnings. Plus a copy of the "Jeopardy!" DVD Home Game.

Red Hook Coffee and Tea on Fabric Row is almost too cozy for conversation.

There are only two proper tables and a few other seats around, so you are bound to overhear every conversation.

And DiNucci is not the quiet type. She makes herself heard above the din, in particular her laugh. DiNucci puts her body into her speaking - it is little surprise when her lemonade takes a tumble, the lid, thankfully, holding strong.

Flamenco Punks Le Yikes Surf Club makes catchy music by bringing together various influences.

Le Yikes Surf Club was born after the hiatus of Dirty Tactics, Gary Viteri and guitarist Chris Haberstick’s old band. Originally Viteri’s pet project, LYSC expanded with Haberstick and drummer Ted Quann. Bassist Vinny Orender joined after sitting in on some practices.

“It was a boy’s club,” says Viteri of the hangout sessions. The result was a blend of funky Spanish guitars, organs and maracas with an ’80s punk vibe. “You’d drink a beer and play a set.”

“It’s always been that way,” says Haberstick.

“The first songs had that kind of flamenco style. Flamenco punk. That was cool.”

LYSC focused on crafting their music and it paid off. Just after announcing their second live show, the band was picked up by Grizzly Records.

The label’s founder/operator, EJ Binns, was drawn in by the band’s capability to leave him humming tunes after a single listen. While the overall style wasn’t new, Binns found that LYSC brought something distinctive by combining 20

simple riffs, hooks and rhythm for an easily digestible but uniquely fulfilling experience.

“All the dudes are fucking crack ups, super passionate about their crafts, and [they] play some really fucking catchy songs,” says Binns.

“I was sold.”

Soon after, the band was performing gigs with the likes of The Dickies and Agent Orange.

LYSC’s self-titled debut was released in 2012, showcasing jaunty surf reverb with an energetic edge. Tracks like “Ghost Ride the Whip” call to mind a sunset-lit beach, smoking a spliff with pals and watching the waves after a wild punk show. The band’s upcoming fulllength, Apocalypsos - recorded by Philly’s Joe Reinhart - promises to expand on that feeling.

On the deck that leads from Viteri’s second-

- Eric Fitzsimmons

floor kitchen, the guys kick back in lawn chairs, enjoying beers and smokes. Discussion ranges from the expansion of Comcast - whose megatower dominates a clear view of Center City to alternative PR tactics.

“How about a Le Yikes crossword puzzle?” suggests Viteri.

“And if you solve it, you win a copy of the new EP,” Haberstick says with a smirk.

Despite few compatriots in the surf/world/ punk-art project scene, the group is making a name for itself.

“It’s kind of cool,” says Orender, slumped in a chair against the wall. “We don’t really fit the bill. We’re always playing with bands from outside of town.”

Apocalypsos is set for release through Grizzly by the end of the year. Demos for a new EP are also in the works, featuring “a more ethnic sound, borrowing from my Ecuadorian background,” Viteri says. “A more chilled out, bluesy feel instead of surf-rock.”

At the end of the day, LYSC still holds onto its humble sonic ethos.

“It’s not complicated,” Viteri states. “The planets are aligning. We’re all here to hang and that’s how we sound when we play.”

- Brian Myszkowski facebook.com/JUMPphilly

DiNucci photo by Jared Gruen wald. Le Yikes Surf Club photo by Michael Bucher.

The Getaway Drivers

“I think Philly has just about the most impressive performing arts scene of any city that I’ve lived in and I’ve lived in a lot of cities,” DiNucci says. “I think that the kind of theater and performance art that gets done here is just amazing. I really wanted to be involved in that scene.”

Much of her game show winnings went to her own pursuits, notably getting a Ph.D. in English and performance theater but she also found a cause in supporting local performance arts.

She first got involved in producing after seeing actor, sound designer and writer James Sugg’s “The Sea,” a rock and roll opera about large bodies of water and the men whom they fascinate, which debuted at the Fringe Festival in 2006.

“She is one of those supporters who seems to be at every piece and she has a laugh that is unmissable,” says Sugg. “You know she is at the show without even seeing her.”

In 2007, DiNucci saw the show at Old Swede’s Church and approached him about buying the CD, except there had been no recording made. It is not unusual for someone to approach Sugg after a theater performance and suggest he make a recording of the music. People offer the suggestion for free but not the $10,000 to make that recording.

“But in this case, she did,” says Sugg. “She had won the mad cash on 'Jeopardy!' and she believed in the piece and said, ‘I want to help you do this.’”

DiNucci tried to broaden her scope in 2010 when she founded the Philadelphia Performing Arts Kitchen as a way of bringing funding and resources to projects that fell outside existing financial structures. The Kitchen supported a production of “Vainglorious” in 2012 but shortly thereafter, DiNucci was diagnosed with breast cancer. That pulled her away from the Performing Arts Kitchen and her involvement with the theater scene.

She finished treatment last year just in time for the "Jeopardy!" Battle of the Decades event and now, with a rogue streak of white cutting down the front of her black hair, the future is uncertain.

“I’m kind of in another one of those, ‘What am I going to do next?’ things,” she muses.

Reviving the Philadelphia Performing Arts Kitchen has occurred to her, because what she does know - and has known all along - is that she loves and wants to support the arts in Philly in her work. Though, she really enjoys making music and would love to have the chance to sing more jazz.

“I just need to find a piano to drape myself across,” she says.

Photo by Jessica Flynn.

Honest and Accelerated Beach Slang is relatively new on the scene but they are already getting a lot of attention.

The guys in Beach Slang are open to uncomfortable conversation. They’ll talk about how they can display their most emotional and vulnerable sides through lyrics. They can talk about how they had to write material and form a band dynamic while they were already on the media’s radar. They can talk about how they still get nervous getting on stage. They won’t, however, talk about their age, religion or politics.

Those topics are off the table.

Guitarist/vocalist/chief songwriter James Alex Snyder, formerly of Bethlehem-based band Weston, shares his time between Philadelphia and Easton and decided that this project would be an honest one.

“This was the first time I was like, ‘Oh, you know, I’m just going to wear my heart completely on my sleeve, just strip all of it down,’” he says, standing as the rest of the band sits on couches along the back wall of PhilaMOCA before a show.

Snyder’s voice is quiet and fast. It doesn’t quite have the rasp that comes out when he sings.

There’s earnestness and modesty behind what JUMPphilly.com

he says. Snyder sheds his reserved ways when there’s a guitar in hand. Anyone who has seen Beach Slang live might not think it was the same guy who leaves every bit of his energy on the stage, powerfully leading the charge of the song and laughing with his friends.

The band’s lyrics have a certain aesthetic that can be hard to pinpoint. They balance between self-doubt and vulnerability, with moments of triumph and comfort at the same time. The music itself recalls melodic ’90s alt-rock and emo. “[The lyrics are about] me and my friends and our weirdo, screwed up little lives together,” Snyder says. “I’m a horrible photographer. I can’t get anybody interested in reading a book. So I was like, ‘Well, if they’re songs, maybe that’s the best way I can remember my life and my friends.”

As the band puts it, Snyder writes the songs and then the rest of the members make it loud and it becomes Beach Slang. Originally made up of Snyder, bassist Ed McNulty (formerly in the band NONA) and drummer JP Flexner (formerly in the band Ex Friends), the group added Ruben Gallego (formerly in Glocca Morra) on second guitar after their first two EPs. From there, the songwriting process has gone smoothly, with two EPs released last year and their debut full length, The Things We Do To Find People Who Feel Like Us, due out this fall on Polyvinyl.

“There’s an ease with which we arrive at something that we’re happy with,” Flexner says.

“When we get in a room after James has worked on something, we seem to know pretty quickly

whether we’re on to something.”

They feel the hardest thing for all of them to overcome was handling a boost to popularity while they were still relative strangers. It has been an accelerated pace with the band already garnering major attention from both fellow artists and in the media, with outlets like Noisey and The AV Club singing their praises often.

“We grew up on television, you know?” Snyder says, comparing the band to child stars who grew up in the spotlight and never really got a chance to learn along the way. “We never had a chance to fall and embarrass ourselves. It was right away.

We were becoming friends in this. I met Ed and Ruben in this band already doing this. The band found its legs pretty quickly and everything was just kind of a crazy pressure cooker where we worked at an accelerated pace.”

“They’re at the top of the relatively newer Philly punk rock bands,” says Marco Florey, drummer of Philadelphia-based Spill, who shared a stage with Beach Slang this year in Baltimore. “They have a constantly upward trajectory, as well they should.

Seeing them and playing with them has validated that hype and made me a supporter of what they do.”

What they do is try to create a unique emotional experience—and whether that feeling is uncertainty in life or reveling in a packed basement with your best friends, it’s real to them and the fans.

“For better or for worse,” Snyder says. “Whether it connects or completely misses, I just want to do something really honest.” - Brendan Menapace

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The JUMP Off

Getting To The Gig Even after gigs at major venues, the majority of Philly bands do their own heavy-lifting, shuttling their gear from rehearsal space to venues in vans, cars, trucks or whatever they can find that will carry their worlds (and bandmates!) from place to place.

Our Rachel Del Sordo caught up with a few Philly acts, checked out their vehicles and talked to them about the art of transportation.

The members of Amanda X hauled their gear up a narrow staircase into an over-crowded parking lot for a gig at the First Unitarian Church. The band points out their van through the large crowd of people as the one with the tape on the roof. The Superweaks' Evan Barnard was filling in on drums for this show.

The Lawsuits' blue van is no stranger to adventure. The band has been trucking around the country for three years in this van. They arrived at the Greenfest Philly on South Street with all their gear, the full band and vocalist Vanessa Winters' dog Sadie.

Sometimes load in is easier said than done. Restorations showed up for their Water Front Session at Spruce Street Harbor Park, a venue with no place to park a van. “We are just gonna try and unload at the Hilton before they kick us out,� says lead singer Jo Loudon. The band, which tours around the world, quickly unloads their gear in the loading area of the adjacent hotel as security staff look on questioningly.

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Photos by Rachel Del Sordo.

For A Day Without Love’s Brian Walker, this Wednesday afternoon is just a normal day in the gig life. Over the last two years, Walker has played both solo and with a band. Tonight he is playing as a twopiece at The Fire. No matter how many people he is playing with, he can always count on his trusty minivan to get hime to the gig.

Roof Doctor played a house show in North Philadelphia on this night.

Their green van is their primary mode of transportation for getting around the region. It has been taken on the road by many of drummer Kevin Paschall's other projects and by a few of his friends. Roof Doctor has never formally gone on tour in this van. “The joke is on you,” Paschall states.

“We’ve never toured in this thing.”

Mumblr showed off their 1989 Dodge 350 after a recent gig at Ortlieb's.

Sadly, on their way home from a show in Middletown, Connecticut, the van died. The bandmates say they will always look fondly to their van, which took them to so many places.

JUMPphilly.com

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Connecting the Dots RECphilly aims to provide artists with the resources they need to succeed.

“Philly is and always has been a talent town but it isn’t an industry town,” says William Toms, one of the co-founders of RECphilly, while leaning forward in his seat. “There’s lots of great music organizations in Philly that have pull but they don’t communicate with each other.”

Inside the sun-lit rooms of Venturef0rth, a collaborative workspace near the Electric Factory, RECphilly runs their operation. Headed up by 23-year-olds Toms and Dave Silver, RECphilly is a music incubator that they were inspired to create after seeing the slump Philadelphia’s music industry fell into.

“Philadelphia and Detroit used to compete to be one and two in the music industry.”

Silver says frustratedly, his watch catching the sunlight, noting how the Sigma Sound Studios and Philly International Records buildings were closed, with plans to become apartment complexes.

“We were seeing historic Philly shut down and it inspired us to be the change we wanted to see in the Philly area.”

Silver and Toms both speak with confidence because they understand the issues at hand. One of the major problems with Philadelphia’s music industry is that talent develops here, then leaves. Musicians and producers flee the city for places such as New York or Los Angeles, where there is an industry that can support them. RECphilly is working to keep these artists in the city.

“RECphilly has done remarkable things to help me, amongst others, establish ground here in Philadelphia,” says West Philly rapper Armani White.

Since the official launch in January 2015, the organization has become a matchmaker and an information clearinghouse of services in Philadelphia that musicians might not know exists or have trouble finding on their own.

“For musicians, connecting the dots is the hardest part and that’s why RECphilly exists,” Silver explains.

“The problem we saw was structure,” agrees Toms. “It wasn’t easy for musicians to access resources they needed, from recording studios to entertainment lawyers to everything in between. We needed a system that was more sustainable.”

RECphilly creates deals with local businesses that are beneficial to everyone.

“We represent a boat-load of Philadelphia small businesses,” Silver says.

“We’re able to offer artists different budgets and different niches of services customized to them. ” Artists who work with businesses through RECphilly receive discounted

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rates for the services in exchange for the extra clientele that RECphilly can connect the business to.

“They saw the problem too,” Toms says. “We just wanted to push extra clientele to their businesses. Then, we can take the weight off the shoulders of the musician, other than creating the music.”

The infrastructure RECphilly has built connects artists and businesses in Philadelphia, connections each may not have previously been aware of.

“Now they can come to Philly and be tied to an organization that can help get them to mainstream outlets and assist with funding and distribution,” explains Toms.

The list of businesses and organizations run the gamut from law firms like Offit Kurman to tour DJs like DJ Shiz Lo, public relations firm Montauk Music and local artist development coach Owen Brown.

“RECphilly has kept me involved all the way from the smallest events to the biggest shows and always made sure I had a comfortable position in a tight spot," White says.

Milton, a 22-year-old R&B singer and rapper who has teamed up with RECphilly, says working with the organization has been an unforgettable experience.

“They've been a mediator for me as an artist from the music into the business world,” says Milton. “They helped me find an outlet to plug my energy into by showing me the proper channels for my music to flow and create a future.”

RECphilly not only provides the networking support for musicians, but can provide technical support as well.

“We have a space called the Rec Room,” Toms notes. “It’s all of the tools necessary to create audio and visual content at a low cost. It’s a multidiscipline art studio with an audio booth, photo and video backdrops.”

“The incubation process happens from the Rec Room into our network,” Silver continues. “We open that up to local musicians, offer those things and then the process happens. The gears turn for everybody involved.”

In the near future, RECphilly wants to expand their available resources for artists, but they also want to make a difference in another way.

“There is a huge opportunity in our business model to target the underprivileged youth, to tap into their talents and help them utilize it positively,” Silver says.

“The opportunity to make a difference - there is one of the burning passions behind RECphilly,” Toms adds. “First we have to find the money but then we want to have a whole branch to target youth in the city.”

RECphilly recently traveled to Atlanta for the All Three Coasts event, known as A3C, the largest hip-hop conference and festival in the nation. But it was their success at the 2015 South by Southwest festival that was a testament to their effectiveness and impact.

“It was such an exhilarating feeling but a roller coaster ride to put together,” Silver says with a laugh. Months of emailing, calling and pitching their proposal culminated in putting 40 people on a plane from Philly to Austin for a Philadelphia showcase at the festival. “It was the first time Philly was ever represented completely at SXSW. Chicago and all these different cities had their own stages, but there was no Philly one until this year. We got a call saying that we can do it all again next year.”

“It's so refreshing to see it grow so fast because with the strong team it has behind it, that's still continuously growing,” says White. “It's easy to see that this could be a big thing for the city, akin to a Philly International even.” - Jennifer Granato facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Photo by Michael Bucher.

The JUMP Off

This Place Rocks

Feeling The Fillmore?

After years of planning and millions of dollars spent on construction, The Fillmore opened its Fishtown doors in October with a concert featuring Philadelphia’s own Hall & Oates.

We spoke to people connected to and possibly affected by the complex with a 2,500-person main room and a 450-person space called The Foundry.

- Chris Malo "The Fillmore was a fantastic experience and a great addition to Philadelphia entertainment scene."

- Daryl Hall "It's cool. Philadelphia is our spot considering it's where we're all from. We're excited to be the first ones to do an official show in there... It's cool to be a part of something new for Philadelphia."

- Pat Troxell from Creepoid (the first band to play The Foundry) "While it’s exciting to witness such burgeoning growth in the Fishtown neighborhood, this is just another step in the cultural cycle that every major city is a part of.

Believe it or not, when I first moved here, most of the punks and artists lived in Old City. That was where First Friday originated. The area flourished artistically, which attracted more corporate businesses and investors. All of the artists moved from Old City to the warehouses of Northern Liberties and the same cycle occurred. You can witness the same thing happening in Fishtown.

My 'inner punk rock kid' hates it when corporations enter an artistic area but having an opinion about The Fillmore is a moot point. These changes are an inevitability. If not The Fillmore, then it would have been another type of venue.

On the plus side, it gives the area a large capacity music venue. I mean, shit. It could have been Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar & Grill."

- John Redden owner of The Barbary

JUMPphilly.com

Photos by Michael Bucher.

"This had to go through zoning and the community had to vote on it. The community voted overwhelmingly to allow this to happen.

There are concerns because it is right across the street from where residents live on Allen Street and Richmond Street but there were also concerns when Sugarhouse [Casino] came in because residents are there.

This seems to be setting up as an entertainment district area going down Frankford Avenue. I know our Economic Development Department is really happy about that. I think it's all good."

- Sandy Salzman executive director of New Kensington Community Development Corporation “I am excited to have a new live music venue in the city. I continue to work with The Fillmore to be a good community partner to the near neighbors and create a positive atmosphere for the patrons and the residents alike.”

- Mark Squilla First District City Councilman “It's an honor to have the keys to such an amazing venue. The economical impact to the neighborhood that The Fillmore is able to accomplish is something we are very proud of.

Having one of the most flexible venues in the music business will ensure that the city has a new ‘Entertainment Complex.’

The Fillmore is the only venue in the city to find a great selection of food, while seeing your favorite artist and having the opportunity to hang out before the show in the Ajax Hall.”

- Jason Bray general manager (Philadelphia market) Live Nation “The Fillmore and the other national chains coming to our small, unique and cool area destroys a vibrant and growing mixed-use residential community that is filled with wonderful small venues like Johnny Brenda's and Kung Fu Necktie.

I would encourage lovers of the Philly music scene to take your business elsewhere and join us in opposing this poorly sited megaplex.”

- Jethro Heiko neighbor "I was there when there was no roof on the building and we were talking with Live Nation from the get-go, which is nice to be in on the ground level of the whole plan. They wanted it to be the best amongst their venues and in Philly.

The Fillmore in Philly is not only the debut of the Fillmore itself but also a new system from us. That is the main left-right array system. It's very powerful and clear, with a nice emphasis on clarity on the mid and high frequencies with a big, full, punchy low end. It is a (sound) system that will work for any style of music and covers the main music hall very well with distributed speaker systems throughout the venue."

- Josh Sadd vice president and chief engineer for Clair Brothers

"It's great to have a new room in the city. I have some friends at the Live Nation office in Philly and I'm happy for them. I was only there for a few hours on opening night but it seemed pretty cool. They have a slightly different approach than we do with our venues but I'm sure this will be a wonderful addition to Philly."

- Sean Agnew R5 Productions

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Photo by Chris Fascenelli.

The Gear Whisperer Alex Santilli and the crew at Spice House Sound built a studio and now they are building a legacy.

Fishtown’s Spice House Sound is quickly becoming a go-to recording studio for rising indie acts from Philly. Much of this is due in part to the genius of managing partner Alex Santilli, who has dedicated much of his life to creating the perfect sound. This sound can be found throughout Spice House Sound thanks to the meticulous design and engineering which Santilli had his hand in from the very beginning.

Spice House Sound was originally located in the basement of a South Philly spice warehouse, the place Santilli got his start by fixing equipment and later engineering sound sessions. Not long after, Santilli became the lead engineer. During the stint in South Philly, Santilli got word that the operation had to vacate the space being rented.

“We got kicked out of our building, essentially,” he says. “The building got sold and we didn’t know it. It was an interesting adventure.”

They were originally told that they would have a month to vacate the premise but Santilli says they ended up having six months of transitory time to find a new space.

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After that six months of looking around, Santilli and the Spice House Sound family found the Fishtown space that they now call home. From the very beginning, Santili was deeply involved in the renovation, alongside partners the WaltersStoryk Design Group, of the one-time carriage house into the state-of-the-art recording studio it is now, even down to the architectural design.

“I tried to design an acoustical system based on the mathematical principle pi … it's an infinite number and it goes on forever,” he says. “It’s in all living things. It's in acoustics. It's in everything.

It’s in the space between this bone and this bone.

It’s mathematical but it's also kind of mystical and people attach all sorts of interesting things to it. I approached it from an acoustic and mathematical standpoint. I made every measurement that I possibly could based that ratio.”

Santilli is a self-proclaimed gear nerd. People like John Storyk, who partnered with Santilli on the design of the studio, call him the “gear whisperer.” From a young age, Santilli has dedicated much of his time to understanding the dynamics of sound, occupying himself by taking apart audio consoles, tape machines and other sound equipment. These skills have developed so much over the years that Santilli is able to take pieces of old equipment, then retrofit and redesign them with modern high-quality parts to create something new - and better sounding than anything you could buy. The access to old equipment in the studio is complemented by the

capability for artists to record full analog, full digital or any hybrid in between.

“The level of commitment to audio - and great audio - is what separates it from everywhere else,” says Dave Pettit, a Spice House Sound producer.

“What we are doing here is breeding the next generation - so another two or three years and who we’re working with are going to start replacing who is out now,” says Santilli. “We will start building our reputation from the ground up just like we did with the studio.”

For the year and change that Spice House Sound has been in operation in Fishtown, Santilli and crew have been working with such up-andcomers as Flyermile and Binary Sea, and are currently in production with prominent locals including Cape Wrath, Among Criminals and Vita and the Woolf. Santilli says that the laidback atmosphere that is maintained at the studio makes the artists feel as if they are in a stress-free environment.

“The most important thing is that we have so many happy clients and that we really care,” Santilli says. “It’s fun. People describe studio sessions as tortuous sometimes. People have a bad time, and they are scared by it and don't want to go back to studios. A lot of those people who are unhappy come here because I’m a friendly, nice guy and they are so surprised that they have a ton of fun while they are recording. It’s a painless process and we get great results way quicker.”

- Lissa Alicia facebook.com/JUMPphilly

This Place Rocks Photos by Jason Melcher.

Arts in Progress Rittenhouse Soundworks in Germantown is still being renovated but it's already becoming a magnet for creative types.

Jim Hamilton appreciates the creative process.

He sees the value in creating music organically in a room with other people. The beauty in music is hearing the time, effort and collaboration within.

His studio in Germantown, a work in progress in itself, reflects that.

Hamilton, 57, of Germantown, explains the history of his new studio space on Rittenhouse Street—the aptly named Rittenhouse Soundworks—as he opens the door to reveal a large empty garage.

“This building was built by Chrysler in the turn of the last century,” Hamilton says, gesturing to the expansive room. “So, where it once was a symbol of the industrial revolution, now it’s a symbol of manufacturing art.”

Hamilton speaks very softly, as if he’s trying not to wake someone up. His eyes widen and he begins to speak with passion when he gets onto a topic that interests him. He says he can go on for hours about things like percussionists and the evolution of musical styles across the world.

Every now and then, when he references an old piece of music, he’ll mimic a saxophone melody or pat out a drum rhythm on his knees.

Hamilton grew up around the arts. While coming of age in Kensington, his father was a professional tap dancer, so Hamilton grew up in a dance studio and got his own start in music tap dancing.

The library in his studio, filled wall-to-wall with records, is where interns will eventually be working on radio broadcasts out of the studio.

Hamilton says the room is a recreation of the environment he grew up in. His father sold turntables and taught tap, with renowned dancers from all over the world coming into his family’s studio to teach.

Hamilton has a wealth of musical history knowledge. He knows about how Appalachian dance meshed with a Cherokee flat foot dance and evolved into tap, and how tap is the reason the drum set exists in America. He knows about how old Irish rhythms made their way to the rest of the world and created new styles. He rattles off countless musicians many have never heard of.

And he says if you want to learn about history, you follow the music.

“You don’t really learn about it in school, because they don’t really teach culture,” he adds.

“Information isn’t knowledge. It’s how you connect that gives you the awareness.”

With so much creativity and encouragement in his family, Hamilton says that the arts became a way of learning about himself.

“My parents instilled in [my siblings and I] this mentality with talent, you can go anywhere,” he says. “So it was kind of expected that you would find out who you were as an individual and then do that. So it wasn’t said, but it was implied, that you were going to find your place through this improvisation.”

JUMPphilly.com

The main recording studio at Rittenhouse Soundworks is one of the largest rooms in Philadelphia, in terms of open floor plan— approximately 5,000 square feet. Behind the studio, the control room has a mixing board that was used for the last three Sly and the Family Stone records. Thanks to detailed schematics, Hamilton and fellow Rittenhouse producer and engineer Brian Boland were able to fix the console themselves.

Though Rittenhouse Soundworks is still in the works, the studio is already drumming up business. Hamilton and Boland just finished recording a classical ensemble of seven musicians for a production of "Peter Rabbit Tales" at the Enchantment Theater Company, composed by Charlie Gilbert, who is the composer in residence for the company. The sound of French horn and trumpet bleeds into the room from the mixing room downstairs. It’s one of the more complete areas of the studio.

“It’s been great to be a part of the whole experience [of working at the studio,]” Boland says. “Jim and I always used to talk about it, and then he pulled the trigger and got the building and kind of lured me back from Los Angeles.”

Boland had been in Los Angeles for 10 years before moving back last October to work with Hamilton. He’s playing back takes from the Peter Rabbit project to Gilbert, who’s sitting with stacks

of sheet music in front of him.

“I was excited to work here, first of all because I was completely captivated by Jim and his vision of the place when I came here,” Gilbert says. “I was really jazzed and wanted to be a part of it. And it offered us a big room where we could have seven musicians. I was looking for a big room with a good acoustic sound, and this really fit the bill.”

Hamilton smiles when he hears this. It’s clear that the studio is truly a labor of love to him. He does it to be a part of the creative process and make something special.

Going forward, the studio will be used to broadcast three online radio shows under the name Tension Rod Radio, named for Hamilton’s record label. The first release on his label was a percussion duo out of Rio de Janeiro.

Hamilton devoted his space and his time to something he believes in. He wants to use his facility to teach younger generations how to create something organic through art.

“You got empty chairs in the studio? There should be kids there, learning, so they can understand that this is how you be a producer,” he says. “We’re creating an environment here that supports learning. We learn from each other because everybody trusts and nurtures each other. And people come here to be a better them. You’re here because, whatever it is that you do, you’re here to give that away.”

- Brendan Menapace

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Photos by Mina Lee.

This Place Rocks

A New Home For Jazz Heritage in Northern Liberties brings together food, drinks and live music to create a comfortable, enjoyable atmosphere.

Sitting on a black leather chair surrounded by red cedar walls, Terrance Leach, part owner of the restaurant and live jazz bar Heritage, begins to tell his story – one that starts 13 years ago after Leach moved from Newport, Rhode Island to South Philadelphia.

Leach met business partner Jason Evenchik while working as a waiter and bartender.

Evenchik asked him to be the general manager of Time, a whiskey bar, restaurant and live music venue he was opening in Center City. That was more than seven years ago, before Time had lines out the door on weekends and Center City was in its nascent stages of the booming nightlife scene.

The struggle to find talent was daunting.

“I really had to go out looking for dudes,” Leach says. “There weren’t a lot of places to hear live music like there is now.”

However, as Center City evolved, Time went from having bands play three to four times a week to seven days a week. Currently they have two bands per day, every day.

“Now I can build a band if I want to,” says Leach.

Having pieced together the right blend of music, food and drinks at Time, Leach and Evenchik applied this model to Heritage, located in Northern Liberties, which they opened this past April.

“People are drawn to the diversity,” says Maddy La Voe, who has been going to both Time and Heritage since their openings. “Because they combine many ideas in one building, there is something for everyone. Plus, there aren’t many places to hear live jazz anymore.”

For Evenchik, offering live music as opposed to using an iPod or records was never in question.

“There's no comparison,” he says. “I listen to music constantly but nothing is as moving as a live performance. There are shows that bring people to tears and that is something you cannot get, typically, from a recording.”

For alcohol enthusiasts, Heritage offers nearly 100 types of whiskey and 36 draft beers. For foodies, the dishes utilize local, fresh, seasonal ingredients with a menu that changes weekly.

For those seeking a venue with sound quality, the Heritage owners built a wooden clamshell shaped stage surrounded by cedar walls and sprayed the

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ceiling with K-13 sound-proofing, allowing each note to travel the entire length of the room.

“We don’t want people to come just for the music,” Leach says. “That would defeat the purpose of having a huge dining room. We want people to come for dinner and drinks, have a conversation, turn their chairs around if they want to and enjoy the music.”

What Leach and Evenchik create are not just music venues, but atmospheres. To fulfill their vision, they needed music that was neither loud and bustling nor sleep inducing. They found their answer in jazz, funk and soul.

“Jazz allows for the opportunity to turn it up and really get moving with organs, horns and vocals,” says Evenchik. “It’s a music that approaches funk and what we call the Philly sound.”

The “Philly sound” Evenchik refers to continuously echoes within the walls of Heritage and Time. It is produced by the local bands Leach booked years ago that still perform at the clubs today.

“I get calls from people all around the world asking to play because they heard the words ‘music venue,’” says Leach. “But if I were to bring in a bunch of new people in one month, all the people who have been loyal to me for years, all the local musicians, it’s like I’d be firing them. They wouldn’t get their gigs.”

This loyalty paired with family-style treatment is what Leach says separates their restaurants from other music joints in Philadelphia. He admits that while he may not pay the bands as much as other places, he covers their bar tabs and everyone is viewed as a family member. In addition to family treatment, the bands are given stylistic freedom.

“I don’t micromanage the musicians because I’m not a musician,” Leach says. “I understand music and I love it, but I hire them because they know what they’re doing. They’re the talent – you have to let them do their thing.”

Another significant factor that keeps bands returning is an appreciation for sound quality.

“We’re always getting compliments on the way our rooms sound,” says Leach. One saxophone musician, Tom Moon, who plays for them at both places but got his start at Time, continuously says how he loves the room.

“So eventually we named his band Tom Moon’s Love Room,” says Leach.

Looking back seven years, Leach never thought he would be recognized for his live music offerings. His goal at the time was to work with Evenchik to create an establishment filling a void.

“Years ago you couldn’t find a whiskey bar, restaurant and live music venue all wrapped up in one,” Leach says.

Today, Leach has a phone full of contact information for local jazz musicians like Luke O’ Reilly, Ernest Stuart, Tom Moon and Lucas Brown.

Though there was no master plan or personal ties to jazz, this music genre has become an important pillar in the pair’s success. Symbolizing this is the chandelier that hangs in Heritage. It is constructed of old brass instruments Leach and Evenchik collected from various pawnshops and bids off eBay. “I want to continue expanding it by ceremonially adding things to it, like on our one year anniversary, add a trombone, kind of like a Christmas tree,” says Leach with a laugh. “Who - Hannah Kubik knows how big it will get.” facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Photo by G.W. Miller III.

Music & Politics

Focused on Philadelphia Melissa Murray Bailey is not a lifelong politician. In fact, the Republican nominee for mayor of Philadelphia isn’t even a lifelong Republican.

Returning to the area after working abroad for Universum, a firm that brands employers to prospective employees, the 36-year-old Bailey is trying to rebrand and introduce herself to her hopeful future employers: the residents of the city of Philadelphia.

Our Chris Malo sat down with the candidate to see how that is going.

You were born in New Jersey and before moving to Philly, you were living and working abroad.

Why here? Why now?

Growing up in South Jersey, Philadelphia is the metropolis you are always looking toward. All of your class trips are here. Everybody successful you know lives in Philadelphia. So, it was always a natural draw.

When we were in Singapore and our daughter was born, we had a decision to make on where we are going to raise our family. We evaluated all the different places we could go but Philadelphia seemed like coming home.

The best thing about Philadelphia is ...

I love the hard-working mentality. People don’t want to get a raw deal. They want to fight for what they deserve, and I love that about it. It is so hardcore, hard working, gritty and I think that gives the city a lot of character.

What are some of your favorite Philly artists or venues?

My favorite venue is Festival Pier. My sister just got me turned on to War On Drugs. She’s really the music person in our family, so she’s always telling us who some of the hot new bands are.

How would your skills from Universum translate to being mayor of Philadelphia?

The things you need to run a city? You need general leadership and you also need management. Those JUMPphilly.com

two things are quite different, and then you need experience making hard decisions, prioritizing, strategizing. They are not skills that you learn while you are in the legislature. The experience I have at Universum - and prior to that, is all about setting a path forward for a company. So, the roles that I have chosen in my career have been about building or turning around.

Also, as a leader within a company, you’re not always going to have the approval of your board of directors. So, you have to think, “How do I create a strategy that is going to get buy-in?” And that’s the same thing with city council. You have to create a strategy that is going to get buy-in or else we are never going to get anything done.

You switched parties, from Democrat to Republican. Do you find there is distrust with the party or the people the party represents?

I think when you are serving constituents, it doesn’t matter what party they’re in. We need to take politics out of public service. That’s what I am really trying to do in the campaign.

I’m not just meeting with Republicans. I’m not just meeting with Democrats. I’m trying to meet with community members. And that community member group is a mix of people. When people are talking about moving their community forward, they’re not talking in political lines. I think, too much, we talk about, “Well Republicans think this,” or, “Democrats think this.”

I think it’s about what do we want to get done and who is the person that is going to deliver on what they say.

What are the things that as a lifelong Democrat you would say to the Republican Party to make them say, “Hey, that’s a good fit for us?”

As we started to come together, it was about treating people of Philadelphia with respect.

The political class of Philadelphia has gotten so far out of balance with how they are not serving the people, how they are not talking to the people, how they are just spending money on everything and they continue to come to the taxpayer and ask for more.

As a citizen, I was getting really frustrated. I don’t mind paying taxes but what I do want to know is where is that money being used and is that money being used in the best interest of the people of the city? So, that is where I really represent the Republican, conservative views.

If you don’t win the election, will you continue to stay involved in politics?

I don’t know. I didn’t do this to get on a political career track. I did this because I saw a real need. I thought my experiences could help.

I’m really focused on Philadelphia and building a better Philadelphia, ending the cycle of poverty, creating opportunity for people. What happens after that, I don’t know.

I don’t know how I could have seen all of the things I’ve seen in the last nine months and turn my back on it. Whether that is through politics or not, I’m still unsure.

As a woman and being new to the city, new to politics, with limited political connections and running as a Republican for mayor in a city with a heavy registered Democratic voter base, with all that some may say work against you, by chance, you aren’t a Dallas Cowboys fan too are you?

No! I’m a lifetime Eagles fan.

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Music & Education

The Student Becomes the Teacher Joseph Conyers graduated from the Curtis Institue of Music, one of the most selective schools in the world. Now he teaches there.

Joseph Conyers has come a long way, from a 5-year-old living in Savannah, Georgia and plucking away on piano to the assistant principal bassist in the Philadelphia Orchestra.

“My mother wanted all her kids to grow up playing classical music,” he explains. “She’s an amateur singer herself. That was my introduction to the symphonic world.”

Conyers picked up the bass at 11 and when time for college came around, the Curtis Institute of Music was on his application list.

“I never even heard of Curtis until the summer of my junior year,” Conyers notes. He applied and was accepted on his first try. Luckily there were two openings in the notoriously small bass program.

The Curtis Institute of Music, located on Rittenhouse Square at 18th and Locust streets, was founded in 1924 and has since become one of the most prestigious music conservatories in the entire world - in part, because of their selective admissions.

“This year, Curtis has 173 students enrolled from 20 different countries,” says Jennifer Kallend, Curtis’ senior director of public relations and patron engagement. “Enrollment is limited to the number of musicians needed for a symphony orchestra, opera department and select programs in piano, guitar, composition, conducting, organ and harpsichord.”

Curtis has a shockingly low acceptance rate. At 4 percent, as tracked by U.S. News and World Report, it’s one of the lowest acceptance rates of any institute of higher education in the country.

That puts current enrollment numbers around 155 students enrolled at Curtis with approximately 105 in the orchestra. Since 1928, tuition has been free for every student.

“Since Curtis is so competitive to get into, and because it is so small, the talent level is really uniform,” says Daniel Matsukawa, principal bassoonist of the Philadelphia Orchestra.

“Everyone there is quite excellent already but it’s never snobby. There’s a sense of good pride.”

Matsukawa, a resident of Mount Airy and a graduate of Curtis, now works as a professor at the school, teaching bassoon and woodwinds chamber music. As a student, he attended The Juilliard School for two years while waiting for an opening in Curtis’ bassoon program.

“Juilliard to me was really competitive and not

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in a good way,” Matsukawa explains. “It really felt like people were just out for themselves. At Curtis, it felt like, ‘Welcome, you’re part of the family now.’”

“Curtis is an incubator for the most protected and nurturing growth of the most talented musicians the school can find,” Conyers adds. “To my understanding, the Curtis orchestra didn’t even perform for the public until the 1980s.”

Today, the level of world-class talent in the heart of downtown, nestled among the city’s trendiest eateries and boutiques, is right under people’s noses, unbeknownst to some but not to all. The institute can seem like a world-renowned secret, at least to people here in the city.

“It doesn’t need to be but for some reason, it’s a well-kept secret and a treasure we have right here,” says Matsukawa.

“It’s probably less so now because Curtis has tried to become more global but I still think that most Philadelphians are not aware of this gem on Rittenhouse Square,” says Yumi Kendall, assistant principal cellist of the Philadelphia Orchestra. “Which, in a way, is so Philly-style, un-self-consciously awesome.”

Kendall herself is a Curtis alumna.

“It’s absolutely unique in the world,” she continues, “and while the world dilutes itself with globalization, I feel that Curtis, and institutions like it, are ever more relevant and necessary.”

The education that students receive at Curtis also set it apart from other conservatories.

“What makes Curtis unique is literally about discovering the human element of being a musician,” Conyers says. “It’s about the stories we can tell through music, how you can pull at the heartstrings.”

Conyers, now 34 and living in Center City, graduated with a bachelor’s degree in double bass performance in 2004. In addition to his career with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Conyers also teaches a studio of private students and at various workshops throughout the year. He is an intense man to talk to, each word more passionate and excited than the one before. He credits his development as an educator to the focus Curtis places on artistry.

“Looking for the message of music is something I teach with almost a responsibility of having to pass this information along to my students,” he says, noting with a laugh that if students aren’t

even able to play the notes, they are free to study elsewhere. “That’s a bit of a jest but also in seriousness. I want my students to get the best out of their journeys as a musician and discover what they can contribute to the world through their music.”

Helping students discover their potential as musicians is something important to Conyers, who devotes much of his time to public outreach.

He is the director of Project 440, a non-profit organization dedicated to teaching young people about the importance of social entrepreneurship and community service through their music.

Project 440 works to develop what Conyers refers to as the “21st century artist-teacher,” or someone who is a very skilled artist but also uses their gift to empower and inspire others.

“The worlds between performing artists and educators have been historically separate,” says Conyers. “We want to start to combine these worlds.”

On June 18, Conyers debuted as the new music director and conductor for the All Philadelphia High School Orchestra, an organization that draws high school musicians from all around the city and rehearses throughout the year to perform an annual concert in the Kimmel Center’s Verizon Hall.

Project 440 is working especially close with the All Philadelphia High School Orchestra, also known as All City, to help them with college and career preparedness.

“Right now, I believe the counselor-to-student ratio in Philadelphia is around 1-to-560 students, which is pretty abysmal,” Conyers notes. “We’re hoping the students in All City will get the skills and resources they need to make college and career choices.”

Curtis is also playing a role alongside Project 440 in furthering the development of the All City program. Curtis hosts All City students once a year for a program called The Curtis Retreat, where the students spend the day at Curtis working through music alongside Curtis students and faculty. Conyers hopes these partnerships will continue and grow in the future.

“One of my goals through these partnerships is that we can all work together and make it so that every child in Philadelphia has access to music education,” he says excitedly. “It sounds crazy, but - Jennifer Granato why not try?” facebook.com/JUMPphilly

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Photo by xST / Shawn Theodore.

Cover Story

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facebook.com/JUMPphilly

THE

LONG-TERM SIDE JAWN Lithuania began when Eric Slick and Dominic Angellela met at the University of the Arts a decade ago. They put the band aside as each worked on other projects. Now, joined by Ricardo Lagomasino, they are finally dedicating time to their passion project.

Story by Tyler Horst.

Photos by Michael Bucher.

E

ric Slick is opening for his own band. It's the night of Lithuania's record release show at Boot & Saddle and Slick is performing double duty as the bassist for Anomie, another Philly act who takes the stage first.

It might seem like a strange choice to volunteer for an earlier set on such a big night for your band but Slick has been putting other projects before Lithuania for a long time.

“Are you guys excited for Lithuania?”

Anomie frontwoman Rachel Browne asks the audience. “Tonight they're celebrating the release of their new record.”

The crowd cheers.

“Ten years,” Slick says to himself, just off-mic. “Ten years...”

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n a weekday afternoon, at a table in Reanimator Coffee in Olde Kensington, Slick starts to get excited as he talks. He's a very mild-mannered guy, so his energy comes out through hand gestures rather than raising the volume of his voice. Today, Slick is discussing Lithuania and that's something that he doesn't normally get to talk about.

Seated around the table are his friends and Lithuania bandmates Dominic Angelella and Ricardo Lagomasino but these three are also all bandmates in other projects. At another point in time, this could just as easily have been a

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meeting for DRGN King or Hop Along. Today, though, it's all about Lithuania.

And it's about time.

“Lithuania was the cool, almost joke-y thing we would talk about and occasionally write songs and play shows,” says Angelella, whose uber mellow demeanor contrasts Slick's nervous energy. “But it was like a secret. It wasn't a real band yet.”

The guys in Lithuania have been making music for a long time, just not always as Lithuania. Collectively, they're a sort of underground force in the Philadelphia music scene, appearing as key players in bands that ended up gaining more notoriety than Lithuania.

It's sort of funny then - but not surprising - that when they started getting things rolling in earnest within the past two years that a lot of the press about Lithuania referred to the band as, “Eric Slick of Dr. Dog's new side project.”

B

ut “side project” is a difficult term to use for a band that started 10 years ago, pre-dating any of the projects that its members are known for. Lithuania was originally a two-piece recording project that started when Slick and Angelella met in a music theory class at University of the Arts.

Angelella, a Baltimore native, got the feeling even before meeting Slick that

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he was different from the other squares in their class.

“He had the hair that I have now,” says Angelella, gesturing with a fistful of his shoulder-length locks. “I looked across the room at him and said to myself, 'That dude looks like a freak.'”

They started talking bands, each sizing up the other's tastes, and immediately bonded over a mutual adoration of bands like Hüsker Dü and Lightning Bolt.

They started making music together in the same raw, crunchy vein as those bands, but their musical curiosity led them in many different directions and to many other projects, sometimes with the same people.

“For both of them, in their professional working lives, [Lithuania] was their escape,” says Brendan Mulvihill, who has written and performed music with Angelella in DRGN King and with Slick in Norwegian Arms.

Mulvihill says that even while the guys could put their all into a certain project, they still always had more left over that they needed to pour into another outlet. When Mulvihill learned that Slick and Angelella were going all in with Lithuania, he knew only good things would come. “[Lithuania] puts them in a situation where they allow themselves to push their boundaries and experiment,” says Mulvihill. “It's really beautiful to see two friends come together and persevere on a project that's really just a celebration of their ability to work together in such a beautiful way.”

A

ny sense of urgency about the band has disappeared in Slick and Angelella’s 10 solid years as musicians They've learned that slow and steady is an okay way to go. “[Lithuania] has been the focus for so long, it just exists,” says Angelella, referring to a three-year period in which the project lay completely dormant. “We've already been a band that does nothing.”

After letting their shared ideas marinate for so long, Slick and Angelella decided to get cooking. When they made the move to cut a record in 2014, they had a deep history of ideas and friendship to draw from. The result was the aptly titled Hardcore Friends, recorded in a four-day blast at The Headroom studio in East Kensington.

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34

ithuania played its last show as a two-piece at Kung Fu Necktie, in the middle of recording their LP. The economy of playing as a duo gave way to its limitations, and after a set beleaguered by technical

malfunctions, Slick and Angelella decided it was time to bring another member on to help things run more smoothly.

Luckily, Lagomasino was right there in the crowd.

“I thought it was an awesome show,” Lagomasino says with a laugh.

After Slick and Angelella's time in the studio was completed, Lagomasino took his place behind the drum kit and Slick transitioned to guitar, where he could be a more traditional frontman. With the aid of some technical wizardry, Slick does double duty as guitar and bass. He plays through a splitter that sends a signal from his guitar to both a bass and guitar amplifier.

“I'm trying to invent a new way of playing for myself,” Slick says.

Being able to do more with less is something of a core value for the group at this point. It's what's allowed them to remain invested in the project for so long, and also what lets them keep going even in the face of what for other bands can be a crippling disaster.

While on the road with mewithoutYou, Lithuania and their touring buddies in the band Foxing had a trailer full of gear stolen the day before the tour’s final show.

Foxing had to drop out of the last performance but Lithuania was able to soldier on with gear borrowed from mewithoutYou. It was heartbreaking to lose so much so quickly but also a reminder of how their high-energy approach can defy technical limitations.

“I write songs based on knowing strings could break at any moment,” says Angelella.

“We've got to be able to just plug in and play wherever we are,” Slick agrees.

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o r t u n a t e l y, nothing breaks during their performance for the release of Hardcore Friends. Slick and Angelella haven't stopped smiling all night. When they take breaks between songs, it's only to thank the crowd for being there to support what they've been preparing for a decade to share.

With a record under their belts and a solid three-piece lineup, Lithuania is ready for phase two, only 10 years later. Slick says they're looking forward to writing new material with Lagomasino, and dedicating more time, energy and focus to the project.

“In the back of our minds we have always been like, Lithuania is our band,” Slick says. “It's not a side project. It's what was born out of our friendship.”

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Photos by Rachel Del Sordo.

Cover Story

ROCK STARS AND ROADIES: “Not too many people can say they own their dream car,” Ricardo Lagomasino states as he and his bandmates pack up his Honda Element after a gig opening for The Sidekicks at PhilaMOCA. “I can say that.”

Getting gear (and bandmates!) into tour vans can be a nightmare, a giant game of Tetris. But the guys from Lithuania say Lagomasino's Element works perfectly for now.

- Rachel Del Sordo

JUMP photographer Rachel Del Sordo spent several weeks watching Philly acts do the not-so-glamorous work of transporting their equipment to and from shows. See more of her photo series on pages 22 and 23.

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Cover Story

36

JUMPphilly.com

THE

MADNESS OF

MINKA Story by Brianna Spause.

Photos by Charles Shan Cerrone.

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Cover Cover Story Story

I

t’s National Tequila Day, and for the boys of Minka, that’s cause for celebration. With burritos and a bottle of El Jimador Gold in hand, the funky four-piece make their way over to Bardascino Park, a shaded little South Philly spot on 10th and Carpenter streets.

Fresh out of a typical songwriting session where Legos were used as inspiration and ideas were tested out on an audience of plastic snakes, spiders and dinosaurs, the guys relax before their next gig.

Between shots straight out of the bottle, memory-soaked laughter tells the story of how they all ended up together. It goes a little something like this: a Craigslist ad landed frontman Ari Rubin and guitarist Ian Brick on a reggae tour in 2012 and something just clicked. They initially tried to start Minka with a dude whose arms became paralyzed in a freak sleeping accident, creating a need for some new talent. After humorously watching Rubin absolutely sabotage a live show with some side project, Max Perla was sold and slid in behind the drum kit. Bassist Joe Flack jokes that he made it on the team for being a “warm body with two working arms.”

The rest is history, marked with a few footnotes: weird, loud and most likely naked.

Rubin, better known as Dick, isn’t shy when it comes to entertaining an audience. He fondly recalls stripping during 90 percent of shows in Minka’s early days.

“Ari likes to expose himself,” Flack says as Rubin nods approvingly. “It always started with the shirt, the belt, the socks. Always, the socks get thrown at me for some reason. I’m just trying to hold it down back there and I’m getting socks thrown at me. Then the pants come off. But he’s never gotten beyond the underwear.”

“That’s not true,” Rubin adds confidently, recalling that night at Bob & Barbara’s when the button over his fly went missing and the whole crowd got a revue.

Rubin’s unabashed stage presence leaves the rest of the band wondering if he’ll get naked at any given show.

“That’s one of the jobs of bands,” Brick says. “To get noticed, you have to have a gimmick of some sort. But then, once you understand that it’s a gimmick and that’s separate from your band, you kind of have to slowly phase it out. He’s done that for the most part.”

“We’re on to a new shtick,” Perla offers.

So, the birthday suit got a replacement.

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efore the smell became an issue, the men of Minka played shows in the paint-splattered suits that they crafted while making the music video for “Jackson Pollock,” the lead song off their latest EP, The Republican (think South Philly after-hours strip club, not the GOP, which has no place on this record). More recently, Rubin struck gold digging through his 86-year-old dad’s closet when he found four matching, nude turtlenecks and some sweet valour tracksuits.

“We were really in touch with our South Philly roots at that time,” Brick says of their faux athletic wear. For a while, Rubin paraded around in the loudest suit of them all, leading the band in American flag apparel.

What’s the fun in coming dressed as themselves, anyway?

“We’re all a bunch of different people inside,” Brick says. “We focus on one specific part of us that we can really bring out. We try to think of ourselves as scientists and we’re in the lab doing a controlled experiment on ourselves - a controlled, schizophrenic episode.”

The byproduct has been two EPs full of tongue-in-cheek lyrics and a high standard for a stage presence that physically illustrates them. With less-thansubtle songs like “Let’s Fuck,” Minka is all about taking risks.

“We’re not afraid to do something a little strange, clearly,” Brick says. “I mean, this guy is our lead singer. That was a huge risk.”

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“It was a risk, in actuality,” Rubin says. “I had never sung before the band at all. I was a piano player and I hurt my hands real bad. I didn’t think I’d be able to play again, so I started singing.”

Contrary to the band’s style, Rubin was brought up on opera and classical music. His piano training would stretch 10 to 12 hours a day with no breaks up until 2012, when a bad case of tendonitis redirected him to the mic.

His tense, often shouted vocals fuse the influence of artists like the Talking Heads and David Bowie, backed by synthed-up, dance-y drum beats that give Minka its signature sound.

“The ’80s birthed us,” Rubin remarks while fittingly sporting a retro pair of aviator eyeglasses and beard he hasn’t shaved since Jan. 1.

In their newest single with that ’80s vibe, “Kids These Days,” Minka hits on the inevitable truth that in any generational transition, the old heads will criticize youths walking their beaten path.

In a nearly theatrical chorus, the band sings, “Kids these days just don’t get it, they don’t think like me…they don’t take life seriously.”

“We enjoy the fact that they don’t take life seriously,” Brick says, capturing the ethos of the age-old complaint. “We want to be like them. We are complaining about them only because we desire to be like them.”

He then makes the distinction that they are not, in fact, grumpy old men.

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n the contrary, Rubin would describe Minka as a silly, childlike band who often ask themselves what the opposite is of what most people would do in any given situation.

“We zig when they zag,” Brick says.

He elaborates on how the band occasionally encourages Perla to ditch his skills on the drums to play like a child with no musical ability would, and hold down the beat when Rubin sporadically jumps from instrument to instrument that he doesn’t know how to play.

“That’s what the music scene is missing – bands that just want to freak out and have fun and don’t worry about looking cool,” David Sweeny, better known by his alter ego Johnny Showcase, says of Minka. “We’re kind of kindred spirits.”

Sweeny and his friends in the electrifying funk outfit Johnny Showcase and the Mystic Ticket handpicked Minka to open their record release show for The Octopus! at Underground Arts on Oct. 16 because their ideals align.

“I think we both think that music should be fun and should be about pleasure and doesn’t have to take itself seriously, but can also be really good music,” Sweeny says. “They wear turtlenecks. That’s the ugliest thing you can think of and they still have hot college girls freaking out to them. It’s great.”

The guys all have day jobs where they manage to take themselves seriously, so when Minka gets together they turn the focus to having a good time. Perla says the band wants to break the humdrum cycle of bands that stand on stage to play slow and sad tunes.

In modern music, Sweeny says it’s par for bands to just get up in front of a crowd who just stand there and then everyone goes home.

“Minka aren’t afraid to be absolute fools for the audience and totally give it to them,” he says. “That’s what makes them head and shoulders above most other groups in the city.”

“We just feel like there’s missing a loud, fast, coked-out, fun band on the scene,” Perla says. “We want to try and be that band.”

“Coked-out, figuratively,” Brick adds. They just like the idea it represents.

“We play mostly sober…” Perla says, with “at this point,” echoing in from all sides of the table as sunshine wafts through the half empty bottle of tequila.

I

n Minka’s infancy, Rubin would black out before every show, the rest of the guys trailing somewhere behind him. He recounts their first 15 shows being long, foggy nights before the band made a change.

The era of getting smashed before every show has passed. Instead, Minka focuses on being, ‘loud, fast and a little raggedy’ on their own terms, turning their main focus to playing small, local spaces.

“Right now we’re just trying to cultivate Philly,” Rubin says. “If people don’t give a shit about us here, why would they give a fuck about us anywhere else?

We’re doing tons of house parties and we’re open to playing anybody’s soiree.”

No space is off limits – the smaller and sweatier, the better. Minka thrives on a stage all to themselves with no regulations on their eccentric performance style. They make themselves right at home, from the pool to the kitchen. Perla facebook.com/JUMPphilly facebook.com/JUMPphilly

cites bonus points if the space is dirty and “in your face.”

So naturally, when super-fan Adam Weinraub reached out to the band to play his “crazy secret rooftop blowout kegger,” they were all in.

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cool breeze rolls in as the sun begins to fall on a mild Friday night, alerting the guys that it is time to pack up and head over a few blocks to 7th and Wharton streets for the show.

“I can’t believe he’s actually doing this,” says Caiola Katz, Weinraub’s longtime friend, as he shows Minka up to the roof. “We’ve been talking about this for months.”

It is perfect timing for the show, as the second and third floor tenants just vacated days prior.

New listeners to the local music scene, Weinraub and Katz caught Minka fever after watching a show at Bob & Barbara’s, where Rubin ended up on the floor with the mic stand between his legs, humping the stage.

“When we first saw them, we were a little disturbed,” Katz says. “But you can’t take your eyes off of Ari.” Several shows and blurry house parties later, the pair are hosting their very own Minka show and aren’t sure what to expect.

“No show is the same,” Weinraub says. “It’s like going to a sporting event and seeing a different game every time. You go and you see Minka, and each one of them brings it like they want to entertain everyone in the crowd.”

Pale pink clouds have long fallen behind the skyline as a more-thancasually-late crowd begins to form on the roof deck to find Minka dressed in thrift store Hawaiian shirts. The open-air playing space is dimly illuminated only by a waxing crescent moon hanging in the distance and a lone floor lamp stuck smack in the middle of the band.

“We’re going to play the fastest, best show we can before the 5-O show up,” Brick murmurs, preparing himself while soaking in the last moments of peace before Minka turns up the volume on an otherwise quiet night.

“We are Minka, and we’re here to fuck your brains out,” Rubin opens, and they were off to start the set with a cover of Weezer’s “Hashpipe.”

The crowd of about 40 strong – with dudes in plaid button-downs in

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every which direction – warms up quickly, grooving along with Rubin’s wild footwork as the sounds of crashing cymbals take over over the streets, rattling the fence of an empty alleyway across the way and echoing through the neighborhood.

“This is the greatest shit I’ve ever seen,” Katz says to a friend as songs like “My Room” and “Justice” fill the air, exposing the residential neighborhood to amusing lyrics and overtly sexual comments from Rubin like, “I wanna see you grab some ass. Someone can come up here and grab mine, I’m inviting you.”

From above, an obviously intoxicated man can be seen dancing on the street in front of an unmarked police car.

“Fuck it,” Weinraub says, while going down to investigate. “I’ll get arrested tonight. I don’t care.”

Turns out the police are in a forgiving mood. They offer 30 more minutes of playtime until they will be up to pull the plug themselves.

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o need for a reminder, Minka’s set is cut short right before the last song and the teetering 30 minute mark when Perla, who’s notoriously wild on the kit, breaks his kick pedal. No gripe from the band though – one less Prince cover isn’t going to kill anyone.

With the volume pulled down on Rubin’s Talking Heads playlist and the keg of Rolling Rock still flowing, the party wears on into the night.

“I told Dick, ‘I’m collecting money for you man,’ and he goes, ‘I don’t give a shit about the money, I just want people to have a good time,’” Weinraub says with a shrug. “It’s nice to see that their end goal is everyone having fun and enjoying themselves.”

From getting dressed up, to stripping and carving out a space in the crowd to throw down dance moves, Minka is all about having fun, and they label lowkey spots the most human way to do it.

“At house shows, we can connect to people,” Rubin says, stressing the meaningful relationships he’s made. “And Adam is going to get laid tonight, that’s awesome.”

“That’s like community service,” Brick jokes.

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BUT

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NO MO STILL HUMBLE

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Cover Cover Story Story

Mo Lowda & The Humble received love from the national media after their debut album dropped.

As they prepare to release their sophmore effort, they're making changes, including the name of the band.

Story and photo by G.W. Miller III.

I

t’s late in the evening on a sweaty night in East Kensington. The trio behind Mo Lowda & The Humble are at The Headroom Studio wrapping up the recording of their upcoming album.

“Are we getting a lot of room?” singer Jordan Caiola asks from inside the sound room as bandmate Shane Woods sets up the mixing board in the adjacent room. “It sounds like we’re getting a lot of room.”

Bass player Nate Matulis sits on the couch, scrolling on his smartphone. At his feet, on the coffee table, are bottles of Svedka vodka, Jefferson’s bourbon and Jose Cuervo, plus a bunch of empty coffee mugs that clearly were not used for coffee.

Finally, Caiola begins to sing: Sick of living where the sun don’t shine, sick of walking on the same old line.

The voice is mature - a bit gravelly and slightly cracking at times, with almost a Southern accent. His words trail off at the end of sentences and he sounds bitter, as though life has let him down.

I can’t live like a runaway.

He’s thin, wearing a white T-shirt, black jeans and a pair of well-worn, brown Sperry dock shoes with no socks. His appearance and that voice seem incongruous, a well-adjusted young man belting out pain.

Mo Lowda & The Humble have not seen a lot of pain as a band, however. The guys got together when they were in high school. They performed regularly when they went to college and wound up having their first album – a 45-minute blast of good old fashioned rock ‘n’ roll – recorded and produced for free.

“After the first album, we thought, “Now it’s going to happen,’” Caiola recalls.

They hit local and national milestones and drew comparisons – repeatedly – to Kings of Leon but then things eased back a little. They finished up college and moved back home. Caiola now works in the parks and recreation department in Lower Makefield Township, mowing lawns and doing other odd jobs in Bucks County.

As they prepare to drop their sophomore release, they are making tweaks to the band and their sound.

After nearly five years as Mo Lowda & The Humble, a random name chosen when the guys were in high school, they will now simply be known as The Humble.

“Same great taste,” Woods says. “Same great look.”

Their new music is more accessible, with fewer long jams that made otherwise radio-friendly songs a little too drawn out.

“The new stuff is absolutely still rock,” Caiola says emphatically. “It’s just different.”

C

aiola, who is the primary songwriter, began performing when he was in 5th grade, when he was selected for the school chorus.

“I was one of 20 kids who could carry a tune,” he says modestly.

He soon learned a few chords on the guitar and began singing over them.

Woods was learning the drums at the time and they began messing around together. When they were both attending Pennsbury High School in Fairless Hills, they added Matulis and they had a band.

They practiced for 30 minutes just prior to their very first show.

“It was ridiculous,” Caiola says, noting that Matulis had to read the music during the performance.

But it worked. Even as a teenager, Caiola had that soulful voice. Matulis and Woods added strong rhythm and tight hooks.

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They packaged a demo in 2012 when Caiola and Woods were at Temple University and they began playing the basement party scene.

“At one point,” Caiola says, “we were trying to play Philly every week.”

They performed at the weekly open mic night hosted by Mic Stew at Maxi’s, a bar on the Temple campus.

“We were like the house band,” Woods says. “One time, a guy came up to us and said, ‘Yo man, can you just stay up there and I’ll rap over it?’”

They decided to spread things out to get a larger draw.

Their hook-heavy, progressive pop started gaining a following and they got the attention of Bell Tower Records, Temple’s music label. Their debut fulllength, Curse The Weather, was recorded at school and released in the fall of 2013.

The band was featured in a 2014 Huffington Post article with a headline that read, “Someone Needs to Give Mo Lowda & The Humble a Record Deal Immediately.” It was a classic click-bait title but the reporting was real and the enthusiasm earnest.

That, along with their music being added to Spotify, helped gain them a national fan base. In January, the guys played a packed room in Northampton, Massachusetts, which prompted Matulis to ask the crowd, “Who are you here to see?”

And the crowd screamed, “You guys!”

Last June, they did 300 pre-sale tickets for a headlining show at the Black Box, the smaller room at Underground Arts. A few friends asked them for comps but the room was nearly sold out. So all three members of the band stood in line on Callowhill Street and wound up buying a few of the remaining tickets.

“We didn’t buy all the tickets,” Matulis remembers. “We didn’t want to be assholes to the other people in line.”

W

here they used to have three-minute songs with four-minute outros, they ‘ve cut tracks in half, creating more tangible tunes.

The ideas presented in the lyrics remain deep – connections to Caiola’s childhood, a life-changing car crash, fictional tales steeped in reality – but the new focus is on creating catchy tunes.

“Lyrics are not the deciding factor,” Caiola says. “The melody is what grabs me. The melody is going to draw more attention to the words, anyway.”

The three bandmates sit by the mixing board at Headroom talking about the meaning of their music.

“I try not to write a love story every time,” Caiola says.

“They are emotive,” Woods says of the lyrics. “Sometimes there are songs I don’t really understand.”

“Lyrics take on a new meaning over time,” Matulis adds.

“We’re kind of emotional dudes,” Caiola continues.

“We don’t have any conversations without explaining things,” Matulis says, almost completing Caiola’s sentence.

T

he new album is set to drop in early 2016 and the bandmates are optimistic. It will be their first as simply The Humble, which they realize is a branding problem. But the name is fitting for the three longtime friends who come from solid, middle class backgrounds.

“The main goal right now is to get on support for a major tour,” Caiola says, noting that it must be the right tour. “We’re not just going to take anything.”

Even their aspirations are humble.

All of the guys have recently moved back home to lower Bucks County, though Woods works at Headroom. They stay overnight at the studio frequently, like tonight, and crash on friends’ couches in the city often.

“Once we can get by on the music, we’ll be here,” Caiola says.

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Eclectic Entertainment & Food Franky Bradley's offers a wide-range of music and performances, as well as dining options.

As the early afternoon sunlight pouring through its windows casts a subdued hue over the hardwood floors and litany of exotic art lining the walls, assistant general manager Dave Morreale surveys the second floor lounge area of Franky Bradley’s.

“There’s always going to be something for everyone,” he says while resting against one of the dozens of square, chest-level wooden tables that form a semi-circle around the venue’s corner stage. “That’s one of the main philosophies here.”

Located at 1320 Chancellor St. in the heart of the Gayborhood, Franky Bradley’s has embodied this philosophy by hosting an eclectic and constantly evolving calendar of events featuring local and national talent in a wide range of genres.

“If you’re looking for live performances, like cool burlesque shows or a drag show or comedy show, you’re going to see that,” explains Morreale. “If you’re looking for solid DJs, we have that too. And then there’s the whole live music venue as well.”

A quick look at the event calendar for Franky Bradley’s will confirm this. Whether it’s the 42

monthly “HUGS” party hosted by resident DJ/ booking agent Ed Cristof, a set from Broadzilla DJs, the Little Big Things Crew throwing their “Little Big Things” party or a First Friday performance from the venue’s very own drag troupe, “Franky’s Foxes,” visitors to Franky Bradley’s will always find themselves in the midst of something new and exciting.

Further expanding on the concept of diversity, Franky Bradley’s will venture into the world of film screenings in October, hosting the exclusive Philadelphia premier of “Stretch and Bobbito” – a documentary surrounding legendary New York DJs/on-air personalities Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito Garcia, whose late night radio program was responsible for turning the world on to artists including Nas, Biggie Smalls, Wu-Tang and Jay-Z – with an after-party that sees the two DJs joined by Rich Medina.

As Franky Bradley’s continues to expand its event roster to include national artists, Morreale points out that the venue hasn’t lost touch with its hometown talent.

“Philly has so many talented musicians and so many talented DJs and performers,” he says

while adjusting the bracelets around his left wrist. “I think it’s important that we stay in touch with that. It’s always nice to see bigger national acts - and that’s something that we’ll look forward to having as well - but always having support for the local heartbeat is what’s important.”

Part of Franky Bradley’s success has been because of this support for local artists, and is an important value carried over from owner Mark Bee’s other musical hotspot, Silk City. When he needed help with curating the decor of Franky Bradley’s, Bee enlisted the help of local artist/ impresario and close friend Scott Johnston.

Johnston’s artistic touch gives the interior of the two story brick and stone building the visual flourish that sets it apart. Diners in the first floor restaurant can savor their meal underneath a Tiffany lamp or while sitting next to a portrait of Pam Grier made from one and two dollar bills while party-goers on the second floor can dance beneath sconces, a painting of knights jousting or one of Johnson’s original pieces - a portrait of local cabaret and drag star Martha Graham Cracker based on a photo of Martha taken by photographer Jeff Fusco at Silk City.

Johnston was also responsible for adding more than 500 Swarovski crystals to the enormous painting of a leopard woman, which was previously a signature art piece of Sisters nightclub (the business that previously occupied facebook.com/JUMPphilly

Photo by Charles Shan Cerrone.

Food That Rocks

the building), and lining the bathroom walls with funny and provocative clippings from old magazine ads.

For one of the venue’s first shows, Bee was quick to book one of his favorite local acts – The Martha Graham Cracker Cabaret, who were also the first act to completely sell out a show at Franky Bradley’s.

“We’ve known Mark Bee for a long time,” says Cabaret cofounder and keyboardist Victor Fiorillo. “[He has] traveled to New York to see us many times, he had us at Silk City, and so he knew he wanted us as the big opener.”

Fiorillo notes that this appreciation is part of the appeal for performing at Franky Bradley’s, with the Cabaret’s third return performance leading off the venue’s October calendar.

“We only play at venues that value the artists and pay them accordingly, and where the staff is excited for us to be there and treats us right,” he explains, but draws attention to the other reason that keeps the quintet coming back. “That room has a lot of character. We'll choose a 200-person room like that any day over a 1,000-person box with no personality. And it doesn't hurt that there is a painting of Martha prominently displayed in the room.”

The “something for everyone” philosophy carries over into the kitchen, influencing the menu curated by head chef David Kane, of Bar Ferdinand and Silk City fame.

“It’s American food,” says general manager Joe “Joppy” Ferrone. “It’s big. It’s hearty. But we want what people want, so we didn’t want to get pretentious with things. We wanted it to be down to earth but have a different kind of ‘higher’ quality.”

The menu, in part, pays homage to the first business to occupy the space and provide the venue with it’s namesake – Frankie Bradley’s, a steakhouse owned and operated by Frank Bloch, a retired prizefighter who named his restaurant after his stage name of “Frankie Bradley.” Bloch’s restaurant was a fixture of the city from the early 1930s up through the mid 1980s and was well-known as a celebrity hangout.

“When Mark re-did [the restaurant], he was looking for a modern take on it: a cross between a ’70s feel and what Frankie’s was doing in the ’50s, and bring it into the ‘now,’” Ferrone explains. “Some of the menu items harken back to what Frankie Bradley’s had on the menu, like latkes. But we do a potato and celery root latke with an apple butter underneath and it has a smoked salmon that we do on top of that with dill and crème fraiche.”

“At the same time, amazing chicken wings with a bourbon barbecue sauce, potato skins topped with house-smoked brisket and sharp Cabot cheddar and horseradish crème over them,” he adds. “A lot of it is bar-driven food but it’s made to be both accessible yet really unique and intriguing, and something that you don’t find at an ordinary corner bar or venue.”

In addition to a sizable array of dinner choices, Franky Bradley’s has started serving a weekend brunch that features an equally eclectic menu. Menu highlights include baked crepes with formage blanc and fresh fruit, smoked chicken hash with sweet potatoes, peppers, apples, poached eggs and cider jus, and a classic Belgian waffle topped with vanilla icing, cinnamon butter, candied pecans and maple syrup.

Having only been open since January, Morreale notes that Franky Bradley’s is still in its “infancy stages” but that it’s been exciting to see it continue to grow over time. With an everexpanding calendar of events and a constantly evolving food and drink menu, he’s confident that the venue will continue to provide the city with events and eats to suit every taste.

“There are a lot of good things to come in the house of Franky Bradley’s,” he adds, grinning widely.

- Dan Halma JUMPphilly.com

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Inside Voices

Continued from page 47 ... find out about publishing. So we started to work together. There was a group called Candy & The Kisses, part of Jerry Ross’ label. Jerry and I wrote a song for Candy & The Kisses called “The 81.” It was a dance. Huff had a writing partner and they also wrote a song for Candy & The Kisses. That led us to work together in the studio, the first time we ever worked together. I went to Huff’s house in Camden and we began to write. That was the best experience that I’ve ever had in music. It was so easy. I was doing what I did best and he was doing what he did best. I’m a lyricist. He plays the keyboards. We must have wrote six or seven songs that day.

Mont: What are your memories of working with The Jackson 5?

Kenny: I had known them for a long time. They used to come through the Uptown Theater when they were small, maybe when Michael was 10 years old. Because they grew up as Jehovah’s Witnesses, we had a bond. They used to come over to my house. This was in, like, 1967. I got to know their mother, their father, everybody.

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Mont: How was that?

Kenny: They were just like everybody else. They were a nice family. We always said, “Maybe one day, we’ll work together.” Then Joe called me one day and said they were leaving Motown and they wanted to work with me and Huff. I wish we would have had more time with them. We did two albums with them.

But they were kids and they were growing up.

Jermaine had left them and they were going through a depression.

They were signed to Epic Records and they wanted them to be a pop group. We were doing message songs.

The O’Jays were signed to us. When you owned everything, we had control over everything.

We could take our time with everything the way we couldn’t with The Jackson 5.

Mont: Even then, could you see Michael was special?

Kenny: Oh yeah, absolutely. I used to tell him that he should record himself because he had different ideas. He used to call me every night at 2 in the morning. He was in California. I said, “Man, I need to get some sleep.”

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But he wanted answers, just my view on things, sometimes spiritual things.

I remember when we were recording, he wanted to try certain things – doubling his voice, tripling it, speeding the tape up – stuff I had never even thought about.

I tried to get Tommy Bell to record him. He was too busy. So Michael got up with Quincy Jones.

Mont: Do you ever talk to Tommy about that?

Kenny: Every time I see him.

I think Michael would have been a different person had he stayed with us. He would have been away from all the Hollywood stuff. I used to tell him about everything we’re doing here (at Universal) with the schools and housing and all.

Mont: A lot of artists don’t understand how to have control over their own career.

Kenny: Most careers don’t last that long. You should know every detail of your business because it’s all about business, the economics of it. You got to love what you’re doing but you also need to understand it because it’s a living, after all. Control your own publishing, masters, your own image. Controlling all these things is important because they become assets to you.

You’re building up assets, things that have worth.

Mont: Is it still an ill feeling hearing your stuff, like on samples.

Kenny: I love it. I seen Jay-Z one time. He used a few of our songs. I said, “What made you use our songs?” He said, “I just love them.” I just said, "Thank you." It keeps us current. Kanye West has done a lot with our music. He said, “Yo man, give me a better deal.” Just keep the music going, you know?

These are the guys who are in the spotlight right now. But that’s going to change. I like what they’re doing because they are branching out to different things.

Mont: That’s why you are my hero. You’re just a kid from South Philly. Not only did you get a record deal and do well in music but you’ve got properties and schools. What has kept you grounded?

Kenny: I think my spiritual side, understanding what is the purpose of my life. I’m not amazed by all that stuff because this is where I am. I’m still on 15th Street. What I enjoy is working with the schools and the redevelopment, creating a model for what we can do.

We have one goal and that is to see the African American community be independent and sustain itself so it does not have to run to all these people and ask them for anything. Education is the way out. Want a loaf of bread, start a bakery.

Take care of your own economy so you can be a part of the human family.

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Photos Photo by

by G.W. G.W. Miller Miller III. III.

Inside Voices

"There Is A Master Plan."

Kenny Gamble grew up in South Philadelphia, singing on street corners. He aspired to be a performer but quickly went from the stage to behind the scenes. He and his musical partner Leon Huff went on to produce some of the most well-known music in the world.

Today, Gamble oversees Universal Companies, which aims to revitallize neighborhoods through education and entrepreneurship.

We listened in as Mont Brown, a rapper from Southwest Philly - with dreams of bigger things, interviewed the music legend. - G.W. Miller III Mont: If Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and other leaders were alive, what do you think their outlooks would be on the world today?

Kenny: First of all, they both were working with each other. They both wanted the same for our people. There has been a lot of progress. I think both would be shocked by the Internet and social media. They would be more interested in who is going to make the sacrifice. It takes a sacrifice to do what they did, so much so that they gave their own lives to be able to speak the truth.

Mont: Do you think we’re lacking those voices today?

Kenny: Maybe but I think they’re coming. The youth are going to bring those kinds of leaders. You have a lot of good-intentioned people. But people like Minister (Louis) Farrakhan are sacrificing their lives to wake up the people, to wake up humanity about injustices. So much of the problems of the world are about greed and oppression. The only way you get rid of that is by the people uniting.

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We’re lucky to be here in America. We have the opportunities to vote people in and vote them out. We have the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Those three documents are what Dr. King stood on. They are what gave Malcolm X the opportunity to have the freedom of speech. In some countries, you would not have that.

I would not be the person I am today without Malcolm X or Martin Luther King. Even more than Malcolm X, I would not be the person I am today without the person who taught Malcolm X, and that’s the honorable Elijah Muhammad, who brought a different view for African American people. That view was to do for yourself, accept your own people and have your own.

Mont: Why do you think we have not had a powerful leader since those leaders?

Kenny: Those kinds of personalities, they don’t come every day. Malcolm X was in a special time. Maybe you’re going to be the next leader, Mont.

Mont: Whatever God sends my way, I’m going to do it.

Kenny: That’s right.

Mont: Why do you think the younger generation does not step up?

Kenny: The spirit guides everybody. I look back when I met my partner (Leon) Huff. I didn’t know him. We just ran into each other and in doing so, facebook.com/JUMPphilly

we forged a relationship that has lasted 50 some years. We’ve been able to be creative together, work together. We’re two different kinds of people but we found harmony, writing songs and all.

Wherever the spirit takes you. That’s what I go by. People just need to be able to step up to the plate to hear that spirit, to consume that spirit. A lot of people are too scared of it because it takes sacrifice. It might even cost you your life, standing up for what you think is right.

Mont: That’s going to happen anyway. You’re going to pass away eventually.

Kenny: Yeah, but not everybody sees it that way.

Mont: The world is 4 or 6 billion years old, or something like that. If you live to be 90 years old, so what? What did you do with your life? Why not be legendary for your family?

So, who is Kenny Gamble? He’s a guy who has been trying to make it, trying to do good things and I’ve always been a praying person, all my life. When I came into contact with Islam, I really enjoyed what it had to say. It answered most of those questions I had- reading the Koran, talking to people.

Mont: Frankie Lymon was your musical hero?

Kenny: He was like the Michael Jackson of my day. I used to go to the PAL. There was a little store across the street from the PAL (Police Athletic League) and they had a record machine. That’s where I would be pretty much all of the time. I’d play The Dells, Frankie Lymon, everybody. My dream was to be in show business in some way. I didn’t know how.

Mont: Were there people on every corner doing the same thing?

Kenny: Everywhere. And I had a good relationship with everybody.

Kenny: First thing you got to do is find out, "Why was I born? What am I doing here in this world?" Life is short. We’re just traveling through.

Mont: It’s borrowed time.

Kenny: That’s all it is. You got to look at it as, “I know I did not create myself.

The world is too big. The whole thing is too big. There is a master plan.” Can one get in harmony with that master plan so that you say you are walking with nature, walking in the sprit of things.

Mont: Did you think you were the best?

Kenny: I was just a normal guy, trying to make it in school. I didn’t know nothing about the music industry. There was nobody to teach us about the music industry. I started writing songs with Tommy Bell. We started as soon as I got out of high school. We used to perform at all the little nightclubs.

You don’t know where you’re going to end up. You just got to keep on trying.

There is a job description for everything that’s been created. Think about worms. People look at worms and say, “That’s nothing but a worm.” You rarely see them. But without them, there wouldn’t be crops. They’re such a significant thing to human life.

I got a job at Jefferson (the hospital) in their research department. I was there for 7.5 years.

Why did the creator make us? What role do we play? We are created in order to be the keepers of the Earth. That’s our job.

Kenny: Mostly on the weekends. I needed that job. I had to help my mother out. We would perform on the weekends and all the people from Jefferson would come out and encourage us.

Did we do something to help the next generation? If we don’t do it, it’s not going to get done.

Mont: What if there wasn’t a Martin Luther King, or Malcolm?

Kenny: Then there would have been other people. There is always somebody who may not be getting the spotlight. All these people have good teams around them. There’s always going to be somebody else.

Mont: Who is Kenny Gamble?

Kenny: I’m a guy who was born and raised in South Philly. I’ve seen the best and the worst. I always wanted to be involved in music. We used to sing on the corners.

Mont: What year was that?

Kenny: I was born in 1943. So, when I was 10 or 11. I was on the corners. And then there was a group called Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers. That’s who everybody wanted to be like.

Mont: That’s what made you want to start?

Mont: While juggling music?

We had a great show. We had Tommy Bell who later wrote songs and produced for The Delfonics. We had a guy named Roland Chambers, who was the lead guitar player on all our music. We had his brother and we had Huff. We sang in harmony.

Mont: What was the group?

Kenny: We were The Romeos. We had all the girls. That was the main thing back then. We were trying to make it.

Mont: When did the break come?

Kenny: There was a group called Don and Juan and they had a hit record, “What’s Your Name?” A lot of duos came out around that time. Me and Tommy Bell found a guy, Jerry Ross from Heritage Records, who wanted to record us. We were Kenny and Tommy. It didn’t do too much but it got airplay here in Philly.

Tommy Bell, he worked in a fish shop. When it came to playing on the weekends, he couldn’t do it because he had to cut those fish up. I started going to Heritage Records myself.

Kenny: Oh yeah. That was just my music side. Along with that, I had my mother and my two brothers. My mother took us to church all the time. We were Jehovah’s Witnesses. I learned a lot about the Bible. We used to go doorto-door, in cold weather, early in the morning, waking people up by knocking on their doors.

Mont: That’s when you got your solo deal?

Me and another brother, Brother Wilson. He was one of the elders. I used to work with him. I always had a lot of questions. Things used to trouble me. A lot of things had no answers. People said, “You got to have faith.” That wasn’t good enough for me. I wanted to know about certain things. There should be an answer for everything, I think.

Jerry got a job in New York. He had to give up his office and he asked me, “Do you want this office?” The rent was only $60 per month. I met Huff on the elevator coming into the building one day. Me and Huff used to talk all the time. We had the same goals. We wanted to be producers. We wanted to

JUMPphilly.com

Kenny: That’s when I got the solo deal with Columbia Records. Each time, I was getting a little closer. Jerry Ross showed me how to write songs. I was learning so much.

... continued on page 44

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