March Music

It's been a long time since I was excited over new music. Even when Blaqk Audio's 'Bright Black Heaven' came out, I didn't buy it and still haven't listened to it.

But I'm back and ready to plunge headfirst into the land of new music. The other week I went to the Whitechapel/Emmure NYC show and wanted to cry over how it feels as though I abandoned my first love and the one big high in my life. I haven't been writing for the one music publication or been in a photo pit in forever. Breaks my heart. I got caught up living a life that took all my ambition and energy away from work. My mind is clear and I know now I can manage the clothing line, random costuming gigs and music journalism.

So with that little motivational rant out of the way...

March I am DYING for new IAMX and Senses Fail. Both groups have tour dates for April and May and I'm about to buy tickets (or maybe get listed which would be awesome). Not sure if IAMX has any previews available, but I'm really scared with the first single "Mi Amor" from Senses Fail. It opens hard and hope the rest of the album is in that direction, but the chrous/hook is odd from them. Sounds like all the 'silly metalcore/post-hardcore AP Mag bands of the moment.' I've heard people comment they don't like how it's over-produced, I just feel it's trying to appeal to younger fans and therefore, making it not Senses Fail.

Well, we'll just have to wait for the end of March to hear things.

My Sneakers

My sneakers were resurrected last night. From the depths of my sneaker bin with a pile of others that are slowly fading, they emerged to be reborn with the light and weight of metal pyramid studs.

They are at this time, six years old. Bought in 2005, my first pair of Converses and worn to my first time to Warped Tour. At that tour, I saw Offspring for the first and only time, argued with the singer from Boys Night Out because I'm a crazy fan, witnessed the end of My Chemical Romance ever being an underground band. I wore these shoes for my first photo pit experience. Senses Fail and 30 Seconds to Mars - I died. The amount of venues these shoes have walked over is too long to list.

They stayed with me through almost all of my days working at a coffee place. With mocha powder, milk, soy, coffee and matcha powder covering them regularly.

The bleach stains came from the day I helped out one of my inspirations and mentor at the time bleach jackets in her backyard.

I left mud caked on the soles until it flaked off thinking it had magic powers as it was from outside the venue of which I just saw AFI perform.

They're just sneakers and probably really gross, but when I look at them, I relieve 6 years of my life in one glance.

Senses Fail

BTW - Senses Fail's new album The Fire really has grown on me and no doubt - they're best album musically. Really great, go give it a listen.

Electric Factory
Philadelphia
November 27, 2010


OMG! I couldn't go to their show the night before Thanksgiving at Starland, so I figured I would try to get in to the Philly show.

The damn show sold out and I took the chance that my request went through for tickets being I didn't get confirmation (but I was pretty confident it was all good). But we make the trip and firgured if we couldn't get into that show, we would go across town and see Foxxy Shazam!

So it was a win-win situation if you ask me.

But...I walk up, give my ID and low and behold - two tickets are mine!

I made the mistake of not asking for set times, b/c my friend and I got stuck watching ALL the bands on the bill. Late show.

Balance and Composure was good, but I really wish I could have done without Title Fight and then Bayside. I was never into Bayside - even with a Weezer cover, meh.

Senses Fail was amazing. It's been awhile and I was loving all the older songs i.e. those off Let It Enfold You. I haven't listened to that album in forever. And they mainly stuck with older tunes, only a couple off the new album. They did do "Lifeboats" - my favorite.

The music sounded perfect and their singer was insane - drunk? who cares - Stellar performance, running around, doing acrobats and improvising when microphone dropped and seeing if he could sing in a handstand.

Left before the last song - don't know what that was or if there was an encore. But I was happy.

Damn Straight.

Finally got to listen to the new Senses Fail album, The Fire.

It's OK. It did take me a bit to really get into the last album and The Fire feels like a great continuation of the previous. I was interested to hear any differences in the sound because guitarist Heath left - I'm assuming it was before the record got started.

Not too much seems different, but I only listened to the album twice and via Myspace. Really feeling "Lifeboats."

Then I find on PunkNews this video. It's my boyfriend...I mean the it's the singer of Senses Faill talking about pop-rock boy bands and it's pretty interesting. (note me being funny)

I mean, you can say that lyrically, Senses Fail provides deeper topics, with real problems and I can say that I'm defintely one of the fans that connect with A LOT of the songs and yea, they've helped me through tough times.

Whereas bands like All Time Low, what really is the meaning in their songs? Most people do agree it's music you can just write off as pop-rock that'll just fade. But I also would beg to differ that NSync was meaningless bubblegum pop, BUT it also had the power to make a difference. I listened to that music during hard times and while the lyrics kind of mean nothing, it was music to get me away.

So yea. Even when music sucks, it still can make a difference.


On a side note - LA Ink is over for the season. I really think Jesse James and Kat should have been smart and not had him go to her gallery opening. She seemed so pissed over the press asking her questions about him - well duh! He's right there. If he really cared, he would have said like 'It's your night, I want to be there, but with what is going on with me, I don't want to bring negative attention.'

Or go through the back door!

Jeffree Star looked fabulous! Really sucks his New Jersey tour date was cancelled. I think I know why - boooo....

Bayonet and Shoots

haha...see what I did there with the title?

anyways...I have some pictures to post from two shoots I got images of and Oh. My. Goodness. They are all amazing. The one set, I'm going to do a post tomorrow with those images, but for now - let's talk about my first music experience of the new year and I'll leave you with one sneak peek at another shoot we did last week.

So tonight, I stuck around to see the set from BAYONET on the NJ stop of SET YOUR GOALS' tour. Who are they? Basically the singer of SENSES FAIL, people from the now disfunct THE BANNER and other dudes.

Let's remind the reader of my love and slight obsession with SENSES FAIL and their singer.

That said, I had to stick around and see what was to come of this, as the songs on their myspace didn't grab me - http://www.myspace.com/bayonetdoesntcare

So! I must say, it's basically SENSES FAIL wihtout the little 'metal shredding' flourishes and Buddy whining about this and that - well at least it's not clear in the vocals.

I liked it. Few moments of catchier melodies, back then to some 'harder' drums and such and non-nasally vocals, which you got to love.

Check it out if you haven't. I'm excited for what's to come as I've kinda given up that any new material from Senses Fail will live up to what I remember of them.

(After I went home b/c snow sucks and I wasn't going to drive in what's accumulating outside)

That said, here's a shot from the Creepshow shoot we did last week. Rock and Roll!

Oh No! Senses Fail!

So, I just heard a couple days ago that Heath from Senses Fail will be leaving the band after Warped Tour. Kinda bummed.

Everything sounds all kosher and he just wants to move on in life and such.

I'm just bummed b/c as a fan (obviously I never shut up about them), it felt this last record they finally came around and have the basis for something really amazing musically-wise.

Plus, I didn't know if Jason Black - their bassist on tour & from Hot Water Music - was going to maybe record with them. I was excited for this and I think Heath was damn good, so...that plus the lyrics I love and the way Heath and other guitarist Garrett worked together...

So now I wonder who's going to come in or is bad news going to come? Probably not, but we'll see after Warped what's going to go on with them.

Saints and Sinners Tour

Show Review
Theater of the Living Arts, Philadelphia, PA

If you had looked foward to another Saints and Sinners down in Asbury Park around this past Halloween, then you unpleasantly surprised with a "See You in '09" line on the website. Promoters took the line-up package, condensed it to four bands and traveled the county.

It was a little upsetting, but they did provide a pretty ecletic mix of bands and one act is a favorite of mine, so I definately had to be in attendance.

First up - Brokencyde. My sister was stoked and said they are hilarious live. I took a listen on the myspace and was amused, but knew I would only be able to listen to 2 or 3 songs before getting a headache.

We were late, so that's about how many we saw. The guys primarily stayed hidden in the light show they had set-up on stage, but the kids on the floor didn't care as all they wanted to do was dance.

It really felt as though they stole beats from Lil' Jon and were just kicking and screaming with vocals over it. Fun for the first song, annoying for any other ones.

Haste the Day was excellent. They're your typical metal/metalcore band, but who know how to get it done right.

At first, I wasn't too into them and just wanted to see Senses Fail, but the more you listened, the more their talent shone through. Especially when they played tracks off their new album, Dreamer.

I was surprised when the lead singer took a moment to thank God and talked about Jesus for a second and said fans should come over and chat with the band later. Cool.

Finally! It was Senses Fail time. I had been listening to the new album a lot lately and was very excited to see them again since their Fall Headlining tour. But things didn't feel right...

The floor was barely moving. The lead singer was either tipsy or took note of the bland crowd and wasn't as intense as last time I saw them. And again, drunk Jersey trash girls make me sick.

The music was on point. Between Heath, Garrett and Jason Black (Hot Water Music, now joins them live), everything has been sounding just amazing live. But as I said, their singer wasn't as electric as back on the headlining tour and I felt bad when his new love of telling jokes/funny stories really hit a sour note with the crowd.

They played the majority of the new album and a few from the previous albums, but had to overlook the EP as for some reason, THEY were not the headliners of the tour. Whoever did that, was wrong.

So the headliners of the night were Hollywood Undead. I haven't seen them before and have mixed feelings about them. It is a guilty pleasure and the music is catchy, heavy and contain those hip hop elements. However, I get very ultra-feminist when I have to hear guy refer to women as bitches for only so long.

There are six members and there was also an additional drummer on the stage. I will give it to them that the music sounds just as it does on the album, even better maybe, and the energy and crowd response is great for them. The one guy even took a tween boy on his shoulders for the first (or was it second?) song and carried him around on stage.

"Undead" and "California" are favorites of mine so that was cool they played them in the beginning, but it sucked you had to wait till the end for "No. 5," well that's not really a shocker.

Saints and Sinners turned out to be a great tour package. Great bands, with one interesting and unique first act, but the suckiest audience ever.

Was it like that for the majority of the stops? The Hollywood Undead kids took over the population, which is cool, but makes it less entertaining during the metal & post-hardcore acts.

Senses Fail....my love returns

Did I ever mention I went to the Senses Fail show at Starland Ballroom back in November?

No? Well...It was amazing.

First off, Foxy Shazam is friggin' insane! I was torn whether or not to consider their show smart and genius or just plain retardness. The lead singer was crazy and I love it. He was all over the place, talking non-sense to a crowd that half of 'em loved him, but the other booed and hated him.

He began singing the Fresh Prince of Bel Air theme song and it was boring, but funny. Some of the crowd standing by me wanted them gone - but they were the same dumbasses who would late 'mosh' to Sky Eats Airplane.

Anyways, later on, the singer threw the microphone over one of the beams above and proceeded to climb up the cord to the ceiling, swing around and then fall back to the stage. Quite impressive. The keyboardist also wanted attention by standing on his keyboard. They are fun.

Sky Eats Airplane is a Chiodos/screamo hardcore outfit that I wasn't too impressed with. Of course, the lead singer on stage looked hot, but that's about it. I had more fun watching the ceiling fans in the stage lighting that this band had set up.

I was so stoked to see Dance Gavin Dance, but they failed to really give me my fill. I'm most familiar with their older album, but since they have a new singer...nothing from that album, just new stuff. Which isn't a problem, but they fell a little flat.

The last song morphed into a jam, progressive kind of thing and was really nice.

Ok, so I had complained about Senses Fail's new album, mainly b/c it felt like the heart was missing. I remember reading in a blog by their old bassist, who left before this record, something along the lines that he doesn't want to pretend he wants to make music like some others.

So I kind of felt like he was right.

Wrong! My goodness, their lead singer was totally on the ball this show. He didn't seem completely intoxicated (like last time I saw them) and his vocals were so on point and the energy was flowing like crazy. He divided his time during the set between jumping into the crowd and rolling out the stage like a madman.

The music just radiated through me. Maybe with now the talent of Jason Black (originally of Hot Water Music) they can really get into that full-bodied, ambient thing or maybe it's all just clicking.

I loved the fact that they played every hit, not sticking solely to the new record and I was completely satisfied with this set.

They're headed out on the Saints and Sinners Tour in '09 (yea, there's no Saints and Sinners Fest, but that's okay b/c if you saw what they did to the inside of the Convention Hall in Asbury, you wouldn't want it there either).

With them is like hardcore screamo cats and Hollywood Undead. If I get in free, you know I'm going.