METRO BALTIMORE – 1700 N CHARLES ST, BMORE, 21218
MOBTOWN BALLROOM – 30 W North Ave, Baltimore, MD 21201
S.C.U.M. (aka Society for Cutting Up Misogynists) is as much a manifesto as music. This is take-no-prisoners feminist punk with a clear and unbending agenda.
Genevieve’s self-description — “Avant-garde metal” — is accurate but we’d argue even that wide berth isn’t enough. The band incorporates elements of drone, classical composition, prog, post-rock and everything in between. As such, we’re more comfortable saying simply: this band is utterly epic.
LCL FMS
1:15 PM
@ EMA’S CORNER
Evergreen opener LCL FMS may prefer to remain mysterious, but the project’s rare performances are ALWAYS the stuff early birds brag about and latecomers don’t believe actually occurred.
Brave, barenaked meditations on grief and loss, Carl Gene’s songs temper unbridled struggle with bright tones, whispered vocals and soothing, echo-y ambience. It’s a stark and powerful reminder that transcendence can often come with great emotional cost.
An amalgam of influences, Burger Monday mediates post-hardcore ethos, Black Flag buzz, and the prescience of DC’s late-90s emo scene. The result? An assault on reason, and a complete massacre of the mundane.
Boasting a rack of guitar pedals that rivals combined legions of other artists, HEUP! is more than adequately equipped to wind epically into the atmosphere. Thus, elements of pysch and shoegaze are present as noise-driven atmospheres majestically melt and fuzz over one another.
Shoegaze for the spacially adept, Curver edge their distortion well into the atmosphere. It’s a Ride worth strapping in to experience.
Suppai Helwa are a motley crew of unendingly energetic punks if ever there was one. At times poppy, at others ball-bustingly brash, they are, perhaps, Baltimore’s most pogo-ready rockers.
When it comes to Waco Mammoth, the term “free jazz” isn’t entirely accurate. This is rabid free-form skronk of a more roaming and ecstatic nature (or as they say it, when it comes to intensity, “there is no limit.”)
While indie-poppers Thee Windows may drape themselves in echo, the band’s shoegazing is never in excess. The bands affecting dream pop is always steeped in a pristine sense of song.
Between spot-on pop-punk riffs, unflinching ideology and side gig as a wrestler, there’s plenty to say about Chaz Monroe. But why talk when the name of this song “Piloting Giant Robots as a Form of Gender Expression”) more than sums it up?!
Featuring a powerhouse lineup of local noise legends, Pale Stag are lumbering towers of dissonant no wave energy and experimentation. Wild, unwieldy, and untamed.
Is it Krautrock, prog-pop, post rock or something even more oddly experimental? Classification may fall short but Herschel Hoover’s sprawling ensemble doesn’t just pack a stage — it fills the room with an epic, uproarious energy.
Femme-fronted hardcore with a razorblade edge, Darker Than take a room the way ogres take a tower. Unrelenting punk in a pogo assault of the ages.
The work of multi-disciplinary artist Khristian Weeks is deep in concept, yes, but utterly engaging in application. Interactive electronics intertwine with abstract narrative as engaging static pushes the boundaries of what it means to be alive and sonically engaging one another.
Boat Water are unclassifiable insomuch as they blend americana, jam, space rock, and shoegaze into winding indie epics. Whatever you call it, the result is enormous and all-encompassing.
Chasing Mice are Geek rockers with a true sense of self – introspective, emotional and catchy beyond belief.
STREET RAT
5:00 PM
@ EMA’S CORNER
Brooklyn’s Street Rat is a pulsing, writhing pile of static and uncoiled energy. Featuring modded electronics and full-body engagement, their wild noise emanations are simultaneously electric and unquestionably organic.
The lines between provocateur, performance artist, crowd-worker and group therapist don’t exist for Bao Nguyen – nor do the constraints of stage, script or setlist. Profundity to the profane The first few rows generally get the most attention, but, invariably, the entire audience WILL get wet.
Underlined Passages reach sky-high into the alt-rock oeuvre, exposing a shimmering shoegaze above.
Buzz-saw guitar meets psychotic black metal shiekage as altars fall and fists pound. If it aint broke, dont fix it.
Catherine Savage deftly explores the intersections between folk, indie and pop, plumbing the nexus between Joni Mitchell and Feist with unflinching abandon. That or an airy, dance lounge where the poets read, then reconvene to rock.
Prognoz are madmen. They seduce with accessibility before blasting into the obscure. Each killer indie tunes evolves and expands into a long and complex noise jam of the ages.
Sad Roach call themselves goofy goober core, a description as hyperactive as their stage energy. Their hardcore boppers land at 1 to 2 minutes apiece so be careful not to blink.
Little Lungs push a lot more than open air: the group’s folk-based groove veers into lounge-y indie pop as evocative as it is emotional.
Performance artist, comedian, and provocateur Virginia Warwick leads a trio that is simultaneously abrasive, poetic and powerful. Truly an otherworldly experience.
When it comes to Eyelet’s monstrous etudes, the term “Screamo” seems almost inappropriate, After all, the band mashes elements of the aforementioned genre with more traditional hardcore, post-rock and doomy elements, ultimately transcending classification of such a simple sort.
Early American aren’t so much a throwback as a mighty toss against the grain. Post-hardcore with an eye to post-rock of the late 90s and early oughts, the band’s unfurling epics reach heights of absolute azure.
Los Dientes Hundidos en la Garganta is a pedal pusher’s dream. Cycling through untold levels of ascension, Andres Lugo creates foggy, static-y skies, only to piece them savagely with noise rock, shoegaze, experimental, and drone inspired atmospheres.
Obscure electronics evoke a mix of library and symphony hall spaces as Liz Downing’s breath echoes, both sweetly, and with eternal, ethereal ambience.
INSIGNIA
8:30 PM
@ MOBTOWN BALLROOM
Screamo/post-hardcore for the chronically unsettled, Insignia are a force of nature. A writhing stage beast that’s ready and willing to tango.
Manners Manners makes no bones about breaking rules. The band rolls unapologetically through a rolodex of 90s and early oughs inspirations, from dreamy indie pop and alt-rock attitude to Sleater-Kinney grit and grapple. The result is utterly engaging, and poised in honest, approachable emotion.
Whether pioneering 4-track taping techniques, rubbing dusty elbows with the folks at K, Slumberland, and Shrimper, or just producing unfathomably unique bedroom pop, Linda Smith has always been an enigma. The stuff of Baltimore lo-fi legend, her recent resurgence is a welcome return for Gen-X indie acolytes and a boon for every age group after.
Black Lung live In a country-fried blues garage with a punk/metal neighbor on either end. Ozzy-adjacent howls meet Zep-worthy riffs as the group ascends to heights both seedy and sublime.
Staunch advocates of killer 80s/90s camp, The Electric Grandmother are a multi-sensory electro experience. Some lyrics may prove a bit much for the easily offended (you were warned!), but at all points the duo remains witty, dance-worthy, and absolutely entertaining.
Bedlam Brass is less a band and more a frenetic, interactive experience. The group’s pit energy (and its members’ level-10 calisthenics) are immersive, enormous, and, of course, skronking in the extreme.
Intense, abrasive, unrelenting — Just a few ways of saying that hardcore powerhouse Dry Socket take the pit (and politics) up to 11. The band slaps new intensity against old-school ethos. The result? Chaos colaeseing into catharsis.
Criminaly catchy and always incisive, Landis’ electro epics have earned nigh-on legendary status on the interwebs. The reason? Whether culturally prescient, deeply personal, or straight up silly, Landis’ prolific nature is only outpaced by his absolute sense of song.