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The Fresh & Onlys + Chuck Johnson at Monarch

Danno — Wed, 26 Jun 2013 18:00:00 +0000

An awesome lineup and an equally awesome conclusion to a quietly magical series at Monarch, Since the Devil Is Gone I Mostly Feel Lonely. Monarch hosts this time round San Francisco indie-folk rockers The Fresh & Onlys plus Chuck Johnson playing live, live, live.

‘Folk Minimalism’ is what Chuck Johnson labels his music as, whether it be his outsanding electronica work or his forays into acoustic guitar. With Chuck Johnson the creation of new musical lifeforms from one simple opening chord is just what he does and what he’s all about. Layered guitars, with each line weaving in and out of the others, american ragas, small forests of sound growing where seconds ago only one small shoot was showing.

Having been a part of soundtracking a number of films and featuring in a number of experimental music ensembles, Chuck Johnson’s got a new LP out, Crows in the Basilica being the title.

“Joyful yet cerebral, the new record spirals melodic phrases in and out of the depths; it’s like a gentle hurricane at sea. At eight minutes, the deceptively quiet On a Slow Passing in Ghost Town is a raga that rages moodily.”

- Lars Gotrich NPR

The Fresh & Onlys are no strangers to Berlin (previously) and no strangers to the hearts and minds of indie-kids everywhere. They play a fresh, sounding, bubbly but sensible, American indie-rock that’s got a discernable country twang to it. It’s the perfect music to hear in a club, if your club were a T-Bird peeling off down a deserted middle-American highway, heading to a beach or just getting you the goddamn hell out of this two-bit town.

The Fresh & Onlys have also a newish album out, late 2012′s Long Slow Dance and the reviews were all in agreement…

“Easily the slickest album the Fresh & Onlys have made yet, Long Slow Dance subtly expands the band’s sonic palette without overwhelming the band’s appealing simplicity.”

- P,P,Pitchfork

Playing here in Berlin as part of the Since The Devil Is Gone I Mostly Feel Lonely music series, The Fresh & Onlys and Chuck Johnson will be hosted at Monarch in Kreuzberg. Tickets are available from the link below for around ten pesos and doors open at 8pm. This is the last night of a very fine americana music series, and your last chance to show some love for a very unique and ambitious set of concerts.

Tegan and Sara at Astra

debjay — Tue, 18 Jun 2013 17:00:00 +0000

Tegan and Sara’s 13-year career has seen them build an avid global following of fans and fellow musicians alike. Their unique ability to bridge the pop and indie worlds has allowed their music to cross all traditional boundaries of genre, from being covered by The White Stripes to collaborating with Against Me! or James Iha (The Smashing Pumpkins). Having sold nearly 1 million career albums and toured with acts from The Killers to Neil Young, Tegan and Sara have now released their 7th studio album – Heartthrob – as internationally-celebrated songwriters, performers, and artists.

Tegan Quin and Sara Quin were born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in 1980 and began playing guitar and writing songs at age 15. Following the release of their first independent full-length album, Under Feet Like Ours, in 1999, they caught the attention of Neil Young’s iconic manager, Elliot Roberts, who quickly signed them to his Los Angeles-based label, Vapor Records. Tegan and Sara’s first international release on Vapor, This Business Of Art, was followed by extensive worldwide touring, including opening slots with Neil Young himself and a first appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman.

Their international breakthrough came with the 2007 album The Con which included the hit single Back in Your Head. Heartthrob is their is their latest and seventh album and takes them down a more danceable road.

Tegan and Sara have become not only two of the most interesting pop stars of the last decade but also gay icons. Though their music is not overtly political, Tegan and Sara are very politically and socially engaged. They are outspoken advocates for LGBT equality, and have done countless fundraisers for youth organizations, music education, literacy, cancer research and LGBT advocacy.

Giveaway: Kate Boy at Privatclub

Danno — Fri, 31 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

Swedish performer Kate Boy picked up more than a taste for synth-wave in her travels through Australia. With the ethereal sound that’s imbued through her material, there’s almost an element of the dreamtime, the Australian Aboriginal spirit-world where the world was created by the Rainbow Snake. This is maybe where the comparisons are coming from between Kate Boy and the Knife. The Knife harness a tribalism that’s part Neo-Tokyo part Clan of The Cave Bear and Kate Boy’s there with a cold timelessness that’s sits between the here-now and the now from before here even existed. There’s a line in there somewhere that they both share and it’s not so complicated to hear as it is to document.

Darling of the international media right now, Kate Boy has become a favourite of the Pitchforks and NMEs of the world. The debut album made it out at the end of last year and she’s making it here for a gig in Privatclub. Things are moving and happening.

Thanks to the kind people of Nordic By Nature, Blitzgigs is giving away a double pass to see Kate Boy here in Berlin. To grab your free tickets, just email us here at winwinwin@blitzgigs.de with your full name and the answer to the following easy question…

What’s the name of Kate Boy’s debut album?

Entries close May 30th and the winner will be notified by email. Good Luck!

Teenitus Fest 2013

Danno — Fri, 31 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

Nobody ever really dies and nothing ever really ends, but at least for this year, Teenitus festival draws a curtain across itself. Before the lights get switched off though, there’s a quietly epic closing program happening, once again across all of Festsaal, Monarch & West Germany and once again there’ll be plenty of drinking and crazed behaviour going on and once again, it would be nothing if you were not there for all of it.

Be overwhelmed at Festsaal by…

Dirty Beaches – Rockabilly for a parallel universe, one where the fifties happened in a bubble of cyberpunk and grim street-voodoo. Taiwanese born Canadian Alex Zhang Hungtai fuses rockabilly with spy film soundtracks, life on the road, found-sounds recorded during the surgical examination of David Lynch’s cerebral cortex.

Zebra Katz & Njena Redd Foxx – “Relying largely on minimalist percussion, the music itself pulls heavily distorted voices, beats and samples through states of intoxication, ranging from hazy deep-bass, codeine and champagne numbers like “ICU” to cocaine-laced blunt rides that serve as explosive escapes from the former experience…” – Cluster Mag

Dawn Hunger – A product of one Andrew Hung (Fuck Buttons), Dawn Hunger generate ultra-distressed electro-pop, the kind of music the comes from tuning a radio to two stations at once with power-tool interference slithering in between.

Station 17 – Classic minimal-synth act out of Hamburg, still making robot music for non-robots even after forming in 1988. Taking there name from the group home that they originally formed out of, the band is formed from a number of disabled artists along with other professional musicians.

Urban Mutations DJ – Berlin based finders of rare and fine music, regulars at O Tannenbaum & Paloma, players of trap to jersey-club to juke to uk-bass.

Have your life changed at Monarch by…

DJ Team No1: J-Du & Jimmy Trash – Twin superpowers collide with a totally rare Afrobeat party at Monarch. Playing all that’s golden until the very late hours of the morning.

And of course at West Germany…

The three day long art gig that’s made up such a big part of the festival finally closes with a very tasteful and not at all trashy party. If you haven’t caught them yet, check out works from Juliane Kowalke, Marian Bodenstein, Florian Bräunlich, Christoph Blankenburg & others.

Single pass to this third day only 17€ or a three day festival pass can be made your own for 54€. Tix available at the door and from the linx below.

Running for the past few years in Erfurt, the festival will be returning there next year. If you’ve this time round had the kind of fun that only dreams and rainbows are made of, the wonderful city of Erfurt is waiting on your visit in 2014.

Not so much a

Chuckamuck at Ritter Butzke

Danno — Thu, 30 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

I’ve no idea whether they’d agree or not, doesn’t really matter any which way I guess. Chuckamuck are really starting to shape up as Berlin’s answer to the Libertines. The music has a tangible no-cares feel and the vibe of the band on a wholistic level is all about the likely-lads and so on. It’s enough to make you want to pull out your old NME back issues and refresh in your own mind how it is that the Doherty got so big so’s you can see whether the Chuckamuck people are fitting into that pattern or not.

Their debut LP is out and ready for you to take home and love. Jiles is the title and as a launch party here in Berlin, the Chuckamuck guys are going to be playing at Ritter Butzke nearby from Moritzplatz. Not a normal venue for a gig, but I think a few people have some plans for these guys that are equally far from normal.

Supporting on the night, The Beit-She’an Valley Hillbillies featuring Charlie Megira. Plus DJs. And you.

Purling Hiss at Marie-Antoinette

Danno — Thu, 30 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

Sounds leaking from an alternate Seventies, a decade where technology is on the decline and radio is only received very weakly from stations nobody remembers the location of. What are the kids left with? Back-issues of Heavy Metal magazine and scratchy broadcasts of bands that nobody ever got around to naming.

Metal, punk, rock, classic garage and all of it in beautiful lo-fi perfection. If you’ve ever bought a record and wished that it would hurry and wear out a bit so that it can start sounding old, then Purling Hiss are for you, they sound like all the best records that the second hand shop keeps out the back and saves for the people who know their stuff. Which is definitely going to be you after this gig.

Playing here in Berlin at Marie-Antoinette supported by Baltimore four piece Dope Body.

Teenitus Fest 2013

Danno — Thu, 30 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in. However, not every one of them is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the planets in the Universe can be said to be zero. From this it follows that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination.

Another day of weirdo art, culture and wanna-get-(actually and literally)-freaky-wit-u music courtesy of Teenitus Festival. This second day stretches your mind even further with live music not only in Festsaal and Monarch, but also West Germany.

It’s not a counter-culture, it’s the new culture.

Tonight hosted in Festsaal…

Palais Schaumburg – Seminal German experimentalia, they’ve been constructing audio realities since the early eighties and are a goto band for any one documenting, discussing or obsessing over classic wave.

Felix Kubin – Late at night when you’re not around or asleep, all of the digital devices in your house gather together and plot your downfall. It’s rare that they take a break from this work, but when they do, they’re all wearing Felix Kubin t-shirts. Member of Klangkrieg, Liedertafel Margot Honecker, Die Egozentrischen 2, X2 and Integrales.

White Fence – Solo project of Tim Presley, member of the Strange Boys, Darker My Love and the Fall. Psych for a drop-out crowd hitchhiking across the galaxy.

But then again at West Germany…

The Night Beats – Devotees to a sound coming from the darkest heart of sixties Texas, US experimental act the Night Beats capture a haunted guitar dynamic that’s at its best riding with the top down through bat country.

UV Glaze – Berlin noise voyagers making the high-tech sound low-tech and the low-tech sound amazing.

And Monarch is amazing with…

Wenzel Storch, cult movie director, author and understated genius will present a very special reading of his latest written work, Das ist die Liebe der Prälaten.

Single pass to this second day only 21€ or a three day festival pass can be made your own for 54€. Tix available at the door and from the linx below.

Teenitus Fest 2013

Danno — Wed, 29 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

Are you a dropout, loner, stoner, deadbeat, heavy-weight, midnight toking musically minded kind of kid? Ever wanted to enjoy the kinds of music heard on other planets, but not willing to travel far from the comforts of your parent’s basement? Lava lamps and Nintendo games are old news, what we’ve got now is Teenitus.

Three days of music & art for the hip outsider, Teenitus Festival is hosted across Festsaal, Monarch and West Germany, along with a bunch of drinking being done on the street outside. Inevitably, since that’s how you roll. Electronica, indie, rock, experimental, art and cool, every molecule of this festival has been arranged with you in mind. So do be there, or you’re being rude.

This first night wrap your mind around all this at Festsaal…

Mouse On Mars – German electronica act who’ ve been kicking around since the early nineties and who’ve had a massive influence on an entire generation of bedroom bangers.

Jan Jelinek & Masayoshi Fujita – Experimental loop electronica featuring live vibraphone & objects courtesy of M Fujita, soundtracking whatever personal mood you feel yourself in.

Farahnaz Hatam – Iranian born enthusiast of algorithmic composition, Hatam studied molecular biology in the States and curates cultural events in Berlin at NK and elsewhere. Her mode of musical transport: Supercollider, an open source programming language for real-time sound synthesis. Science and art, finally in one place at one time.

Meanwhile at Monarch…

Jonathon Toubin’s Soul Clap & Dance Off – the soul party to end all soul parties, or just THE soul party. Don’t judge it, love it.

And also at West Germany…

Art is where you find it and during Teenitus you can find it here at West Germany. This first night an exibition will be opened featuring selected works of Juliane Kowalke, Marian Bodenstein, Florian Bräunlich, Christoph Blankenburg & others.

Single pass to this first day only 21€ or a three day festival pass can be made your own for 54€. Tix available at the door and from the linx below.

Swans at Volksbuehne

Danno — Tue, 28 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

As an art form or genre, post-punk doesn’t easily lend itself toward purity. If there was ever an artistic ethos that created beauty from muddy water, blood and hard drugs, it was post punk and that has been the truth since its birth back in the very late 70′s. New York heritage-act Swans might not necessarily fit within this description, even though they themselves have been pretty much instrumental in it’s definition. While their music over the course of the past twenty years has been everything that distressed rock and stylish punk should be, they have always been seeking a certain order through their music. Whether it’s the repetitive structures, drone-like vocalisations or the general sterility of the final product, Swans might provide you strong visions of the cess-pit, but they were not birthed of it themselves.

Playing here in Berlin supported by London solo artist James Blackshaw.

Mudhoney at Festsaal

Danno — Sun, 26 May 2013 19:00:00 +0000

What’s to say? It’s fucken Mudhoney and it’s at Festsaal. Godfathers of grunge, whatever that means, garage punk gods, whoever that should be. Probably not a coincidence that they’re here and that they’ve got a new album out, their 9th full length, Vanishing Point. In fact, it’s obviously not a coincidence since the new stuff is actually really good and even though these guys might not have ever been the type to be monumentally mainstream famous, when you’ve got something good under your belt, you’re going to want to tell people about it no matter who you are.

Blitzgigs.de - Berlin's #1 live music, concert & nightlife listing.

The Fresh & Onlys + Chuck Johnson at Monarch

Gig Details

Tegan and Sara at Astra

Gig Details

Giveaway: Kate Boy at Privatclub

What’s the name of Kate Boy’s debut album?

Gig Details

Teenitus Fest 2013

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Chuckamuck at Ritter Butzke

Gig Details

Purling Hiss at Marie-Antoinette

Gig Details

Teenitus Fest 2013

Gig Details

Teenitus Fest 2013

Single pass to this first day only 21€ or a three day festival pass can be made your own for 54€. Tix available at the door and from the linx below.

Gig Details

Swans at Volksbuehne

Gig Details

Mudhoney at Festsaal

Gig Details