I don’t often write about folk bands, but Brooklyn-based Pearl and the Beard stand out from the rest of the folk-pop fold in a couple of different ways. The first is that they are not relentlessly cheery or obsessed with being cute and old-timey. While they do have their share of cute acoustic songs, just as many of their songs are dark and unsettling. The trio of Jocelyn Mackenzie, Emily Hope Price and Jeremy Styles use guitar, drums, keyboards and percussion to create a bit of modern menace in the otherwise bubbly world of folk-pop.
CSPS
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Japanese performance group FaiFai make their U.S. debut this weekend in Cedar Rapids
Tokyo-based theater company Faifai will be visiting CSPS in Cedar Rapids this weekend, marking the group’s first stop on their first-ever visit to the U.S…
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Pieta Brown and Lucie Thorne bring Love Over Gold to CSPS Wednesday
Pieta Brown is bringing her latest music project, Love Over Gold, to the grand CSPS stage in Cedar Rapids Wednesday. The two-piece project consists of Brown and…
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Festival preview: Landfall Festival of World Music
The Sixth Annual Landfall Festival of World Music comes to multiple venues in Cedar Rapids from Sept. 24-28. The festival planners boast having more than 70 musicians from 12 countries this year.
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Interview: Christopher the Conquered talks current projects and upcoming Eastern Iowa shows
Central Iowa staple Chris Ford (a.k.a. Christopher the Conquered) has a couple of shows scheduled for Eastern Iowa in the next week, one this Sunday at The Mill…
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Live Music Preview: April 9-15
With the presence of bands like Foo Fighters and Nickelback, some might say that rock and roll is dying if not dead. On the contrary, I would argue that these bands are not rock and roll. Sure, they look like rock and roll bands with their tattoos and guitars, but they are missing the most important aspect of rocking: swagger. You can’t be rock and roll if you give a fuck. There are bands that embody the rock and roll ethos such as TV Ghost and Guitar Wolf, who have both always ripped first, not caring about whether they were liked or not.
Posted inArts & Entertainment
On The Beat: Old school’s back in session
By the time that you are reading this column, the annual Mission Creek Festival will be less than a month away, a sign that spring is beginning to rear its head and musicians are getting back on the road. This is a benefit to everyone and means that many artists with a wide variety of backgrounds and approaches to music will be making visits over the coming weeks.
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Iowa City Weekender: November 23-24
Hello and welcome to another edition of the Weekender. I’ve decided to cut out Thursday this week because it’s Thanksgiving and well, nothing is really happening. For those of us […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Landfall Festival of World Music – September 19-22
The words “World Music,” when used as an all-encapsulating genre of music can often be tricky and misleading. How can so many unique sounds from all over the globe be […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
On the Beat: Searching for the summer jam
Although it is my least favorite season for any variety of reasons such as boredom, I do look forward to the summer. It’s the traveling season as well as a […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Event Preview: Landfall Festival of World Music 9/22-25, Sponsored by Little Village!
From the mind-altering, polyphonic a capella of Corsican quartet Barbara Fortuna to the 12-piece Romanian gypsy punk of Mahala Rai Banda, and featuring Kenyan drum ensemble Kenge Kenge, dance music from Colombia’s Cimarrón and Brooklyn-based Nation Beat, Landfall is totally worth the trip up to CR this weekend.
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Iowa City Weekender: 5/20-23
THURSDAY
Simon Joyner w Miracles of God and Brooks Strause | $10 | 8 pm
Simon Joyner is calling this his “Living Rooms and Discrete Spaces” tour and I think they are trying to keep it low-profile, but this show is too cool to not get any sort of mention at all, […]
