White Lung played Baby's All Right (pics); Marissa Nadler reviewed their new album
photos by Amanda Hatfield
White Lung brought their tour in support of their excellent fourth album Paradise to Baby’s All Right on Saturday (5/7), the day after the album came out, for their first of three NYC appearances. It was sold out and packed, and White Lung sounded great as ever. Mish Barber-Way is the kind of frontwoman who can clearly command venues five times the size of the ones she normally plays, and she’s genuinely menacing on stage. I’m all for the punk thing of breaking down the boundaries between the band and audience, but there’s also nothing like a punk singer who still appears larger than life and Mish is absolutely that. The rest of the band are of course no slackers either, with a rhythm section set to “full speed ahead” and the mind-melting fretwork of guitarist Kenneth William. Check out pictures of the show — including openers Wives — in this post.
White Lung’s next show is tonight (5/9) at a secret location. RSVP is open but does not guarantee entry. They also play day one of Panorama (the one with Arcade Fire, Broken Social Scene and more).
In other White Lung news, the great haunting folk singer Marissa Nadler (who has a new album and tour on the way) just reviewed Paradise for The Talkhouse. Here’s an excerpt:
This is music that stirs up the inexplicable, music that makes you want to do crazy things or recall surreal childhood memories that are impossible to confirm. Yes, this album sounds brand-new and modern, but it makes me feel the same way I felt when I first heard some of my favorite bands. I’m stopping myself here from naming these bands because it’s not important to know who, but why — and because the endless stream of comparisons from which musicians suffer, particularly female musicians, has made me resolve not to make my own comparisons. It’s that direct, no-frills intensity that slayed me then — as a sixteen-year-old wallflower searching to experience more than my humdrum reality — that slays me now with Paradise. For example, on “I Beg You,” the transition from the verse to the chorus is razor-sharp, cut with an X-Acto knife, while Barber-Way hollers, “This is the death of me/I need our fantasy/Blow out the dust in my empty mind.”
Read the rest HERE.
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Wives
White Lung
more pictures of White Lung at House of Vans during SXSW in the gallery below:
