Busy day today (and yesterday), so I’ll keep this short. Taylor at T-Sides has been reporting from the CMJ Music Marathon in New York City for the last few days. It’s basically 4 or 5 nights of Indie bands playing gigs and impressing the locals in the Big Apple, and she wrote about a band that I’ve grown to like quite a lot. Their name is Elk City and their sound is very New York. There’s a bit of Velvet Underground, a bit of Patti Smith, a bit of Blondie, and probably a few other heavy hitters in their style, but it’s not overblown to the point where you say “Oh, there’s VU…and there’s Patti Smith…and there’s (fill in the blank).” Instead, their dreamy sound and powerful vocals from Renee LoBue will certainly propel them up from the underground soon enough.
I’m really grooving on a couple of their songs right now, and I wanted all 12-14 readers of this blog to have a listen as well. My current favorite is “Cherries in the Snow” (Download HERE), which is a song that really reminds me of Blondie. “Silver Lawyers” (Download HERE) is also quite good, but it took me a few spins to really get into it. The song has a lush and, at times, a kind of surreal quality that captures an arty coolness of an out-of-the-way enclave in a city.
In true “I’m smitten by a new band” style, I added Elk City as a friend on Myspace and even wrote them a note saying how much I liked their music. Their drummer/producer, Ray Ketchem, wrote back and said they might come to California and play some dates in ’07. 🙂
I’m not sure when their new CD is coming out, but I intend to buy it as soon as it does. In the meantime, enjoy these two songs and I’ll meet you back here tomorrow for the Weekly Mix Six.
–PK
8 thoughts on “New Music: Elk City”
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I liked what I heard of this group, too! When I’m downstairs, I’ll have to listen some more. Fun to get into a new band, and how cool that they’re still small enough to write you back!
Thanks for the new stuff! Will miss your Friday Mix Six tomorrow 🙁 We have the day off being gov’t employees and all.
But you can always catch the “late edition” on Monday!:-)
Sounds cool! I’ll check it out. BTW, is the Jenny cat song a bad one? 🙂
PK- Cherries in the Snow is the very first song I have listened to with a DSL at work. Wow! Love it! I have missed so much. Thanks!
Initial reaction to the Cherries in the Snow song name…. I’m not going to like this, purely on the name. I’m like that.
After listening – It’s pretty catchy. Kinda has an 80’s groove to it. But still having a hard time getting over the repeated use of my name.
Thank you music Genius. You are really great with the music. I like the name Cherries in the snow.
Beenzzz: “Jenny Cat” has some strange lyrics,but it’s a simple song about a bratty cat.
MsMamma: Welcome to the world of high speed! Glad you like the song.
Cherry: There aren’t that many songs with “Cherry” in it, so I would think you’d like this one. “Cherry Cherry” by Neil Diamond is pretty good, too. 🙂
La Luna: “Cherries in the Snow” is a great song title. How did you like the song?