Lottery hosts free Minneapolis rock shows

The Minnesota Lottery has put together a great set of free shows with many of HowWasTheShow's favorite bands on board. Check out the summary below. The Lottery has engaged social media marketers to reach the fans directly and has been successful in generating buzz about these top notch lineups. Check out the summary of May's events in the e-press release below.

MINNEAPOLIS – Free rock will be on tap at local venues in May, courtesy of a new concert-themed scratch game from the Minnesota State Lottery. The shows are open to anyone 18 years and older:

• Sunday, May 16, 8 p.m. – Triple Rock Social Club: Red Pens with BNLX and Voytek. (Facebook event - http://bit.ly/bJ4I3C)
• Wednesday, May 19, 8 p.m. – Fine Line Music Café: Melismatics with Alarmists and The Idle Hands. (Facebook event - http://bit.ly/9E5FX9)
• Thursday, May 27, 8 p.m. – Varsity Theater: Rogue Valley with the Jason Shannon Band and Strangelights. (Facebook event - http://bit.ly/dCdyk8)

Cash & Concerts is a concert-themed Scratch Game that features music downloads and VIP concert tickets, in addition to cash prizes. Details for the shows and the new game at LuckyMN.com/rock.

Chasing the Sun: The Best of The Honeydogs

Just in time for them to help First Avenue celebrate its 40th Birthday on Saturday, The Honeydogs are releasing a digital compilation of some of their best songs of the past 15 years.

The Honeydogs play First Avenue Saturday night, May 8th along with Lucy Michelle and the Velvet Lapelles and Anders Ponders. The 18+ show starts at 6PM. (Tickets and details here.)

Kings Wine Bar will be hosting a special listening party for the Honeydogs with members of the band on hand to help celebrate featuring rare live tracks and studio outtakes on Wednesday, May 5th. That event gets underway at 9:30 p.m.

I was honored to be asked to write the "liner notes" for the digital release of the record:

There aren't many Twin Cities bands or contemporary bands, for that matter, who would dare (or even could) assemble a “best of” album 35 tracks deep, but from the first song on the new Honeydogs compilation "Chasing the Sun: The Best of The Honeydogs,” you will find yourself swimming in an ocean of smart, catchy songs selected from their nine studio albums since 1995, and you won’t see the shore for more than two hours.

They aren’t all obvious singles like “Rumor Has It” (the opening track) or “I Miss You,” two of the Honeydogs most recognizable songs; but you can’t throw a dart at this collection and hit anything that even comes close to being considered filler. This truly is an “essential” Honeydogs collection.

Drawing on some of the best pop of the last 50 years (Elvis Costello, Merle Haggard, Brian Wilson, Harry Nillsson, Dylan, Bacharach, Randy Newman, Serge Gainbourg, Brazilian Tropicalia,and Nick Drake)“Chasing the Sun” delivers pop, country, rock, jazz, boss nova, and occasional middle eastern seasoning, showcasing the broad spectrum of musical styles the band has not just dabbled in, but mastered over the years. However you cut it, this is addictively listenable music: pop with a conscience, and proof that brainy rock can be fun.

- David de Young (April, 2010)

Voltage Band Spotlight #5: Caroline Smith and the Good Night Sleeps

Caroline Smith and the Good Night Sleeps - Photo by Amanda Johnson

Band members: Caroline Smith (guitar, vocals), Arlen Peiffer (drums), Jesse Schuster (bass) and Colin Hacklander (keyboards)

Listen: http://www.myspace.com/carolinesmithmusic

Caroline Smith is going places. Literally. Smith and her three piece band band The Good Night Sleeps, which consists of Colin Hacklander (Something With Kites) on keyboards, Jesse Schuster (Lucy Michelle) on bass and Arlen Peiffer (Cloud Cult, The Wapsipinicon) on drums, will hit the Voltage Fashion Amplified stage a week after a tour of the Midwest and the East Coast that takes them from Iowa City to Brooklyn and back again. As soon as Voltage winds up, the band will be back out on the road less than a week later to Madison, Chicago and South Bend, Indiana.

Smith’s folk/pop debut Backyard Tent Set came out in 2008. Often compared to Lucy Michelle, with whom she shares bassist Jesse Schuster, for her Billie Holiday/Joanna Newsom-like vocals, Caroline Smith played First Avenue’s Best New Bands showcase in 2008. On her Myspace page, Smith cities an exceedingly diverse list of influences, from Ben Gibbard, to Wilco, to Carly Simon and The Pixies. It all adds up to a listen that is always engaging, often tender and accessible whichever direction your musical taste runs.

What strikes me most about Smith is her poise. She’s a performer fully aware and fully in control while on stage. Her songs are often troubling, but matter of fact stories. Check out “Closing the Doors” as an exemplary song.

Smith released Live At The Cedar in January, and the band is currently working on a full length album due out later in 2010.

For Voltage, Caroline Smith and her band will be outfitted by Calpurnia Peach, the designer team of Luci Kandler and Ashley Wokasch. (In the publicity photo above, Smith is wearing one of their dresses.)

Voltage is Friday, April 16th at First Avenue. Buy your tickets now!

Head over to our Voltage partner, L'etoile Magazine for this week's designer profiles on Emma Berg and Kevin Kramp.

Voltage Band Spotlight #4: Red Pens

(Red Pens - Photo by Stephanie Colgan)

Band Members: Howard W. Hamilton III (guitars, effects) Laura F. Bennett (drums)

Listen: http://www.myspace.com/redpensband

Guitarist and drummer two-piece rock bands have appeared on the local and national scene in the past whom I have wished would get a bass player. Red Pens is not one of those bands. The duo of Howard W. Hamilton III and Laura F. Bennett have no trouble filling rooms (even First Avenue’s main room, where they played the most recent “Best New Bands” showcase) with their powerful, feedback and emotionally-drenched dissonant sound. The band holds the stage with the energetic presence often reserved for three and four-piece ensembles.

Bennett (drums) and Hamilton (guitars, effects) are both veterans of the Twin Cities music scene, Hamilton most recently a member of The Busy Signals, and Bennett the former drummer for the Mood Swings. Red Pens won the coveted “Picked to Click” designation from the City Pages in 2009 even before their debut album, Reasons hit the streets. Reasons was released in February on the Grain Belt Records label, and vinyl aficionados will delight the album was also released in limited edition 12-inch format with a record release party a couple weekends ago at the Hexagon.

Red Pens’ moody, sonic attack is best experienced live; though Reasons does a terrific job of representing the range of sound the band is capable of. The band toured earlier this spring, playing venues from Chicago to New York City. Both Hamilton and Bennett give it their all when they perform live, Bennett often smiling from behind the drums balancing Hamilton’s stern visage. It’s the perfect balance of yin and yang.

If you like Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine or the Velvet Underground, you’ll likely find much to love about Red Pens, who will bring fuzzy, art-rock intensity to Voltage 2010.

For Voltage, Red Pens will be outfitted by Red Shoe Clothing Company, a design group founded by Kerry Riley in 2002.

Voltage Band Spotlight #3 - Mayda

Mayda

Band Members: Mayda Miller (vocals, guitar), Michael Bland (drums),Cory Eischen (keyboards, samples), Andy Mark (bass), Jacob Hanson (guitar)

Listen: http://www.myspace.com/imaydasong

St. Paul’s Mayda Miller (or simply Mayda) comes to Voltage hot on the heals of her 2009 EP Eyes on the Water which was released digitally on Michael Bland’s Sonic Matrimony Collective label in November. (Bland, Mayda’s drummer, is best known as the drummer for Prince during The New Power Generation years and even more recently as the drummer for Soul Asylum.)

I first encountered Mayda when she played acoustically at the Mad Ripple Hootenanny in 2009. Those who were seeing her for the first time that night will never forget when she strapped on her blue guitar for the wonderfully risqué “Good Girls,” which appears on her latest EP. (That song is a great starting point for a new listener, and you should check it out here.)

Though “Good Girls” is an catchy and clever acoustic ditty, Mayda is known for tearing it up at electric shows: exact, energetic and in control, she is an attention-getter and attention-keeper.

I’m proud of myself for making it halfway through this profile without mentioning Mayda is a petite and unassuming 4 foot10 inch tall Korean woman, but seems at least twice that tall when she hits the stage. In person she exudes a calm and gentle confidence.

CD Baby recommends Mayda to music lovers who like Black Eyed Peas, Grace Jones, or Prince, and that’s a start. Her power pop, and both acoustic electric alternative hip-hop have mainstream appeal, but are more than engaging and intriguing enough to endear her to the most critically-minded music fan as well.

Of all the other comparisons I’ve read in reviews, perhaps Mark Brenden put it best in the fall in the Minnesota Daily when describing her new EP, saying it contains “the vocal prowess and Aretha Franklin-level emotion” as well as the “guitar goddess-ness of Nancy Wilson.”

However you describe her, Mayda and her band are a brilliant addition to the Voltage line-up bound to add cutting-edge flair to their segment of the show that’s bound to get the heads of the crowd bobbing.

Mayda and her band will be outfitted for Voltage by veteran local designer Laura Fulk.

See also this week, Juleana Enright’s Voltage Spotlights on designers Raul Osorio and Elena Mercurio.

Voltage Band Spotlight #2: Blue Sky Blackout

Blue Sky Blackout - photo by Kate Iverson

This is the second in a series of Voltage 2010 band spotlights we'll be running here on the HowWasTheShow blog, one each week up until the week of the show. (Last week we profiled Ruby Isle, who will also be playing Voltage 2010 at First Avenue on Friday, April 16th.)

Blue Sky Blackout

Band Members: Jon Hunt, Christian Erickson, Marc Iwanin, Mykl Westbrooks, Tim Ritter, and Brandon Dalida.

Listen: http://vimeo.com/9734324

If there’s such a thing as good cholesterol, perhaps there’s such a thing as good testosterone. Every time I see the six members of Blue Sky Blackout on stage, I can’t help but think: damn, that’s a lot of dudes. And cool, fashionable dudes at that, who know how to rock.

Blue Sky Blackout was conceived by Jon Hunt (Shatterproof, Landing Gear, Medication) in 2009 and played their first show in July 2009 with a lineup that reads like a veritable super group of Twin Cities rock: Christian Erickson (Astronaut Wife) provides lead vocals, Mykl Westbrooks (Landing Gear) and Brandon Dalida (Mercurial Rage, The TV Sound) both play lead guitar in addition to the guitar by Hunt himself. The band is rounded out by Tim Ritter (Astronaut Wife) on bass and drummer Marc Iwanin of Basement Apartment. Blue Sky Blackout proves beyond a shadow of doubt that there are times in life when three guitars is exactly what the rock doctor ordered.

Blue Sky Blackout plays heavy, catchy Brit rock with hooks and attitude that literally spills from the stage. The songs are fresh yet somehow familiar. I don’t believe anyone in this band would dare claim they are doing anything particularly new; my take is they are just doing something extremely cool that they are all very good at that no one else on the local scene is doing right now. The result is a whole helluvalot of fun.

But don’t take my word for it. Check out this teaser of “Somebody Said That You Loved Me” from their upcoming Susstones 3-side, to be released in April and I believe you’ll instantly see what I mean. Blue Sky Blackout are sure to bring a rock star touch to Voltage this year.

Blue Sky Blackout will be outfitted by Steve Kang of BlackBlue for Voltage 2010. For more on menswear designer and boutique owner Kang, check out this interview L’etoile did with him last fall.

Also this week, check out L’etoile’s Voltage designer spotlights on Brianne Jones and Christine Carmichael.

Voltage Band Spotlight #1: Ruby Isle

Ruby Isle, publicity photo

This is the first in a series of Voltage 2010 band spotlights we'll be running here on the HowWasTheShow blog, one each week up until the week of the show. Our first band profile is of Ruby Isle, who will be playing Voltage 2010 at First Avenue on Friday, April 16th.

Ruby Isle

Band Members: Mark Mallman (vocals, guitar), Dan Geller (bass, vocoder) and Aaron Lemay (drums)

Listen: http://www.myspace.com/rubyisle

Twin Cities/Athens, GA electro rock band Ruby Isle (who may or may not be named after a shopping center in Brookfield, Wisconsin) is at SXSW this week debuting their take on Guns ‘N Roses “Appetite for Destruction,” which they recently covered in its entirety.

Ruby Isle’s MySpace page claims they are a singing trio of brothers, though those in the know realize this is completely fictitious. Even those who don’t will begin to doubt that when they read on to hear that in 2008 the trio of brothers were asked to defend the Mexican village of Santo Poco from a bandit named El Guapo. Or who knows, maybe it's all true!

In any case, the band, who call themselves “the party band for the apocalypse” (if so, it almost makes you wish those four horsemen would gallop faster) come from three separate well-respected bands, Mark Mallman (Mark Mallman), I Am The World Trade Center (Dan Geller) and International Espionage (Aaron Lemay.)

Known for their electro dance covers of songs by bands like the Decemberists, Fleet Foxes, Animal Collective and Bon Iver (see the videos for several of these on their MySpace), the band will bring some of their originals like “So Damn High” and “Night Shot” to Voltage 2010 and the result is bound to be an explosive set you won’t want to miss.

At Voltage, Ruby Isle will be outfitted by Anthem Heart, who will also be designing this year's limited edition t-shirts for the Voltage event (available at the show.)