Author Archive for shaun bateman

11
June
2009
tags: all we ever do is post flyers, anthems.

RESoteric: You’ve never heard anything like this

June 20, 9:30 PM, Manhattan we go hard:

resoteric.jpg

 Resonator Magazine: you ain’t never had a friend like us. We’re kind of like that cool older brother or sister that tipped you off via mixtapes to music that was way ahead of its (and your) time, so that you got to walk around your middle-school cafeteria acting like you were incredibly clued-in and impressing all the 8th graders.

 In fact, we at Res are EXACTLY like that. So, for this installment of Resonator Magazine’s monthly live music showcase at the Tank (354 W 45th St, Manhattan), we’re bringing you RESoteric-stuff that we love and that we can guarantee you’ve never heard anything like, ever. These bands are ones that you’d use to bookend mix tapes (screw CDs, tapes take love) to impress potential suitors, friends, bosses, baristas. These are bands that make you stop and say “daaaamn”.  That’s it, just “daaaamn”.

 All the way from Hotlanta, GA (which is what the cool kids call it, trust us we know these things), are both The Constellations and Judi Chicago. The Constellations bring an energetic, massive stage spectacular comprised of a who’s-who of the best in Atlanta bands. Judi Chicago is a band Res Mag’s been writing about forever and a day, and it’s about time you finally get to see them if you haven’t-one of the craziest, most insanely fun live shows ever, perfect music for drinking and dancing at the same time. Trixie says “Judi Chicago sounds like Happy Mondays with circuit bending.” You’ve never heard anything like that? EXACTLY.

Headliners for the night, NY-based Ava Luna, focus in on the tension between a charged post-punk drum-and-synth-bass rhythm section and the combined vocal talents of manic frontman Carlos Hernandez and a trio of startlingly gospel-voiced backup singers. Post-punk futuristic gospel? You’ll be thanking us and begging for more.

As per usual, Res folks Shaun, Hacks and Trixie will be DJing throughout the night to make one flowing, cohesive experience, and there’ll be a three-VJ showdown between Paris, Mary Ann and Jean to ensure that you’ll have never seen anything like RESoteric, either.

RESoteric: You’ll have never had a night like this.

 We’ll be working our cute little butts off to get you a plethora of music in the next few days, but for now:

Judi Chicago

The Constellations

Ava Luna

For presale tickets, go here: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/70840

4 Comments



20
May
2009
tags: Ghost Of Summer Suns, The Swear.

Swirls of Midnight

Elizabeth Elkins is a singer-songwriter you call when you need to rock-and note, if you will, that there are two parts of this sentence that seem to contradict one another-”singer/songwriter” and “rock”.

That’s merely one of many fascinating facets of the Atlanta-based Elkins, who, in addition to being front-woman for Resonator favorites ;The Swear (whose criminally underrated album Hotel Rooms And Heart Attacks is a mastery of pop-melody and hard-rock muscle), is launching a new solo project,Ghost of Summer Suns

Whereas the music of The Swear tends to traverse graveyards at midnight and blacktop at dusk,  the sound of Ghost of Summer Suns is confessional, winter-kissed soundscapes that still, well, still rock.

In typical RES fashion, the following Q&A with Elizabeth encompasses everything in our long, strange and ultimately awesome history with her and her various musical projects, culminating this coming Saturday when Ghost of Summer Suns plays our RESrawk party in NYC. Take a read and get familiar now, so that you’re not left behind Saturday night (or…ever). Cheer as she takes no prisoners, calls out rock crictics and indie kids alike, and cue this up for an audio taster:

Ghost Of Summer Suns: Gifted

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 RES: I know that in your holy chapel of musicians, Moz is number one and…I think…Tori Amos is number two. If you were to pick five records that have had a massive impact on you, musically, song-writing wise, and otherwise, that WERE NOT by either of them, what would they be?

Elizabeth Elkins: Five most influencial records (minus Moz/Smiths and Tori):
PS - this is tough because when I think of most influential, I generally think of literature (T.S. Eliot, Joseph Conrad, Gustav Flaubert, Edward Albee, Eugene O’Neill, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Erich Marie Remarque…) influencing me as a writer just as much as music….but here goes:

Continue reading ‘Swirls of Midnight’

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15
May
2009
tags: Mp3.

RES presents: RESrawk

All we ever do is post flyers

For its second monthly RES live music showcase at The Tank in Manhattan, NY, Resonator Mag is going back to its roots.

(No, think farther back than the glowsticks.)

May 23, Resonator Magazine presents RESrawk, a night of getting back to guitars. You hear that, Junior Boys? None of your fancy-schmancy “samplers” welcome here, as RESrawk is a night all about snarl and volume. Power chords, turn it up to 11, and all that jazz.

(There will be no jazz.)

From Atlanta comes Ghost of Summer Suns, aka Elizabeth Elkins of The Swear (the hardest rocking band you’ve ever heard, ever) in her solo guise with a powerful, plugged-in swagger. New York’s the Royal Chains play jangly rock that’ll shake your (and your girlfriend’s) hips, and headliners Shapes, acclaimed (and intense and crazysexycool but mostly just crazy) pretty much everywhere, will be a lovely punch in the face with their intense eyeliner punk.

As always, the Resonator trio of Shaun, Trixie and Hacks will each be DJing thematically appropriate tunes between live sets, eye-catching mind-blowing visuals will be a-goin’ on, and there’s certain to be more rock-and-roll debauchery than you can shake your wallet chain at.

Facebook Event for RESrawk

Presales available here

Ghost of Summer Suns

Royal Chains

SHAPES

More from these bands coming next week.

1 Comment



29
April
2009
tags: Today The Moon, Tomorrow The Sun.

Don’t be too cerebral

The first and only time I saw Atlanta band Today The Moon, Tomorrow The Sun live, I didn’t actually intend on it. Resonator favorites Tealights were opening for them, and I was sick, just physically and emotionally spent from one of the most taxing times in my life thus far. After Tealights, I wanted to leave-the reserves that normally exist within me were gone.

Then, Today The Moon, Tomorrow The Sun took the stage…and owned the damn place. Am utter gale-force of an electro-rock 4-piece, with all the stomp and swagger of bands that fake the glittery sound these days but with a dark, gritty and emotional lyrical underpinning. I was hooked, instantly.

Today The Moon, Tomorrow The Sun: Traits of a Traitor (Autonomic Remix)

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“Traits of a Traitor” is a re-fashioning of the first song off of TTM,TTS’s new EP, The Lightning Exhibit, and it’s pretty much the damn coolest song you’re going to hear today. Electro-drunk female-vocal swagger that oozes sex, power, and late nights.

Today The Moon, Tomorrow The Sun are playing a show at the super-intimate 529 club in Atlanta this Thursday, April 30.

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24
April
2009
tags: Blank Dogs, Mp3.

Sounds in a hollow room

Trot out all of the myth-making musical tropes:

—Band name for a one-person act

– Veil of secrecy around actual one-person

–Face covered in promo shots

–Music is grainy, low-fi basment tapes

And then get ready to allow total license to Blank Dogs, the insanely prolific musical output from one guy named Mike from Brooklyn.

The reason Mike’s allowed any and all of the above telltale trappings of artistic pretension? Because when he emerges from his basement (possibly still masked), he presents music like this:

Blank Dogs: Tin Bird

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A haunting, skeletal ghost of a song, bass high and omniscient like the hand that guides the song’s murky, muddled perfection. I throw this around lightly, but I throw it here: it’s what New Order would sound like if Ian was still around. This is, hands down, one of the greatest single songs I’ve heard in 2009.

There’s really no overcoming what repeated listening to Blank Dogs’ forthcoming debut for In The Red records, Under and Under, does to the emotions. These songs grey the sky, darken the night and then bring the morning’s euphorically sleepy dawn.

For a bit more of a taster, here’s the video for Under and Under’s “Setting Fire To Your House”, which feels only a little less like “Ceremony” brought from the grave to the daylight than “Tin Birds”.

Edit: removed video because it was fubaring our htmls, yo! (hacks)

Blank Dogs Under and Under is out super-soon. Check the BD Myspace, he (they?) are playing a bunch of NY shows.

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14
April
2009
tags: Telepathe.

SoWhatSoFine

This is why I fucking love New York already.

Telepathe’s Dance Mother is one of the most stark, striking electronic albums I’ve heard this year (or any year, really). It’s layer upon layer of percussive instrumentation and voice, sometimes a scream and sometimes a whisper but most often a chant, a mantra, hypnotic and beckoning and oh my god yes I said yes Telepathe yes.

Telepathe: So Fine (Lauren Flax remix)

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The number of people who I know that are all “oh, I went to college and ate polenta with Lauren Flax” is like, well, ok, at like two or three at this point, but still, Lauren does something with this remix of Dance Mother’s kickoff track that strips the anger and ups the brooding.

Also, check out the awesome, stripped of anger and up’d of brooding Fader Telepathe Mixtape.

Dance Mother is available on CD/LP (the CD, I think, comes with some nifty remixes). Put your hard-earned dollars on this record, it’ll spit ‘em all right back at you and you’ll love it.

1 Comment



14
April
2009
tags: Mp3.

This is what REStart looked like

Drunk Shaun, Trixie and Hacks. We’re now no longer faceless, so you can kick our asses in the street for not liking your band or for only posting flyers on here when we’re actually busy trying to make the site BETTER you ungrateful bastards, go to you rooms and don’t come out until hi, oh, wait, phew for a minute there I lost myself.

Me (Shaun Bateman) playing Tealights. For the record, Tealights’ “Passport” will go down in history as the first song played at a full-on Resonator Mag party.

IvanaXL

Trixie and Hacks. Trixie gets no witty commentary because she’s on vay-cay this week.


SoundMatrix being effing awesome.

Hacks and some guy that I honestly have never met, ever, in my life.

Right around there is where the photo documentation I have (thanks K.!) ends. Blame the free champagne and cupcakes. However, our friends at Last Year’s Model managed to document themselves, and as such, some awesomeness from their way:

May 23rd is the second RES party. Bands, theme and sponsor coming your way.

Oh, and, um, so that this isn’t, you know, just a “flyer” post:

Tealights: Passport (first song at at first-ever RES party)

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And, since good old Thom is taking on the RIAA in court, an awesome, mind-melting remix of a great song from one of the best hip-hop records to come out yet this year

Doom: Gazillion Ear (Thom Yorke remix)

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2 Comments



04
April
2009
tags: Mp3.

ResTart

Have we harped on this enough yet? Don’t think so.

2 Comments



23
March
2009
tags: Tealights.

…where do i go now…

It’s officially t-minus five days and counting (well, four, really-ok, however many days lay between Monday and Friday) ’til I vacate the south and join Trixie and Hacks in the frigid, heathenistic northern wasteland of New York.

(Love ya NYC)

In case you’ve somehow managed to miss it, we’ve planned a giant party, the first of many, to celebrate on April 11. If you did miss it? Get familiar.

Before I leave here, though, I have definite plans to catch up on one of my favorite up-and-coming Atlanta bands, Tealights (no “the” before “tea”). Each time I see these kids, they just keep getting better and more cohesive, piling layers upon layers of sometimesboy but mostlygirl vocals, classical training and deft instrumentation on top of, over, under and through a heady mix of electronic programming that comes out sounding, all at once,

A) like Lali Puna having tea snacks with Jimmy Tamborello while discussing Monika records

B) like nothing else, really

and

C) instantly heart-breaking, comforting and familiar.

Tealights: Passport

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The first time I saw Tealights was actually their first public performance, and this was the first song of the set. During that show, the low-end of “Passport” rattled and hummed and filled the venue with a sense of foreboding and unease. I thought it was to be the definitive version of what’s become my favorite song in Tealights’ body of work thus far.

Months later, I saw them again. In a larger venue, with a larger crowd, on a larger stage, with an expanded range-the addition of a live drummer. This time, the heartbreak and uplift of the lyrical content on passport remained, and rather than be clouded under the murky, swampy electronic fuzz that I recalled from the earlier version, the updated, re-framed “Passport” was indeed carried by the live percussion, only subtly augmented by beat programming.

It was pretty-much heart-stopping.

Hyperbole aside (and derailing any potential tangent about how this song, right now, sums up my mental and emotional states), Tealights are opening for Asobi Seksu at Eyedrum this Wednesday. It’s my goal to make it out.

They have their first official EP coming out in the next few days, also. Watch Tealights’ myspace for that.

2 Comments



06
March
2009
tags: live review, Salem.

In Memory Of Dr Zelig

Dr. Shlomo Zelig, Born July 20, 1979, died at 10:59 PM on March 4, 2009 on assignment for Resonator Magazine. As a frequent cited member of the Res Mag “Away Team”, Zelig oft participated in various “live-blogging” events such as Resonator’s innovative “Grammy LiveBlog”, the first of which kicked off a trend of such events being done to a lesser degree of skill by various other music and culture blogs.  Zelig’s fondness for dark, obscure and obscene techno, as well as the dirty “ghetto” music of the southern U.S., caused him to instantly fall in love with mysterious, up-and-coming goth-tech-crunk duo SALEM. Assigned to cover their recently released WATER E.P., Zelig, under unknown circumstances, found himself in amongst the highly-selective invitees to a rare live performance by SALEM to celebrate the E.P.’s release. The performance, which took place in a small venue in Salem village, just outside the historic city of Salem, Mass (30 minutes north of Boston), would be the last time any would encounter Zelig alive. Zelig was found, in the morning light, dead of carbon monoxide poisoning inside the venue, along with about 50 others. Police reports on the event have ranged from baffled confusion to outright angered lunacy at the mysterious circumstances regarding the mass poisoning.

Dr. Shlomo Zelig’s twitter feed serves as our only documentation to what occurred in Salem, Mass on the night he witnessed what must have been a once-in-a-lifetime live performance. Zelig’s twitter documentation can be found here, and should be read, for chronology’s sake, from the bottom up-exactly as Zelig lived his life.

SALEM could not be reached for comment.

We dedicate SALEM’s “Skullcrush”, the second song on SALEM’s Water E.P. to our fallen comrade Dr. Zelig, as we continue to piece together what happened on this fateful night.

SALEM: Skullcrush

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