Without concert promoters like Brian McKenna (owner of Abstract Entertainment), Sacramento would be a lot more boring. Seriously, this dude has been putting his neck on the line to consistently bring amazing artists through our town for well over two decades! Point your browser to Abstractpresents.com or Facebook.com/abstractentertainmentsac (or check out his ads in the back of our print issues) and chances are you’ll find a few upcoming shows that you’ll want to go to. Too lazy to do that? Here’s one for ya: Legendary indie rock band Built to Spill, who is on tour in support of their 2015 album Untethered Moon, is hitting Harlow’s Thursday, April 14, 2016. Opening the show will be none other than hometown heroes Sister Crayon, an energetic electronic duo whose latest album Devoted deserves a spot on the rotating list of shit you listen to. There is no question about it, this show will be epic. And it’ll likely sell out, too, so get your tickets (just $30 in advance), like, right now or you’ll be suffering from a severe case of FOMO (“fear of missing out” if you’re not up on your Internet slang). Doors open at 7 p.m., show starts at 8 p.m., ages 21-and-over only.

It’s time to say goodbye to 2015. From rock concerts, to dance parties, to comedy shows and everything in between, here is your ultimate guide to Sacramento-area New Year’s Eve parties! Have fun, be safe and please don’t drink and drive.

1) If you’re looking for a funky dance party head to Torch Club and get down with two fantastic local bands: IdeaTeam (featuring Aquifer) and Black Star Safari. Cover charge is $25, 9 p.m., 21-plus. Torchclub.net for more info.

2) Enjoy a soft rock explosion at Harlow’s with Mustache Harbor. Tickets are $30 in advance, doors open at 9 p.m., 21-plus. Hit up Harlows.com for a link to buy tickets.

3) Sing along to your favorite hard rock hits with Radio Heavy at our favorite downtown Roseville watering hole, Bar 101. This party is free and 21-and-over, with a 9:30 p.m. start time. Bar101roseville.com for more info.

4) Groove to late ‘80s and early ‘90s hip-hop, hip-house, and R&B at “New Jack Fling” at Press Club, brought to you by DJs Crook (featured in our current issue), BenJohnson and Satapana. $7 cover, 21-plus, 9 p.m.

5) Ace of Spades wants to party hard with you on NYE when they host legendary heavy metal band Y&T, with opening sets by locals Skin of Saints, ONOFF and Roswell. Tickets are $35 in advance, available at Aceofspadessac.com. 7 p.m. doors. This show is all-ages!

6) The newest dive bar on the grid B-Side invites you to check out their digs and get down to sounds by DJ Whores and friends. No cover, 21-plus. Search for “B-Side” on Facebook for more info.

7) We here at Submerge are teaming up with the Lipstick crew for an epic NYE dance party at Old Ironsides featuring live music from local dreamy/synth-y pop group The Good Fortune, as well as DJ sets by Shaun Slaughter, Roger Carpio and Adam Jay. 9 p.m., 21-plus. $8 advance tickets available at Cuffs.

8) Laugh away the new year at Punchline Sacramento during “2015’s Last Laughs” featuring sets by Ngaio Bealum, Keith Lowell Jensen and many other local faves. Two shows: 7:30 p.m. ($20) and 10 p.m. ($25). 18-and-over. Punchlinesac.com for more info.

9) Blackbird recently re-opened and they’re throwing a party this NYE co-presented by Rue 27, THIS Midtown and 1810 Gallery featuring live tunes by nu-disco act Figgy, and a DJ set from Sacto faves Sister Crayon. 7:30 p.m., $40 per person, $75 for VIP upgrade. Studio53.eventbrite.com for more.

10) Visit historic Grass Valley for Center for the Arts’ “Laughs, Lolo and Legs” party featuring comedy from Katie Rubin, neo vintage jazz pop music of Lolo Gervais, burlesque from the Bow-Tie Beauties, DJ dance party hosted by Jamal Walker and more! 8 p.m. doors, tickets start at $22. Hit up Thecenterforthearts.org for advanced tickets.

11) For a family-friendly daytime celebration that everyone can stay awake for, head to Crocker Art Museum’s “Noon Year’s Eve” event, which is free for all ages and runs from 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Performances from Germar the Magician, Ebo Okokan, Ohana Dance Group and many more.

12) Enjoy some amazing homegrown talent at Crest Theatre when Jackie Greene and his band perform a special NYE concert! Doors open at 8:30 p.m. and tickets start at $35 in advance.

13) The kind folks over at Blue Lamp are throwing a free NYE bash featuring great music, plenty of booze, good company and a champagne toast at midnight. 9 p.m. start time, 21-plus, no cover.

14) Groove to some soul, funk, disco, reggae, latin and more from a few of Sacto’s best selectors at Fox & Goose. DJs Larry Rodriguez, MC Ham and Wokstar will be spinning all night! $10 cover, 21-and-up, 9 p.m.

15) Bundle up and head up the hill for three days of SnowGlobe (Dec. 29–31) in South Lake Tahoe featuring headliners like Jack Ü (aka Skrillex and Diplo), Kaskade, Dillon Francis, Run the Jewels, E-40 and many more. All-ages event. Check out Snowglobemusicfestival.com for details.

16) NOW 100.5 FM and MIX 96 are throwing a masquerade party for the ages at the Hyatt Regency Sacramento featuring cover band and headliner Apple Z, plus DJ Rated R, Quinn Hedges and Ryan Hernandez. $75 in advance for general admission, 9 p.m. start time, 21-plus.

We all know TBD Fest is going to be a helluva party. That’s a given. Three days of some of the world’s best cutting edge bands, DJs and performers right in our own backyard from Sept. 18 to 20. At the end of each night after the encore is done, when the adrenaline is pumping and you’re just not ready to go home, the question will inevitably be: “Where’s the after party?” Well, here’s your answer.

Submerge has got your first look at the lineup for the official TBD Fest after parties, hosted by Requiem Events at Midtown BarFly on all three nights. Confirmed TBD artists you can expect to see at the after parties include: K.Flay (DJ Set), Autograf, Louis the Child, Jody Wisternoff, J-Kraken, Cue22, Jurts and Soosh*E, Dusty Brown (DJ Set), as well as additional top-secret surprise guest sets! A couple of 2014 TBD Fest alumni, Sister Crayon and French Horn Rebellion, will also spin DJ sets. Friday and Saturday go until 4 a.m., Sunday until 2 a.m. Three rooms of sound all for only $20 a night (for TBD Fest ticket holders). Snag pre-sales at Requiemevents.queueapp.com. Midtown Barfly is located at 1119 21st Street, Sacramento.

Last year’s TBD Fest after parties were epic. They also hit capacity rather quickly, so be sure to get tickets ahead of time if you want guaranteed entry. Who knows, you could be rubbing shoulders with Tyler the Creator, Chromeo, Porter Robinson or other TBD Fest headliners. Hey, it could happen, last year members of Empire of the Sun rolled out to Requiem’s TBD after party! Can you say, “celeb dance floor selfie!?”

Devoutly Dynamic

TBD Festival, West Sacramento, Oct. 4, 2014: Even though the sun went down hours ago, warm dust still erupts into the air like the billion microscopic remnants of an obliterated world. My mind is already reeling from the gauntlet of great acts I’ve been shuttling back and forth to glimpse from one patch of riverfront land to the next; brilliant, virtuosic performances seem to flare out on all sides from different vistas, pushing the inter-stage wanderer towards a kind of polyphonic high. The sound, the flashes of light, the smell of incredible food and the miasmatic, billowing dust after a full day of sun have started to take their toll.

Determined yet tired, I trek towards the far side of the concert area, into the volume and light, to secure bodyspace for the concluding main stage performance of the evening. But somewhere around the halfway point, I pause, struck by a bluish ethereal glow and the thrum of brooding synth and bass accompanied by emotive, full-bodied vocals. I am caught off guard; the sound beckons, the conflicted groove is perfectly in sync with my mental state; it zeroes in on me with an intensity that isolates instead of pummeling the senses. I gaze up at the stage, and enter the realm of Sister Crayon.

Shine Coffee, Sacramento, July 11 2015: I’m sitting across from Terra Lopez and Dani Fernandez, the creative force known collectively as Sister Crayon. The two are remarkably down-to-earth and open, a fact which their otherworldly, often mercurial music belies. Never before has their sound been honed so sharp as on their newest release, Devoted, released early last month. Pared down from a four-piece to their current duo, the project has plunged ahead with the carefully crafted sonic workings of Fernandez and the intensely personal lyrical performances of Lopez. Both are keen to show the specific sources from which their creative output arises, whether it be turbulent personal relationships or a diverse array of contemporary artists and budding music genres. The night before our meeting, the two even showcased some of their favorite material at Dive Bar as a DJ set, and are gearing up for a live show at Harlow’s in early August—their first locally since the release of Devoted.

Our caffeine-fueled discussion, recorded here, skirts topics ranging from spirituality, love and hate and the risks of creativity. Enjoy!

How did the DJ set last night go? What sort of material did you select?
Terra Lopez: Last night was a lot of fun. Good crowd, good energy. It’s always fun coming back to our hometown. We just like to play songs that we like really loud [laughs]. For our set we selected a lot of footwork, a lot of juke stuff from Chicago, deep house, a lot of drum/bass-heavy stuff that’s really influenced our sound and resonated with us. A lot of beat-driven songs, a lot of bassline.

How was the process in crafting the production on Devoted?
Dani Fernandez: We wanted to focus more on a beat-heavy sound and showcase the vocals, and we’ve never really done that on our last albums. There were so many other things going on before, and we wanted to strip that away.
TL: We wanted to make a sound that was undeniable, with how I was feeling lyrically, we wanted that to take precedence along with the beats, and not have anything crowd it—almost a minimalist approach the whole time.

What was the first creative step taken with that album?
TL: We demoed a lot in Sacramento and in Oakland, [Fernandez] lived here at the time. And we would just send each other ideas back and forth. For the first time, we got on a plane with 20 unfinished tracks—we had never gone into a studio with unfinished ideas, so it was really scary. We both didn’t know what to expect.
DF: This was the first time we had done a record on our own.
TL: Yeah, it was nerve-wracking. We got to Florida to work with our producer Wes Jones in St. Augustine and we spent two weeks there in this tiny little town. We didn’t know anyone except for Wes, and we slept and lived at the studio for two weeks—it was a very isolating experience. We were basically in our heads for two straight weeks, and it drove us a little crazy … But it was awesome. It was incredible to be so isolated, it felt like an alternate world that we were in.
DF: Almost all of it just spilled out in those two weeks, very easily. There was never really any arguing.
TL: It was pretty much a dream to be able to work that way. To have that freedom. And then literally on the last day, on our way to the airport, Omar Rodriguez-Lopez [of The Mars Volta] wrote me and asked if he could help produce the record.

I understand Omar had been a fan of your project before he stepped up to produce?
TL: We were lucky enough to go on tour with one of his projects in 2013, and we toured with them extensively and from that tour, we built a friendship with him and his band and so they really liked what we were doing, they would watch us every night, and hang out with us. You know, he’s a pretty reclusive guy, so the fact that he even wanted anything to do with us was a big deal.
DF: We knew that he liked us when he invited us to the movies one night on tour. He doesn’t do that regularly. He likes to stay to himself on tour, not really be on the scene with everybody, but he was totally talkative, wanted to get to know us, loved what we were doing, loved the sound. And you could tell that he was really curious as to what we were setting out to do. It was really cool.

So overall, it was a pretty tension-free recording process?
TL: Yeah, we were very grateful to have had the team that we had, because it was such an organic process. We would spend eight-nine hours working with Wes on the songs, and if we needed a break, we’d go jump in the ocean, and then come back and work until two, three or four in the morning, and then start over the next day—and it was like that for two weeks.
DF: Now I get why artists tend to record in secluded areas. They’re always holed up near a beach, or at a cabin in the woods somewhere. It makes you really focus and hone in on your music. It’s probably going to be the way we record from now on.

I understand you featured “Ride or Die” as a video to coincide with the recent SCOTUS decision?
TL: We did. We had actually shot it a week prior, and it wasn’t a planned thing. I had woken up that morning and seen the Supreme Court’s ruling and was so inspired. So I reached out to the director and was like, “If there is any way that we could release that video today, it would be so fitting.” The song is a celebration of love; the video definitely is. We really just wanted to celebrate the day. Dani and I had never really put ourselves out there with our orientation; it’s a known thing among people who ask us, we’re very open, but we had never really put it out there in a video. Everyone was on board, so we just released it. It was a beautiful day, just a gorgeous day, a really proud moment. To release something in correlation with it meant a lot to us. We were finally able to put the message of our music forward in our own subtle way.

Along with these feelings of a triumph of love over hate, there’s also been a good deal of ambivalence towards the concept of love in your work …
TL: It’s incredible that you picked up on that, because I’ve done a few interviews where that kind of goes over their heads. For me, I was in a place when I wrote that, when I was starting to write the lyrics for these songs, I was heartbroken. I’d been in a five-year relationship, had my heart broken, and I’d never experienced a loss like that before. A loss of love, but also a loss of self-motivation—it was the first time it had ever happened to me, and I really clung to this record with Dani, in order to get out of bed most days back then. So for me, I wasn’t singing about that love loss, necessarily, I just didn’t believe in love at all. During those months when we were writing, I really didn’t, and I was questioning it, dissecting it. I had always believed in love, and I’ve always wanted to, but I was definitely in a place where I was trying to figure out if I still did. And so the whole album was basically a way—we called it Devoted because it was our way of practicing devotion as a way to restore our faith in it. And so there’s definitely moments, it’s kind of like a roller coaster where I’m clinging to that belief that it’s still there, even though I don’t feel it.

It seems like many of your releases have been influenced by particular relationships?
TL: I think that with Bellow and Cynic I was very vague in my language. Especially on Bellow … we were so young and didn’t think anyone would even hear that album, so we made it for ourselves. As a songwriter, I was very, very vague. I would speak about people in metaphors—you would never know what the hell I was singing about. And Cynic was very much straightforwardly about my mother and my father and my childhood, but I still was a little vague about expressing myself. When the time came for Devoted, there was no way around it. I didn’t have the time or the energy to make metaphors, I had to express exactly what I felt.

Do you think it’s necessary to suffer for art?
TL: I’ve never been able to write when I’m happy, and I admire those who can, but I’ve never been able to. I don’t necessarily need to be in a dark place, but I do need to contemplate. I dwell a lot.

What’s next for Sister Crayon? What should we expect at Harlows on Aug. 1, 2015?
TL: We’re working on two videos and some remixes; a lot of content coming out in the summer and in the fall. As for Harlow’s, expect a brand new set of songs that we’ve never played here. Just an entirely new experience, new merchandise and new feelings We’re coming out with a completely different kind of performance.

Give Dani and Terra a warm welcome home to Sacramento! Sister Crayon will play Harlow’s on Aug. 1 with DLRN and Stevie Nader. Doors open at 9:30 p.m. Tickets for this 21-and-over show can be purchased in advance for $12 at Harlows.com.

Sacramento experimental band Cove readies for first EP and tour

It’s two weeks before Scott Ferreter’s band Cove drops its first EP (mostly self-recorded in Ferreter’s mom’s basement), and before the trio goes on its first tour in the freshly purchased “Cove Mobile.” He doesn’t explicitly state it, but Ferreter sounds like he’s floating on nirvana right now.

The 24-year-old Sacramento native patiently waited for these pieces to come together since he left his last band, Comfort Twin, in Santa Cruz more than a year ago.

“It was a zoo to begin with, an eight-piece band and half lived in the Bay Area and the other half in Santa Cruz,” he recalls. “It was a really fun band. Eight pieces is a real pain in the ass for getting together, but once you got it together, in every sense of the word, it was great.”

Ferreter moved back to Sacramento when his dad was diagnosed with cancer, and shortly thereafter Comfort Twin dissolved. The move became an opportunity to create the band he always wanted.

“Once I moved back I was really excited to start a more straightforward band,” he says. Through advertising and hanging fliers at Javalounge downtown, Ferreter met drummer Steven Cranston and 27-year-old bassist Charlie Dale.

The three fine-tuned their sound and lyrics, and had the EP and tour upcoming when Cranston left the band after getting a job. Ferreter became frantic to find a drummer last-minute.

“Our musical existence was weighing heavily on finding a drummer. I was worried we would have to settle so it was humorous when Omar pulled up and he was exactly what we wanted,” Ferreter says. “Charlie and I pontificated on finding a drummer, saying we should get someone who is good at even asking for money at the end of the night. The two of us, we’re not tough guys, so when Omar said the other day, ‘two things I really like is dealing with sound guys and dealing with club owners,’ it was meant to be.”

Omar Barajas, 23, also from Sacramento, joined Cove after stints in other local bands.

“The other bands I played in were completely different,” he says, on break from his day job. “The first was instrumental, then I toured with Sister Crayon and that’s electronically driven with heavy beats. But Cove is really mellow.”

It was a welcome change. Barajas, whose major influences are jazz and bands like Silversun Pickups, wanted a slower pace.

“I was used to just banging my drums, but now I’m focusing more on my technical skills,” he says.

He joined right after Cove recorded its EP. The new trio had their first show in mid-October and Barajas says he’s been able to see the backbone of the songs and insert his own style.

“Scott is a good songwriter, so it’s easy to get lost in the music.”

Ferreter says most of the seven songs on this EP came about from jamming together.

“When I got to Sacramento I had all these songs that I wanted to put on an album. As we started playing together, it was immediate, we saw this energy together that we couldn’t create on our own,” he says. “Cove is my first experience of actual co-writing. These sounds would not have happened had these exact people not been together at that time. Everyone has differing interests and musical paths but there is enough overlap in the stuff that matters: how to approach music, the process of playing together.”

And then there is a good amount of absolute happenstance, Ferreter says.

“I’m a Craigslist junkie, mostly in the name of getting a band together, so if a show needs to happen, I’ve got the stuff for that. I found this $30 electric piano and like a week later, we met Charlie and piano was his first instrument,” Ferreter says. “The last band he was in, he was playing drums but he was really excited about playing piano, and it became instrumental to us as a band.”

On their self-released album, Dale plays electric piano, synthesizer and bass. A few songs also have horns with help from one of Ferreter’s former bandmates, and extra vocals with help from David Lipp, who recorded half the record and, according to Ferreter, “took the project from an absolute zygote to a complete creature ready for the world.

“David (Spare Room Studios, San Francisco) did all of the engineering and I just cannot say enough about it,” he says. “He did it out of the love for the music. He took a handful of sand and turned it into a nice tropical beach. I’ve come to a loss of words, I can’t say enough.”

Some sounds from the album will obviously not be part of the tour, such as Lipp’s vocals, the horns and a full-sized harp that Dale received as a birthday rental.

“Of course in the middle of recording this album, we have a harp so it’s a no-brainer,” Ferreter laughs.

The album doesn’t have a theme per se, but the band thinks of it as more a process of selection.

“These are the songs over the last year we’ve felt a lot of energy from. We were thinking of timing, of this era of our lives. We have some songs that are some of our favorites, but we didn’t end up including them because certain songs feel like they ripen and will start rotting soon thereafter. We play what’s feeling ripe right now, what’s relevant right now. It was also about what tools we have. We have some grandiose ideas for other songs but don’t have what we would need to record them yet.”

For now, the band says, the EP and the tour is the direction they’re moving musically. It’s not a hint of what they’re doing—seven songs could be considered an album—it’s a full piece of pie.

“Basically,” Barajas adds, “If you appreciate good songwriting and cohesiveness, you’re gonna dig it. If you like folky writing, you’re gonna dig it.”

The tour and EP release party start at Luigi’s Fun Garden Nov. 7, 2013 with tickets on a sliding scale from $5 to $10. The orbit of the tour will be around Seattle, Olympia and Portland and will last two weeks. Check out Covetheband.com for more information and to sample two recordings.

15 Years, 11 Tracks, 11 Vocalists, 2 Bandmates: Tel Cairo

Words by Joe Atkins

For the last 15 years Cameron Others and 7evin have been working on their material, laying out beats, loops, archaic recordings of bedroom beatbox compilations and reworking that material into new orchestrations. In the last two years it’s all come together, and now, as Tel Cairo, Cameron and 7evin are set to release their debut full length, Voice of Reason. The album itself has been part of the long process of self-discovery for these two electronic musicians. Their sound, their relationship to composition, their knowledge of technique and technology have increased with each singular endeavor, and the result is a precision track listing of rattling low-end bass and twinkling high-end melodies.

And I’ve yet to mention what, for me, is the most impressive part of the album: its list of local MCs and vocalists who dominate the lyric and lead portions on the majority of the project. It’s a list of past, present and future Sacramento stars, artists whom have been working the scene for the last two decades trying to lift the city up with their own talents and careers. There are individual appearances from Aurora Love, “This Is Not”; Agustus thElephant, “Music Box”; and Mic Jordan, “Electro Knock.” On “Twelve Paths Toward Movement,” Sister Crayon frontwoman, Terra Lopez appears alongside hip-hop local TAIS; Mahtie Bush spits verse after verse on the track “Illicit” and the unknown, yet powerful, Stephanie Barber holds down the hook. Lest we find ourselves stuck in the lady sings the hook cliché, Paper Pistols new lead, Juliana Lydell sings the verses to the high pitched chorus of Caleb Heinze, from Ape Machine and Confederate Whiskey; and Task1ne, Voltron reference and all, flows over the verses of “Evening Push,” before local legend Jonah Matranga gives his signature falsetto to the hook. It’s a list that’s both diverse and impressive, and it makes for an album that highlights the many dynamic qualities of music in Sacramento.

Breaking from some highly competitive Wii, 7evin and Cameron sat down with Submerge, and we talked about Sacramento, influences, genre, processes of songwriting and recording, skateboarding, musicianship, Ira Skinner’s beard and the talented slew of lyricists they worked with on the album. In addition, Submerge exchanged a few emails with the lyricists, and, likewise, we share their thoughts on working with Tel Cairo.

What brought you to Sacramento? What are the best and worst parts about this city?
7evin: I moved here about eight years ago to work with Ira Skinner, a good longtime friend. Sacramento has an amazing group of musically talented individuals. We like what’s going on here. The cost of living is amazing; you don’t have to feel so pressured. The bad part is that there is almost no monetary value for art here.

Can you describe your songwriting process?
7evin: A lot of times we start off with analog, a guitar, drumset, bass. We get in there and start doing electronics. We don’t do samples. We do our own tones and MIDI controlling. There’s always one part, and we shoot it to the next person until he can’t work on it anymore, and he shoots it back. We’ll meet once a week and we’ll work on that song. We made 32 tracks for this album and 11 made the cut.

What sort of influence did Ira Skinner have, working with him as a producer?
Cameron: Ira let us figure out who we were. He took all the things we’d been layering for so long, and we’d forgotten what we started out with, and made them sound amazing. Some of these things were already done. We’d put so much into it. We needed to step away a little bit.
7evin: He is so chill in the studio. He let us fumble around to find a niche, and the second he hears something that’s good, he’s like “Wait, go back! Let’s do that.” We have the first word, bounce it off to someone in collaboration; we get the second word, and Ira comes in; and we get the final word.
Cameron: In between there was also a lot of growth and learning on our side, with the programs.

Of the two of you, who’s the biggest perfectionist?
7evin: We’re never happy with it.
Art is never done. We just move onto another song.
Cameron: We look at things a little differently. I’ll hear things differently that he might not hear. Technically, I think he’s the perfectionist, making sure everything is lined up. I’ve tried to watch, and I’ll fall asleep for a little bit.
7evin: We tag team it, recording. I’m 20 percent deaf in my left ear. I don’t hear high end, I hear mid-tone and bass. You can see that and feel that live. [Cameron will] come in and stick this melody here. He brings the beauty to my dirtiness. I’m a gutter-punk; this guy comes in, and he’s playing 12-string guitar. We’re very similar but we’re like the Alice in Wonderland, Looking Glass Mirror versions of each other.
Cameron: We get inspired at the same time from different things. We get a feeling. It could be DJ Shadow, it could be anything, a country song; our creative juices start, and we just sit down and see what comes out. When we work together we balance each other’s ideas.

I know that every collaborator brings a different set of skills to the studio, the songwriting process. Who impressed you most while recording?
7evin: Mic Jordan is one of the smartest people in the world. He’s brilliant. Just kicking it, he’d expand our minds in so many ways. When he came in, we worked an experimental song; it’s not a typical hip-hop track. He rose to the occasion.
He has like four different cadences, and it’s beautiful.
Cameron: Jordan, for sure. Caleb [Heinze], I’ve known that dude for a long time, and I knew he could sing. The way he nails that chorus is genius.
7evin: He has a range that no male should have. We weren’t sure what to do with that track “Nirvana,” but Juliana [Lydell] approached it off of his vocal, like the ghost of the guy she lost her virginity to.

What was it like to work with Jonah and everyone else? How’d you get them to collaborate on the album?
7evin: They were all our friends, except for Jonah, though Jonah’s now friends and family. Jonah’s someone we looked up to, someone we’d seen as kids growing up, going to shows at the Cattle Club. We had mutual friends so I hit him up.
Cam sent over “Evening Push” and he just ran with it. He was so kind and gentle of a person to work with two guys he didn’t know. We sent a lot of emails backwards and forwards. We haven’t got a chance to do it live with him as far as performance. But we’re doing that on April 4, everyone on the album is performing. It’s never going to happen again. It’s like one shot.
We definitely took a Gorillaz approach with this. Terra [Lopez and Cameron] are damn near best friends. I knew Stephanie [Barber] from helping her and her sister with their restaurant, and that girl can sing. We locked her and [Mahtie] Bush in my bedroom with us, and it was like a Seven Minutes in Heaven kind of thing, writing a song on an SM58 microphone.
Stephanie Barber [who is quietly present during most of the interview]: It was really creepy and productive.

One of the ways I’d describe your sound is electric, post-grunge, skateboard culture, all grown up. You happy with that?
Cameron: I’m cool with that. That’s what I do every day, [skate]. Skate videos have helped me listen to different things. In old Toy Machine videos, Ed Templeton uses a lot of Sonic Youth. I watched them hundreds of times. It made me want to experiment with my own guitar.

Would you say your music belongs as the soundtrack to the cinematic build up of a riot or the post-riot moment of optimistic melancholia, where a new world briefly exists but won’t last over time?
7evin: Afterwards, definitely. After everything’s been destroyed, and we’re rebuilding. There’s healing process in these songs. There’s hope. Your heart gets demolished, but you can grow and
move on.

Tel Cairo will celebrate the release of Voice of Reason at Midtown BarFly, 1119 21st Street in Sacramento, on April 4, 2013. This will be perhaps your only chance to see 7evin and Cameron Others share the stage with all of the vocalists who appeared on the album. For more info on the show, go to https://www.facebook.com/telcairo, or hop over to Midtown BarFly’s Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/MidtownBarFly.

4 Questions with Mic Jordan, Mahtie Bush, Task1ne and Juliana Lydell!

How was it to work with 7evin and Cameron on your track?
Mic Jordan: They played me a skeletal version of the song they wanted me on and set me loose with no real guidelines. I definitely had input into its final outcome, but I also felt like, “OK, everybody here knows what they’re doing, they trust me do my thing lyrically, so I trust them to do their thing sonically.”
Juliana Lydell: They’re really open-minded, supportive, and enthusiastic. Creating with them is a lot of fun.

Can you tell me about the process, e.g. did they have the song done and let you do vocals over it, or was it more of a collaborative process where you aided in the musical composition?
Task1ne: They trusted my expertise and let me just record the track like how I usually do it with no problems. It was a blast. I fell in love with the track instantly. I’m a fan of all types of music, so it was great to get to experiment on something different.
Mahtie Bush: They built the track right on the spot, and as they did that I was writing to the beat. It just happened; we were on the same page. The vibe was ill.

What makes Tel Cairo vital to the local scene?
Mic Jordan: The fact that they are bridging the (artificially separated) electronic, alternative and hip-hop communities. Ultimately, what sets Tel Cairo apart is the fact that their music defies easy categorization while somehow sounding authentic no matter what territory it’s venturing into.
Juliana Lydell: How excited they are, how much they believe in community, and what a team effort they make out of the act of creation. They think big. It’s contagious.

How long until Tel Cairo achieves world domination?
Mic Jordan: Who’s to say they haven’t already?
Task1ne: A better question is, which one is Pinky and which one is the Brain? Inquiring minds would like to know.

Terra Lopez of Sister Crayon will be hosting all-ages live music nights at Broadacre Coffee (1014 10th Street) starting on Friday, Jan. 27, 2012. “I’m looking forward to it, and I think this city needs more all-ages venues,” Lopez recently told Submerge in an e-mail. “I want to host my favorite local and non-local acts in an intimate setting where the bands play a different set than they normally would, say at a bigger and louder venue.” She also noted that the shows will always be cheap, never more than $5. The Jan. 27 bill features Exquisite Corps, Garrett Pierce and a special DJ set from Lopez and Sister Crayon band mate Dani Fernandez. Doors open at 8 p.m. Keep an eye out at Facebook.com/broadacrecoffee for future shows and events.

If you’re not familiar with the artists we chose to perform at our 100th Issue Party on Friday, Dec. 16, 2011 at Ace of Spades, first off, where the hell have you been? Living under a rock? Anywho, if you don’t know who they are, see the vitals below and be sure to type the URLs into your fancy little computer devices. Prepare to be inundated with awesome-ness, because, well, we know how to pick ‘em! See you at the show.

Home Base: Sacramento, Calif.
For Fans Of: Down tempo (yet intense) indie rock/trip-hop. Operatic and dramatic female vocals, mixture of live drums and programmed percussion with keys, synths, guitar, the whole nine.
You Dig? You’ll Dig!: Portishead, The XX, MGMT
Bragging Rights: Signed to Manimal Vinyl Records, recently toured with The Album Leaf. Has been featured everywhere from Showtime to Nylon magazine.
Listen/Learn More: Sistercrayon.com, Facebook.com/sistercrayon

Home Base: Sacramento, Calif.
For Fans Of: Spastic, experimental-rock featuring insane guitar work (two-handed finger tapping, tons of effects pedals, etc.) and non-traditional song structures.
You Dig? You’ll Dig!: Hella, The Flaming Lips, Don Caballero
Bragging Rights: Signed to Sargent House, countless U.S. tours, played Forbidden Fruit Fest in Ireland this year with The Flaming Lips and Aphex Twin.
Listen/Learn More: Teramelosmusic.com, Facebook.com/teramelosmusic

Home Base: Sacramento, Calif.
For Fans Of: Fun, catch-y, space-y/psychedelic garage-rock.
You Dig? You’ll Dig!: Thee Oh Sees, Wavves, Beach Boys
Bragging Rights: Affiliated record labels include Lefse, Woodsist, Captured Tracks and Souterrain Transmissions. Ganglians will be an official showcasing artist at 2012’s SXSW music festival in Austin, Texas.
Listen/Learn More: Facebook.com/ganglians

Home Base: Sacramento, Calif.
For Fans Of: Jam-y funk-rock with reggae roots. Extended jam sessions and dance-offs are common occurrences during ZuhG sets.
You Dig? You’ll Dig!: Phish, O.A.R., Grateful Dead
Bragging Rights: They run their own local music/art/clothing store. Countless tours, tons of positive press, multiple SAMMIES awards.
Listen/Learn More: Zuhgmusic.com

Home Base: Sacramento, Calif.
For Fans Of: Intelligent hip-hop rich with satire and dry wit meets real turntablism.
You Dig? You’ll Dig!: Nas, Talib Kweli, Gang Starr
Bragging Rights: Winner of numerous spoken-word and rap awards/competitions. Has shared the stage with Nas, Immortal Technique, Tech N9Ne, Zion-I, Living Legends and more.
Listen/Learn More: Randomab.com, Randomabiladeze.bandcamp.com

Home Base: Sacramento, Calif.
For Fans Of: Extremely catch-y and well-written pop-rock fit for an arena setting.
You Dig? You’ll Dig!: Muse, Coldplay, The Killers
Bragging Rights: Music has been featured in multiple MTV shows/commercials including, The Real World, True Life, Made and Real World Road Rules Challenge to name a few.
Listen/Learn More: Earlystates.com

Tickets Available @ ZuhG Life Store, Dimple Records, The Beat, Armadillo (Davis)
Online: AceOfSpadesSac.com
By Phone: 1.877.GND.CTRL or 916.443.9202

Sister Crayon Steps It Up Further on Debut LP

It was a gray and windy afternoon on the beaches of Malibu. A tidal wave warning was in effect, but there local band Sister Crayon stood, fully-clothed, sharp shoreline rock at their ankles, as photographer Eliot Lee Hazel barked orders to capture the frozen chaos of crashing white caps for the band’s debut album art.

Lead singer Terra Lopez slipped during one shot, cutting her leg, but Hazel ran his shoot like a drill sergeant. “He just said, ‘Get up. Don’t smile. Don’t look at me,’” Lopez said. “Well, he’s a sweetheart, nice guy, you can sit down and talk to him, but when he’s taking photos he is so intense.”

As absurd as it feels to the members of Sister Crayon, Lopez and drummer Nicholas Suhr spoke of the shoot as one of their most memorable music experiences–even though it had little to do with music. Along with Hazel’s artwork, the band has a high-def music video done by celebrity photographer Robert Ascroft. Browsing both photographers’ websites, perusing the tastefully gratuitous images of Devendra Banhart, Usher, Mariah Carey, Edward Sharpe and Brad Pitt, Sister Crayon will be the first to tell you how privileged, yet out of place they feel. Are these the last remaining minor moments of Sister Crayon before they receive Coachella bookings and Japan tour offers?

In the next few weeks, the band is playing humbler venues like Townhouse for the Sacramento Electronic Music Festival and Luigi’s Fungarden for the Bellow album release party. So our indie darlings have yet to grow too big for our sleepy city. Lopez looks like a siren Viking vixen in the video for “(In) Reverse,” but when I met with her and Suhr at Mondo Bizarro (formerly Butch & Nellie’s) for an interview, she was back in her Midtown garb, a second-hand green army jacket and jeans–the Lindsay Weir of Freaks and Geeks look. She’s still the same shy songwriter, fronting a gloomy pop act that seeks inspiration in the lonesome despair of poets like Jean Genet and Fernando Pessoa.

The Bellow sessions scattered across the span of a year and a half. The newly realized lineup of Sister Crayon crammed in 18-hour shifts at The Hangar with engineer Scott McShane, who described the process as “tense” and a “guerilla recording style.” McShane produced the first Sister Crayon EP, Enter Into Holy (Or)ders, and the band never entertained the thought of working with anyone else. “Recording already is a really intimate thing. We bond so well with him. He gets what we’re trying to do, even before we understand it,” Lopez said.

“He’s able to throw out ideas that’s not in an insulting way. It’s just full-on experimenting and you know that it’s for the best. He pushes us to succeed,” Suhr added.

The tension came from the hourglass pressure of paying for studio time and the unfamiliarity of having a new drummer join two weeks prior, writing his parts on the fly. Suhr was not a complete stranger, knowing Lopez from her stint in The Evening Episode, but he and Lopez talked of the anxieties surrounding a debut full length. “We were zombies. We’d spend 18 hours in the studio and you can hear it in the record,” she said.

Originally, Bellows was intended to be a five-song EP, written by Lopez and synth-keyboardist Dani Fernandez, with “I’m Still the Same Person” being the only pre-released song to make the album. But once the band wrapped recording those five songs, creativity was running high and five more songs were written collectively. “Scott kept telling us there was a lot of tension on the record,” Suhr said. “If you know what was going on at the time it makes sense. There was a lot of time spent coming to an agreement on things, but whenever we’re writing together there’s no awkwardness. It was easy to go into the next five songs with an open mindset.”

Indeed, the settling in is brazen and culminates with a spacious piano ballad called “Ixchel, The Lady Rainbow,” in which Lopez’s visceral croon soars over a piece written by former member Genaro Ulloa. “Ixchel” was the last song the band recorded, a one-take recording done well past the midnight hour. “We did it live tracking,” Lopez said. “He was in the other room and I was in the main room singing. We could see each other through a little window, but that was it. It was the first take and it was incredible. I know it sounds corny, but there were tears in everyone’s eyes. We were all exhausted. Even Scott had tears in his eyes.”

Suhr added, “It’s one of those songs. Every other song on the record we did multiple takes because we felt we could do better. At the end of that song, everyone was just like what the fuck. It’s one of those songs where if it didn’t sound like that, with the imperfections left in, it wouldn’t have worked.”

The gloomy pop instrumentation informed by the troubled words of dead poets is an appropriate setting for an album titled Bellow, but Suhr said a lot of the mood is owed to McShane’s guidance. “I heard the five songs written before I joined, but the mood had changed through Scott’s ears.” Lopez said his touch is most prevalent on “Here We Never Die and “(In) Reverse” as he took the band’s ideas and focused them into a cohesive sound.

In addition to McShane, the Sister Crayon sound, most notably the lyrics, is in homage to the writings of Fernando Pessoa, a 20th Century poet and literary critic. Lopez only admitted her obsession with Pessoa’s work. She has a Pessoa tattoo and her Pug’s name is Ophelia, after Pessoa’s secret crush to whom he never confessed his love. “It’s the despair,” she said. “It sounds dramatic, but he was such a lonely individual. He was very mysterious and obviously people are drawn to that.

“I think that is a huge part of Bellow. ‘Here We Never Die’ is my talking to a lover in that way. The despair and sadness that he wrote is so sad that I can’t even finish one of his books. I have to read a sentence a day sometimes because it’s so much. It just floors me. I have no option when it comes to his presence in my music.”

As intense as Sister Crayon is sonically and visually portrayed, Hazel’s insistency that the band stop smiling as the chilly Pacific waves capsized on their heads speaks of the band’s unbridled joy in its work. As arresting as “Ixchel, The Lady Rainbow” is, Bellow closes with “Souls of Gold,” a cheery campfire sing-a-long with a blasting brass section and woozy synths. “We’re always such a serious band and a lot of our songs are really dark,” Lopez said. “I do like that the album ends on a lighter note than what it could have been.”

See Sister Crayon live at their release party for their new album Bellows at Luigi’s Fungarden on Feb. 19.

Sea of Bees is a buzz with debut album

Just as I was getting ready to ring the bell labeled “Tape Op” on the door of Sacramento recording studio The Hangar, I heard a voice down the street call my name. “Adam!” I turned, and up rode Julie Ann Bee on a well-worn brown bicycle. We exchanged salutations and made our way inside the giant warehouse studio that was once a punk venue years ago. Bee treats me like a friend she’s known for years, a facet of her personality that makes her so easy to engage. I’m really excited for our interview.

Inside the engineer room, where Bee recorded and mixed her first EP appropriately titled Bee Eee Pee, a large mixing console and strange audio concoctions surround us as we sit down to begin. She informs me of the soul this particular room has. Besides being the place where her own journey began, this space was where Terra Lopez of Sister Crayon mixed parts of their record, and the bassist for Rilo Kiley, Jonathan Wilson, recorded a few tracks here himself. Bee hums me a line from a Rilo Kiley song titled “Silver Lining.” It’s a treat, and I’m lost in her voice for a second and stumble over my words when she asks me if I’ve heard of them.

Bee is the singer/songwriter of Sea of Bees, and she is a rare talent. Like a ship in a bottle, she has slowly built herself up inside with love and passion for everyone to see and hear. To watch her sing is almost as enjoyable as hearing her, as the harrowing words flutter from her tiny mouth and her hands strike the strings of her acoustic guitar, brown hair falling over her face. YouTube videos show Bee playing songs like “Skinnybones” and “Gnomes” to rooms full of people who stare at her mesmerized as if gazing into a supernova.

It was at age 15 that she first knew that she wanted her own voice, a different voice.

“But I didn’t know how to go about it,” says Bee.

At that time, Bee was in a youth group at her church where a woman she admired was singing and playing guitar. Bee was “in love” with her voice, and like all great artists have done, she emulated the voice she admired most.

“I just blended with her voice and knew how to do it, compressed it and worked on it.”

Eventually she wanted to make this voice her own, and over time she crafted it to sound the way that it does–natural. Not a word feels forced when you hear Bee sing and even when she cranes her neck and reaches for notes, they wail as if being squeezed from the depth of her very being.

It was her voice that, like a siren’s song, lured in the man who would help guide Bee along her blossoming career.

John Baccigaluppi, publisher of Tape Op magazine and owner of The Hangar, was walking down the hallway of his studio one day when he heard Bee’s voice for the first time. Bee was passing the time in one of the rooms while her current band at the time, Find Me Fighting Them, was recording in the studio. She grabbed a guitar and was recording some demos on Garage Band. Baccigaluppi popped his head in after thinking to himself, “whoever is singing has a nice voice.” He gave her his card and when they talked later, it became clear pretty quickly that Bee needed to come into the studio. She had no real demo and Baccigaluppi wanted to help.

“I said come over and we put her in this room and I kind of showed her how to work ProTools and then left for the day,” recalls Baccigaluppi.

Bee, brand new to ProTools and left to her own devices in the studio control room, went to work. At the end of the day, she had a nearly complete five-song EP that would become Bee Eee Pee.

“I was under the impression that she would come in here and just bang out something,” says Baccigaluppi. “But I would come back and there would be all these overdubs. I was like, ‘Well I guess you figured out how to do that!’”

Having never really recorded a record herself, Bee took full advantage of the opportunity she was granted.

“I didn’t know how many days people spent on recordings. I was just like, ‘Gotta get it done,’” she says.

Maybe it was that exact attitude, that excitement to record, that kept Bee and Baccigaluppi working together. When Bee’s EP was complete, they decided to continue recording, tackling two songs in full production together (“Gnomes” and “Willis”) to see if they “got along together and wanted to go further.”

“We decided to do a whole record,” remembers Baccigaluppi.

With Songs for the Ravens, Bee and Baccigaluppi worked at a slower pace, only doing a few tracks at a time. The recording experience was centered on having fun making a record and exploring any ideas that came into the picture along the way. Bee would record an idea on Garage Band and show it to Baccigaluppi so he could get an idea. From there, they slowly pieced together the songs one track at a time, adding bass here or drums there. Bee herself played 80 percent of the instruments on the album, some of which she had never played before.

“She’s super intuitive as a musician. There’s a lot of stuff on this record with instruments that she played in one or two takes that she’d never seen prior to that,” says Baccigaluppi.

Very limited editing was required for the record, too, and a lot of what you hear on Songs for the Ravens are raw, uncut tracks. Half the tracks on the record, including “Blind,” the masterfully crafted outro song, were live takes, recorded with the other musicians. That says a lot about this record and the musicianship that was involved. Standout players include the tasteful drum set playing of James Neil, who, at times, nailed tracks immediately with very little time to record or to rehearse. It seems as though everybody involved in the creation of this record connected seamlessly with Bee and was able to interpret her ideas perfectly.

“The songs that were in my head, I had a vision of what I wanted them to be. They somehow came out exactly how I wanted,” says Bee with gratitude in her voice.

Another interesting note is the appearance of Wes Steed of Hearts and Horses, who offered his meticulously placed drum programming on songs like “Won’t Be Long” and my personal favorite, “Willis.” Steed was given very rough mixes of the songs to allot as much room as possible for him to navigate the drum tracks. Steed’s tracks were imported toward the end of finalizing the songs, and they would, without fail, fit perfectly into the mix.

The business side of putting out the record was always tucked in the back of both Bee and Baccigaluppi’s minds, but it didn’t need to be dealt with until it was finished. With that moment now upon them, the first thing they did was send it out to a few people that were close in both of their circles. Michael Leahy, who runs Crossbill Records in Davis, was one of the first to respond to Songs for the Ravens. Baccigaluppi sent him a copy immediately after mastering and he replied quickly, saying that what they had created was pretty awesome and to shop it around to lots of different labels. So they did, but to no avail.

“We spent a fair amount of time looking for labels and had some interest from some larger labels, and in the end no one was willing to move fast enough,” explains Baccigaluppi.

In the end, they went where open arms would receive them and inevitably ended up going with Crossbill. This turned out to be a great decision for Bee and was mutually beneficial, as Leahy scored a distribution deal through Burnside Distribution in Portland, Ore., with help from the strength of Songs for the Ravens.

“They’ve been really working it. Every week there’s more good news from Burnside,” says Baccigaluppi.

On top of Leahy standing behind the record and pushing it aggressively, he had a couple more friends up in Oregon that he wanted to introduce Bee to. Riot Act Media, a boutique publicity firm in Portland, picked up on Songs for the Ravens and offered their support for Bee.

“Riot Act’s Joan Hiller and Nathan Walker, they’re good people. It’s like family,” says Bee.

The pace of Bee’s success is steadily picking up with the anticipated release of Songs for the Ravens. And although she’s no stranger to performing, she’s just now starting to warm up to her audience–just in time for a 12-date tour that will land her in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York, to name a few.

“I’m learning to open my eyes and see [the audience]. I’m starting to understand that it’s not just about me and my music, it’s about them,” says Bee. “I want to bring more to the table.”

When I asked Bee if she had measured out any sort of success for herself, she brought up musician friends that she and Baccigaluppi have who are able to “pay their rent and buy a car” by playing music. Modest goals for someone so talented.

“How do they do it?” Bee pondered. “It’s a lot of work. But it’s what I want to do.”