War Elephants, My Heart To Joy, Maneuvers, and Transit - 242 Main - 3/14

We went to see Maneuvers again, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that the other bands were excellent as well.

The show started with War Elephants, a young instrumental band from Enosberg Falls that plays progressive music. They played a pretty solid set. They are good with meter changes, the drummer in particular.

Next up was My Heart To Joy At The Same Tone, from Kensington, Connecticut. They play music in the style of classic emo or screamo, and they can certainly do that well. They brought a ridiculous amount of amps, and rocked everybody's faces off for a while. Their closing song was really intense.

Maneuvers came next, and they played an awesome set as usual. This time, they brought out a couple of new songs, which are going to be on the upcoming full-length they are working on. Two of these songs, "Black Horse Pike" and "Mare Oceanum" are on their Myspace, so check them out.

I didn't get to see Transit, unfortunately. They are a Massachusetts independent hardcore band, and they sound a bit like Braid or Lifetime. If you're at all into that, check them out, they're pretty skilled.

So, another day, another great concert at 242 Main. Be on the watch for more good music.


War Elephants
My Heart To Joy At The Same Tone
Maneuvers
Transit

The Foxymorons

Despite the joke name, these guys make some seriously good music. Incredibly stylistically diverse too- Acoustic, Folk, Pop-punk, Alt-rock... They also manage to pull off the atonal, Pavement style vocals very well, as well as soaring melodies more akin to ELP.
Definitely true indie-rock. Definitely worth listening to.

If you have a myspace account you can download an excellent set of 4 songs from their Official Myspace.


Free mp3s-
Hesitation Eyes
Harvard Hands

Fire the Cannons

Fire the Cannons is (was?) a Burlington, VT indie rock band. You could compare them to Sonic Youth (at least the Sonic Youth of "Goo" and "Dirty"), or The Pixies. The bassist is very good, skillfully integrating chords with his playing. When I saw them, their drummer was pretty good too.
I was told they've apparently broken up? I'm not sure.

Recommended Albums:
I don't know that they have one out. Do they?

Official Myspace

The Gay Blades

The Gay Blades are a rock duo composed of guitarist/vocalist Clark Westfield and drummer Puppy Mills. Their stripped-down sound could be compared to The Kills, The White Stripes, or The Black Keys. They are ridiculously energetic at live shows. I mean, seriously good. Better live than on CD. Check out the Youtube videos linked to here for examples.

Recommended Albums:
Ghosts

Official Website
Official Myspace
Bob Dylan's 115th Nightmare
Hey She Say
Robots Can Fuck Your Shit Up

Deerhoof

Deerhoof is an experimental rock band from the Bay Area. Their music ranges from dissonant noise, to soft indie rock, to really strict composition. Most of their albums and songs fall somewhere between these extremes. Some common characteristics of their songs are loose tempos, odd juxtapositions of catchy melody and noise or dissonance, improvisation, weird meters, and singer Satomi Matsuzaki's distinctinctive vocals.

Recommended Albums:
Hell, there's so much variation between them that it's difficult to suggest which are the best. But for someone first being introduced to Deerhoof, I would suggest listening to Revielle and Apple O'

Official Website
MP3s courtesy of Ibiblio.org
Official Myspace
The Perfect Me
Deerhoof Live