Music
by Will Meyer | Jun 18, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
Joey La Neve DeFrancesco, guitarist for acclaimed punk band Downtown Boys, also performs as La Neve. While La Neve is a project that certainly shares the political concerns of Downtown Boys, it is stylistically different all together. Drawing on house, industrial, and...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 14, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Advocate Sessions performer is rapper Big Sav, who performs auto-biographical rap that turns the pains of life into music. Check out his performance in the video below. Advocate Sessions interview with Big Sav: This week also featured an audio...
by Jonathan Kermah | Jun 13, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Review
Twenty-one-year-old Amherst rapper Tyson Burnett, known as Big Sav, has turned his previous encounters with the law into a promising future. His catchy melodies over upbeat trap piano keys disguise the pain-filled lyrics like “I been lonely hoping that my light ain’t...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 13, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, Staff Picks
Drag Brunch with Hors and Friends for Franklin County Pride at Hawks & Reed // SATURDAY You can support Franklin County Pride and your local drag queens on Saturday morning in downtown Greenfield with a special drag brunch featuring the always magnificent and...
by Jennifer Levesque | Jun 11, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
When I opened the press release for this upcoming album release that was accompanied by a live set at Wilco’s Solid Sound Festival at MASS MoCA, there was one word that caught my interest: Mellotron. The instrument is similar in artistry and the complicatedness of a...
by Advocate Staff | Jun 7, 2019 | Advocate Sessions, Articles, Featured, Music
This week’s Valley Advocate Sessions performer is Jon Carroll & BraveSoul, who is a two-time Grammy Award-winning songwriter making R&B with soulful melodies and an inventive spirit. Interview with Jon Carroll:
by Chris Goudreau | Jun 5, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Review
The work of two artists are on display now through June 30 at Easthampton’s Elusie Gallery in an exhibit titled “Daydreaming,” which features surrealistic illustrated pieces by Samson E. King with images of nature and everyday objects colliding in a kaleidoscope...
by Will Meyer | Jun 4, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
Imagine it’s the year 2020 and you get invited by a friend to a local house show. The catch: you don’t know who the performers will be and you don’t know where it will be located until the day of the show. You must apply in advance to even purchase a ticket and then...
by Advocate Staff | May 31, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Valley Advocate Sessions performer is folk-rock singer-songwriter Lady Jane, who combines melancholic melodies with lyrics that pull on your heart strings. Interview with Lady Jane:
by Jennifer Levesque | May 31, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
Festival season is among us! The Valley is chock full of them all summer long and into fall. There is a new one, however, that has hopes of becoming a bi-annual festival in Downtown Northampton, The STRONG and Pleasant Music Festival. Carla Racine, the woman behind...
by Jonathan Kermah | May 30, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music
Rappers T’Swan and Fabeyon are hoping to mold a hip-hop music scene in their hometown of Springfield. Their sound — potent lyrics over soulful boom bap instrumentals — is more comparable to that of New York legends like Fat Joe than more simplistic trap artists...
by Advocate Staff | May 24, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Advocate Sessions band is Wild Bill and the Flying Sparks, which combines classic country and roots rock n’ roll with a Cajun groove. Check out the band’s full performance in the video below. Interview with Wild Bill and the Flying...
by Will Meyer | May 24, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
As the weather warms up and the sun comes out, musicians flock to Main Street, opening their cases to busk. I have lived many downtown Northampton lives — as a busker, in food service, as a journalist for The Shoestring reporting on Northampton politics, to name a...
by Advocate Staff | May 17, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Advocate Sessions performer is singer-songwriter Jake Klar, who plays poetic folk and blues that stirs the soul. Check out his performance in the video below.
by Dave Eisenstadter & Chris Goudreau | May 15, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music
It can be hard to remember it based on the cold, rainy weather we’ve had recently, but the middle of May is here. That means being outside, enjoying the flowers, and looking ahead to months more of being out and about before the temperature inevitably drops again and...
by Jennifer Levesque | May 14, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
Western Mass’s Weege and The Wondertwins turn it to 11 on the jazzometer and when listening to them, they send you to the nearest time machine. You emerge in a time where jazz was all around you and the speakeasy lounges were a dime a dozen. Do I Seem Weird Lately? is...
by Advocate Staff | May 10, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Fighting Giants is an alt-rock band that combines soaring vocals with intricate songwriting. Check out the band’s Valley Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Fighting Giants:
by Will Meyer | May 10, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
Before prisons became the inevitable institutions they are today, believe it or not, they were introduced as a reform; a humane alternative to torture or death. In 1790, English common law condemned those guilty of “petty treason” to the punishment of being burned...
by Advocate Staff | May 9, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Staff Picks
Weege & The Wondertwins Album Release Show // FRIDAY, 5/10 Weege & The Wondertwins’ sophomore album “Do I Seem Weird Lately?” is a gem to your ears. It’s strong and sophisticated and one of those albums you can put on to instantly change your mood. On Friday,...
by Chris Goudreau | May 9, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, News
This summer at the Pines Theater at Look Memorial Park in Northampton is shaping up to an eventful one with half a dozen shows featuring big name acts such as grungey alternative rock band Dinosaur Jr. with indie folk-rocker Kurt Vile as well as jam rock acts Moe. and...
by Advocate Staff | May 3, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Ed Bentley performs open mic-honed folk music with a sweet crooner voice. Check out his Advocate Sessions set in the video below. Interview with Ed Bentley:
by Advocate Staff | May 2, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, Staff Picks
Motherhood Out Loud at STCC // FRIDAY-SATURDAY Stagestruck columnist Chris Rohmann recently wrote about this production and described this play as 14 vignettes that “traverse the full terrain of the mom experience, from the throes of labor to the empty nest.” While...
by Jennifer Levesque | Apr 30, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
The last time Deer Tick had a headlining show in the Valley, it was canceled the day of because guitarist/singer John McCauley was too sick to perform. Wahhh! I was set to cover the show so I told myself the next time they had a headlining show here, I was going to...
by Advocate Staff | Apr 26, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Advocate Sessions band is electro fever-pop, new wave and experimental pop duo Home Body. The duo just released their new record, Spiritus, and will be performing at their release show on Friday, May 3 at the Shea Theater in Turners Falls. Check out...
by Advocate Staff | Apr 25, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Music, Staff Picks
Opal Canyon album release @ The Parlor Room // FRIDAY, 4/26 A little bit country, a little bit psychedelic rock and a lot of heart and soul. Valley supergroup Opal Canyon are releasing their debut album, “Beauty and Loss,” this Friday at The Parlor Room. The group is...
by Will Meyer | Apr 25, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
Recently, on a Saturday morning, I was lying in bed trying to muster the will to get up when a man dressed in all black, who seemed vaguely familiar, started poking around — letting himself into my room unannounced — and generally scoping out my personal dwelling...
by Jennifer Levesque | Apr 23, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music
Louisville, Kentucky’s Murder By Death are bringing their indie Americana rock to us here in Western Mass, and I’m super stoked! Their sound is strong and hearty, dark and transformative. There are hints of Nick Cave, Johnny Cash and Modest Mouse if you needed...
by Advocate Staff | Apr 19, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Valley Advocate Sessions performer is Jennifer Stuart who play talking folk music about love, life, and poetry. Interview with Jennifer Stuart:
by Chris Goudreau | Apr 18, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Featured, Review
The artwork of Zitong (Ann) Xu blends myth, magic, and the fantastical together to tell human stories about sorrow for “Lost Girls” at the Barnes Gallery at Leverett Crafts & Arts through the month of April. With lifelike haunting faces of women combined with...
by Jennifer Levesque | Apr 16, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
A little bit country, a little bit psychedelic rock and a lot of heart and soul. Valley supergroup Opal Canyon debut their album Beauty and Loss this month. Valley veteran musicians Debra DeMuth, Dave Houghton, Ray Mason, Bob Hennessy, and Jason Smith joined forces to...
by Advocate Staff | Apr 12, 2019 | Advocate Sessions, Articles, Featured, Music
Dave Dersham is a wordsmith who performs ambient folk and Americana songs. Check out his music on this week’s Advocate Sessions video. Interview with Dave Dersham:
by Will Meyer | Apr 12, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
The Flywheel celebrates its 20th birthday this month. In 1999, the Flywheel launched in a former cabinet shop in Easthampton — hosting shows and rousing rabble. The thought that the all-volunteer collective show space would enter a second decade, let alone a third,...
by Advocate Staff | Apr 5, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Julian Sherwood performs jazzy acoustic indie folk-rock with psychedelic riffs. Check out his music on this week’s Advocate Sessions video. Interview with Julian Sherwood:
by Roxann Wedegertner | Apr 4, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Review
Born a red diaper baby in, of all places, Liberty, N.Y., and raised on a hardscrabble poultry farm owned by his American Communist parents, Royalston resident Allen Young’s life as it’s portrayed in his new autobiography, Left, Gay & Green: A Writer’s Life, has...
by Jennifer Levesque | Apr 2, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
Eu·pho·ri·a – noun; a feeling or state of intense excitement and happiness. Westfield’s soulful rock quartet, The Screaming Hearts, are in the process of uniquely releasing a collection of songs that will eventually be compiled into an album. Conducting,...
by Chris Goudreau | Apr 1, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music
For more than two decades Of Montreal frontman, songwriter, and singer Kevin Barnes, based in Athens, Georgia, has been a musical chameleon; starting out with psychedelic indie pop before moving on to a wide range of other genres such as synth-driven electronic pop...
by Will Meyer | Mar 29, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
One of the more difficult things about making music is the shape and form of the modern music industry. There are so many reasons why talented bands might develop a loyal and dedicated niche audience and never break through to larger success. At this point in time it...
by Chris Goudreau | Mar 29, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Review
At first glance, Doris Madsen’s artwork seems to be a collection of slightly abstract paintings inspired by nature: a frigid island shore, an overhead bird’s eye view of Greenland, the stark Icelandic countryside, and a collection of pitcher plants. But on closer...
by Advocate Staff | Mar 29, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Plants of the Bible are a dream pop duo with synths and rich mellow vocal harmonies. Check out the band’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Plants of the Bible:
by Advocate Staff | Mar 22, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Advocate Sessions band is Americana, blues and jamming rock n’ roll band Rice: An American Band. Check out Rice’s performance in the video below. Interview with Rice: An American Band:
by Jennifer Levesque | Mar 19, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Review, Valley Show Girl
Adam Michael Kozak grew up in the ‘80s listening to DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince and Aerosmith. When he was a child, his mother played the digital organ they had set up in their living room, which she mainly played Barbara Streisand and Andrew Lloyd Weber show...
by Advocate Staff | Mar 15, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
This week’s Advocate Sessions performer are The Green Sisters with their mix of old timey, folk, Celtic, and bluegrass music with lush four part harmonies. Interview with The Green Sisters:
by Will Meyer | Mar 15, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music
Where have all the rock bands gone? Back in June, I wrote about multi-talented guitarist Wendy Eisenberg’s solo album Time Machine. Then she told me that she “just wants to be a good person and make very complicated music.” Still, since then, she’s been hitting the...
by Chris Goudreau | Mar 13, 2019 | Articles, Between the Lines, Featured, Music, News
Last Saturday night after returning home from The Big Surf Dance, an indoor, 12-hour winter music fest supporting veterans transitioning into housing, at Hawks & Reed in Greenfield, I heard the sad news that Sam’s Pizzeria in Northampton was closing after 12 years...
by Advocate Staff | Mar 8, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Uncategorized, Valley Advocate Sessions
OroborO combines experimenatal rock with punk, metal, and mathy riffs. Check out the band’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with OroborO:
by Jennifer Levesque | Mar 7, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
I’ve been hibernating the past couple of months. I just bought a house and have been focused mainly on that. The closest I’ve been to live music is listening to my vinyl — live — in my living room. I broke out of my hibernation recently, however, and attended my first...
by Will Meyer | Mar 1, 2019 | Articles, Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music, Uncategorized
Free Pizza was a punk band founded in 2009 and based in Boston. If the name isn’t too much of a giveaway, the ethos of the band was playful and goofy. The heavy-hitting upbeat rowdiness was accessible, earnest, and always a good time. In 2016, Free Pizza threw in the...
by Advocate Staff | Mar 1, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Orlen, Gabriel, and Avery perform folk music with rich vocal harmonies, lap steel slide licks, and ragtime inspired guitar. Check out the group’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Orlen, Gabriel, and Avery:
by Advocate Staff | Feb 22, 2019 | Advocate Sessions, Articles, Featured, Music
Olivia Frances is a folk/pop singer-songwriter with environmentalist themes. Check out her Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Olivia Frances:
by Chris Goudreau | Feb 21, 2019 | Articles, Featured, Music
It’s not often that you find a music festival during late winter, let alone a diverse collection of shows across four nights ranging from zydeco to bluegrass, country music, and folk. But Signature Sounds’ annual Back Porch Festival, now in its fifth year, is right at...
by Advocate Staff | Feb 16, 2019 | Advocate Sessions, Articles, Music
Stoner Will & The Narks play slacker rock with a biting satirical bent. Check out the band’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Stoner Will & The Narks
by Jennifer Levesque | Feb 14, 2019 | Articles, Arts, Columns, Featured, Music, Valley Show Girl
Signature Sounds recording artists And The Kids from Northampton have made a name for themselves throughout their active musician years in the Valley. They’ve been locally and nationally covered and very recently had a live set at Paste Magazine that was streamed...
by Advocate Staff | Feb 9, 2019 | Articles, Music
Electrio combines blues rock with progressive rock, funky grooves, and experimental stylings. Check out the band’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Electrio:
by Will Meyer | Feb 8, 2019 | Basemental, Columns, Featured, Music
Hadley’s Mike Parham, whose solo moniker is Mibble, recently released a new album, “Welcome the Earth Dog.” Parham’s superb home recordings sound like miniature musical collages, complete with sound effects, samples, and a lackadaisical posture towards the...
by Advocate Staff | Feb 1, 2019 | Articles, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Raspberry Jam plays catchy progressive indie rock that’ll get you on the dance floor. Check out the band’s Valley Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Raspberry Jam:
by Advocate Staff | Jan 25, 2019 | Articles, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
No Lens combines reggae rock with acoustic folk and funk grooves. Check out the band’s performance on Valley Advocate Sessions in the video below. Interview with No Lens:
by Advocate Staff | Jan 18, 2019 | Articles, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Dicey Riley with Zoe Darrow is a Celtic-folk influenced rock band with virtuoso fiddle and electric bagpipes. Check out the band’s full Valley Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Dicey Riley and Zoe Darrow:
by Advocate Staff | Jan 11, 2019 | Articles, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Moving Day is a an indie rock duo in the spirit of 1960s pop music. Check out the band’s Valley Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Moving Day:
by Jennifer Levesque | Jan 7, 2019 | Articles, Columns, Music, Valley Show Girl
The gift that keeps on giving is always the gift of music. You can go all out and get someone you love a new record player with a handful of vinyl for them to christen the needle with. You can pick up a CD or even a cassette, and you can purchase the album online to...
by Advocate Staff | Jan 4, 2019 | Articles, Music, Valley Advocate Sessions
Uncle Brothers is a a progressive jazz metal band with electric trumpets and heavy distorted guitar riffs. Check out the band’s Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Uncle Brothers:
