Preview: Ringo Deathstarr, The Kickback, Cross Country, Kvetch / October 22 / Luigi’s
By Alexa Smith, Staff Writer
Luigi's / Thursday, Oct. 22, 2015
You won’t find Luigi’s Fine Italian Dining on a Google search, but it’s there, and it’s available to offer some really tasty treats this Thursday evening for all you hungry guys and gals. Beneath a sheet of cobwebs will manifest catchy alternative emo sounds and groovy beats. Let’s boogie, although it’s likely no one will boogie, because we’re all too cool to dance, but you should come fake it anyways.
Loyal Athens' boys Kvetch, passionate and lively players as they are, are fairly new to the A-town music scene, gathering momentum in their voice and vivacity with each show. They enjoy playing music, this you can tell from their shows, watching as they take on different personalities with each song--some old, some new, some not their own.
Also taking the room, making the trip from Oxford, Ohio, are bedroom rockers Cross Country. Coming from the isolation and non-existent music scene of Miami of Ohio, Cross Country was shaped by like-minded people sharing the desire to play music in a place where music isn’t often played. Together, they desired to grow away from and with that nothingness, happy in their evolution far from the complacency that’s often found in a vague genre like alternative rock.
“I just wanted to play with people who are maybe not, I don’t want to say settling for less, but maybe complacent within genres or the ways people are doing things. It’s really easy to be an emo band and play the same chord progressions and do the same stuff,” said guitarist and singer Ezra Saulnier.
In creating their sound and making it their own, the individuals in XC have grown more confident in what they’ve become. The music is something they’ve created, the songs are influenced by the people who are playing them and the band is something that has been shaped by a lack of environment rather than the existence of one.
Also coming from not much of anything but doing something about it are Chicagoans, The Kickback. Following the lead of The Pixies in searching for the talent necessary to make music, lead singer Billy Yost went looking for bandmates via Craigslists, and, after some time, found them.
Their sound and essence are comprised of opposites, things that don’t necessarily go together, but work in the way of "opposites attract." Considering themselves a rock band, Yost still mercilessly devotes himself to melody, and the “perk delivery system” that can result from a catchy tune.
“Anything we do, I try to make sure that maybe, hopefully, you can get annoyed, catching yourself singing it while taking out the garbage or something,” said Yost.
They attempt to make shows intensely dance-y, sometimes resulting in bloodshed brought on by the pent up energy of spending hours upon hours in a van each day. Again, pairing things that maybe don’t belong together but making it work, this functionality is presented in their debut album Sorry All Over The Place, produced by Spoon’s Jim Eno.
“That record is like [an] ‘I just graduated from college and am absolutely terrified’ record. It’s just sort of unleashing all of that fear of 'now it’s time to make whatever you’re going to make out of your life,' but making it as danceable as possible,” said Yost.
Main-attraction Ringo Deathstarr, hailing from Austin, Texas, brings droned-out shoe-gaze noise pop to the table, easily relating to most mundane music-listeners. Tailoring to an international crowd--playing for Europeans, Japanese and Americans alike--Ringo Deathstarr immerses itself in its all-admired influences, maybe causing one to lose their self in the fuzzy guitars and sweetness of the vocals.
Who knows? Who’s to say? All of the above may be completely false or simply an idea formed in my head. Find out for yourself this Thursday.
