Tag: Spacer

PLAYING BLOOMINGTON: Femme Night @ The Dream

The Bloomington house show network is comprised of dozens of privately owned and rented houses that are scattered across town. On any given night, students and other young adults freely filter in and out of these spaces, packing themselves into hot, stuffy, unfinished basements in order to socialize with friends and listen to a mix of local and touring acts. Somewhere between a house party and a concert, house shows are at the heart of Bloomington’s D.I.Y. music culture. While some house shows are one-off events, most houses have established names and host shows semi-regularly. For the well-established houses, the house’s life as a venue often long outlives any one tenant’s residency. Though these events are open to the public, one must seek them out in order to find them. Facebook events, paper fliers, and word of mouth are the most common vehicles for advertisement. Last Tuesday, I went to The Dream – a house located just south of downtown – to catch Femme Night, featuring Clue, Bad Psychic, Lily on Horn Horse, and Spacer.

With a few friends in tow, I arrived at The Dream about halfway through Clue’s set. Unfortunately, by the time I made it down to the basement, Clue had finished their short opening performance. Bummed that I missed out on what was billed to be ethereal space punk, I found consolation in the fact that I would be catching this Bloomington band at The Bishop in a few weeks. I took the extra time as a chance to get out of the stagnant heat of a packed basement and explore the venue. The Dream, much like other house show venues that I’ve been to, is like two completely different places above and below ground. Upstairs, the place has an aesthetic that calls to mind any other student house I’ve been to: mismatched dusty old couches, dirty dishes in the sink, and shelves filled with peculiar knickknacks. Downstairs, an obvious effort had been put into transforming an unfinished basement into a D.I.Y. music venue. Towards the far end of the basement, a stage was clearly demarcated with a maroon curtain framing the backdrop, a carpet on the floor, and shiny plastic party streamers hanging from the ceiling. Some mismatched chairs were set up against the perimeter of the basement. To the left of the stage, a table displayed an assortment of band merch and Shut Up And Listen zines. An ineffectual room fan was installed at the center of the basement.

While outside for a cigarette break, Spacer’s frontwoman Hannah Hadley peeked her head outside to announce that the next act was about to begin. Bad Psychic is the experimental goth synth pop project of Bloomington resident Liv Mershon. Dressed in tight pants, a jacket, scarf, sunglasses, and hat, I was amazed that she did not pass out from the heat, but beyond that, I was immediately taken by Mershon’s live presence. The multi-media artist energetically strutted around the stage with complete control. As haunting and repetitive beats hypnotized the audience into a swaying submission, Mershon delivered eerie vocal affects and impressive soprano runs. Bad Psychic’s EP, Threee, is available for streaming via Bandcamp.

My personal favorite act of the night was the touring duo, Lily on Horn Horse. Based out of New York, Lily on Horn Horse is the collaborative project of Lily Konisberg and Matt Norman. Together, these two released an eclectic, 28-track album that showcases their collective creative range. While their body of work is too diverse to draw generalizations, the duo’s vocals – Konisberg’s airy pop soprano and Norman’s flawed yet personal baritone – and Norman’s whimsically enchanting horn accompaniment, provide the foundation to their sound. Their songs are quick and punchy. Their music is sometimes jazzy, sometimes poppy, with elements of disco, electronic, and indie music thrown in. During their performance, these seemingly disparate elements were brought to life and amplified in the basement of The Dream. As Konisberg and Norman took turns sauntering into the crowd and interpretive dancing with their instruments, the two seemed determined to start a dance party. And it worked. The weirder the performance got onstage, the freer it seemed the audience got with their own limb usage.

As the event’s de facto host, Spacer was the last band to perform. Spacer is a three-part synth punk group that consists of Hannah Hadley (vocals, vox and synth), Olivia Graham (bass), and Connor Martin (drums). Already a well-established favorite within the local scene, the crowd bobbed around expectantly to favorites, like “Bullet” and “Sore Loser.” These three seemed quite comfortable on stage, delivering the standard that Spacer fans have come to expect: Hadley’s impressive vocal performance, raw and choppy compositions, and danceable, bouncy new wave rhythms.


Spacer’s performance was Hadley’s victory lap after a successful night. Throughout the event, she could be seen working the sound system, making announcements about the lineup, collecting suggested donations for the touring band, and informing people around the house when the music was about to start up. She even made banana bread for the guests. Because the existence of house show venues makes event planning both doable and informal, the local D.I.Y scene relies heavily on the efforts of the individuals who keeps events like these going year-round.

PLAYING BLOOMINGTON: Punks Give Back @ The Root Cellar

Punks Give Back! Bloomington is a local branch of Punks Give Back!, a national, not-for-profit organization that supports local artists and organizers to raise money for local nonprofit organizations. Punks Give Back! Bloomington organizes a monthly event with music and poetry in order to channel funds into various organizations that support local underserved and underprivileged populations. On March 4, this organization’s first event raised money in support of the UndocuHoosier’s fund. UndocuHoosier Alliance is a group that serves the needs of undocumented people at Indiana University and in Bloomington. The second event, held after Bloomington’s Zinefest, raised funds for the Bloomington Anarchist Black Cross and local prisoner support efforts. On Thursday, I caught Punks Give Back No. 3, a benefit show for the All-Options Pregnancy Resource Center in Bloomington. This center provides a number of services to people in the community: free pregnancy tests, peer counseling, diapers and baby clothes, abortion funding, condoms, adoption information, support groups, and referrals.

The third installment of Punks Give Back! Bloomington was held at the Root Cellar. Accessible via two different alleyways and through a parking lot, the Root Cellar occupies the basement of Farm, a popular restaurant in town. One has to walk through an unmarked door at the bottom of a flight of stairs to enter the Root Cellar. Despite its conspicuous location, The Root Cellar, with its hipster-meets-rustic-grime aesthetic, is a popular spot for those who prefer to avoid the more mainstream bars that cater to Indiana University’s overwhelmingly present Greek life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Because a portion of the night’s drink sales was donated to the Resource Center, I felt less shitty about ordering a “Bill effing Murray” before I settled into a corner of the Root Cellar for the poetry portion of the night. Punks Give Back No.3 featured 8 poets: Dan “Sully” Sullivan, Mobe, Bella Bravo, Jasper Wirthshafter, T.K. Williams, Michelle Gottschich, Emily Corwin, and Eszi Waters. After a brief introduction, each poet took the stage for about five minutes. Talking points ranged from love and heartbreak to racism and gender equality. Typical to most Bloomington shows that I’ve been to, the audience, which was already impressive for a mid-week event opener, was supportive and respectful of the performers.

After the poetry had finished, the crowd reshuffled while the stage was prepared for the musical acts to come. I grabbed my second drink and wormed my way into the back of the standing room for Yalla Stockings, the first local musician of the night. Yalla Stockings is the solo venture of British transplant Charlie Jones. With a synth pad, a looping pedal, and her own airy vocals, Jones constructed ethereal, dreamy, meandering synth pop with haunting, repetitive vocal motifs. As the music began to unfold at the root cellar, the audience was physically responsive, despite the fact that Yalla Stockings was the most low-key act of the night. Yalla Stockings is not yet available for streaming anywhere on the Internet, so one has to come to Bloomington if they want to experience it.

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Doozie performing at the Root Cellar. All photos by Rebecca Kunin.

Next up was Doozie, a power pop foursome with a 90s retro grunge aesthetic. Their music is unapologetically straightforward, simple yet captivating, and extremely personal. The audience bopped around to Doozie’s upbeat and catchy riffs, yet from where I was standing the band seemed to be coolly unaware that there was any audience at all. The guitar player had his back to the audience for the entirety of the performance, while the other members seemed to be equally wrapped up in their own actions. Doozie released their first demo back in June 2016. It is available for streaming below.

New Wave-influenced spooky synthpunk band Spacer was the next act to perform. Spacer is comprised of Connor Martin (drums), Olivia Graham (bass), and Hannah Hadley (synth). During their performance, Hadley’s vocal timbre fluctuated between heightened speech, breathy soprano, and quavering vibrato over the confusing and intricate cacophony of noise. Spacer was an eclectic and energetic mixed bag of Hadley’s vocal styling, grungy baselines, spacey synth, and bouncy drum patterns. Spacer has been busy recording and performing all across town. Their most recent single, “Place 2 Go,” dropped this Saturday, May 20.

For the final act of the evening, Jessica Knight (bass and vocals) and Cassie Staub (guitar and synth) of Looming performed a stripped down version of their music. Looming is an indie rock group based out of Springfield, Illinois. At this point in the night, the crowd had thinned out, which is unsurprising as local bands often draw in bigger crowds than the larger touring acts do. But this intimate version of Looming was not to be missed. Its minimalism highlighted Knight’s sharp and punchy vocal performance, which somehow managed to straddle the line between aggression and introspection. Looming just wrapped up their countrywide tour, but their music is available for streaming via Bandcamp.

Punks Give Back! Bloomington has so far helped to show that when the world seems like an overwhelmingly terrifying and unjust place, real work can be done at the local level to help improve people’s experiences. In a state (and country) where the rights and safety of women, LGBTQ+ people, Muslim-Americans, undocumented people, and people of color have been recently under attack, it is hopeful to see local musicians and activists use their art to push back, even if it does sometimes just feel like a drop in a bucket.[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]