second before she started rebuilding it in her likeness. A year ago, she, Sophia Eris, and Claire de Lune were only a few months into their existence as the bombastic party clan the Chalice, and barely had any songs to their name. Still, they became the fi rst hip-hop PICKED 2 CLICK group to win Picked to Click since it began The 23rd installment of Picked to Click, or when the rappers took over in 1991. Now she’s the only rapper to repeat that feat. It’s hard to imagine that Lizzo doesn’t know that this is why she’ll be photographed again at the City Pages offi ces in a few minutes. With her many wigs NTIL LAST YEAR, stowed in her silver no rap act had Toyota, she’s taking a ever won Picked to break from opening UClick, City Pages’ for Har Mar Superstar yearly poll of the best new on his fall tour to do local artists. Not Atmo- several Twin Cities sphere (23rd in 1997), not appearances. As Heiruspecs (24th in 2001), we talk at a coffee not Dessa (26th in 2007), shop, she’s confi dent and definitely not Prof (31st and expansive. Her in 2006). A few who came gesticulating digits closer include Brother Ali have nails that are (4th in 2003), Kill the Vultures white with pointy (3rd in 2005), and Maria Isa red tips — much like (5th in 2006), but only in the foam hand Miley 2004 did rap make the top Cyrus thumped two when P.O.S/Doomtree into Robin Thicke’s finished behind the Olympic crotch during the Hopefuls. Finally in 2012, the 2013 MTV VMAs. Chalice edged out Pony Trash She says she didn’t for the win. realize the similarity, Proving that hip-hop’s but admits enduring enhanced Picked to Click some overlap with the presence wasn’t an anomaly, rebel ex-Disney star. Lizzo, Greg Grease, and Miley’s new album GRRRL PRTY lead this is called Bangerz, but year’s group. (And yes, we then Lizzobangers is know that some of that the one that actually awareness stems from ties bangs. to the Chalice.) Sure, plenty “I’m like, this of rappers have thrived here isn’t trap. This isn’t without a Picked to Click boom-bap,” she says, bump. But right now, Twin describing the beats Cities hip-hop itself is on the she raps over with podium. —REED FISCHER myriad cadences at her pointy fi ngertips. “What is it? It’s dope. I call it superhero music. I think he makes superhero music.” The “he” of this scenario is Lazerbeak, EMILY UTNE / HAIR & MAKEUP BY AMBER ROSE EMILY a.k.a. Twin Cities rap collective Doomtree’s beat architect and a spastic drummer on his MPC. Last year, they met at Fifth Element # says Lizzo midway through a conversa- on Record Store Day after a performance tion with City Pages. That makes a whole of his instrumental beat tape Lava Bangers music scene of us. with Plain Ole Bill. “She was in the crowd 1 LIZZO Everything you need to know on that and jumped onstage after and hugged us BY REED FISCHER topic is addressed on her debut full-length, both and said she loved that record,” he Lizzobangers. “I ain’t your hook girl, boo, recalls. By a few tweets later, she, ’Beak, I’m your feature/And I don’t need your producer Ryan Olson, and hypeman Cliff attention because of my features,” she spits Rhymes had decided convene in “a sweaty, “I’m so glad you on the menacing “Hot Dish,” one of several smoky room.” ain’t asked a tracks that interweave autobiography When Lizzo tells stories, she imitates with her brash artistic stance. Far from the voices of her characters and adds question about just another “rapper with a womb,” Lizzo sounds effects. A whoosh escapes her lips to being a woman has an allure that’s far more rarefi ed. This encapsulate what listening to Lava Bangers daughter of Detroit and Houston needed in hip-hop,” to be in Minneapolis for only about a split

CITYPAGES.COM OCTOBER 16–22, 2013 CITY PAGES 9 did for her writing. In the midst of the HE THREE ENTERTAINING Chalice blowing up and the crumbling of VER ladies of GRRRL PRTY are cap- another group, Lizzo & Larva Ink, she was THE tivating enough to host their own creatively blocked. PAST T hip-hop version of The View. “His chord progressions moved me a lot,” O12 Instead, these friends’ in-jokes and conviv- she says, getting serious and displaying an months, we’ve gotten ial banter color one of the area’s most excit- accomplished fl utist’s knowledge of music to know a lot about ing new rap acts. theory. “This is so overused, but the Beatles Greg Grease, but You already know Lizzo from the cover have this thing where they go [hums a few this could be just the of this issue. Here, she’s joined by Sophia bars]. It’s a half-step down and a jump jump-off. The rapper, Eris, her cohort from 2012’s Picked to down to a minor third or something. It’s so producer, storyteller, Click champs the Chalice. And then there pretty to me. You can easily make someone and musical col- is Manchita, who also collaborated with cry. They’re like [dramatic voice], ‘Oh my laborator won’t let Lizzo in Tha Clerb, and has returned to god’ like Jurassic Park. Music can literally, himself be confined Minneapolis after an extended sojourn to scientifi cally bring on emotions.” to any one thing. Chicago. Got it straight? The emotions spilling out of Lizzobangers “I really just want Conversations about the formation of — using ’Beak beats from Lava Bangers as to show people that GRRRL PRTY took place well before the well as more recent creations — are varied. there’s more than Chalice came together and blew up on There are plenty of boasts and playful one way of doing the scene. “These are the types of musical hooks, including one declaring, “I’ve got my anything,” Grease projects that people like to get into, you batches and cookies.” That one is a product says. And then, as know what I mean,” explains Lizzo. “It’s of stream-of-consciousness talks with Eris, though to play down not like one group or another; this is her tour DJ. “Things’ll just come out of my the importance of Minneapolis. So every time somebody mouth,” she says. “She’ll be like, ‘Save that!’” such a claim, MYCHEL FISHER wants to create something new it’s As for “Go,” Lizzo instructed Lazerbeak to he adds with a # completely acceptable. GRRRL PRTY slow it down to 60 bpm so that she could laugh, “I think 2 GREG GREASE is so fun, and so hip-hop, and fulfi lls so sing over it in a soulful, vulnerable fashion. I’m just trying much of my N.W.A. tendencies.” BY JEFF GAGE “She’s naturally, insanely gifted,” Olson to impress A lot of ground gets covered in fi rst says. “And is so gripped. Her natural musical my friends a single “Wegula,” a song that evolved from grip is unfuckwithable. She knows what she lot. And I have a lot of really good artist (“Before I hit puberty,” he jokes) and then a late-night run to White Castle. It’s a sassy wants to do and she’s super good at it.” friends, so that probably plays into it.” as the drummer. Today, that southern-fried introduction, and showcases each rapper’s Part of this grip is an attention to what One thing he’s grown especially adept gospel fl avor is still deeply ingrained in unique power on the mic. Live, they’re works onstage for more obvious “women at, through recent records like 2012’s the thick, luxurious grooves of his music. accompanied by the duo of DJ Lanae & the in music” heroes like Beyonce and Tina Cornbread, Pearl, and G and especially But in truth, Grease — an avid reader, a Hot Pants, and DJ Clean Drop. Turner, but also Har Mar, Prof, and last spring’s Black King Cole EP, is lover of fi lms, and a would-be visual artist “We just started making more and especially Mars Volta/At the Drive-In conjuring the reality of being young and — draws on more than just music for his more songs, and we were like, ‘Why frontman Cedric Bixler-Zavala. “That’s my black in this country. “There’s so many inspiration, even if it remains his central don’t we just do this?,’” Manchita says. biggest example of controlled chaos,” she different levels of life,” he says. “I really creative outlet. Thus, when he springs “When you work well with someone you says, alluding to her prog-rock(!) past. “‘He just think I try to show the perspective of a surprise like jumping onstage with hold on, and you’re like, ‘This feels good, didn’t mean to scream like that, he didn’t people who don’t have their perspectives Marijuana Deathsquads for a set in New this feels right.’ It was like when you’ve mean to throw the mic like that.’ Yes he shown.” He may not exactly be a York, or remixing a Poliça song, it’s all a got a crush on someone, or when you’re did.” “conscious” rapper, but there’s no piece of the same creative puzzle. courting someone, and you get to hold Lizzo uses the metaphor of going off into doubting the compassion of his work. “I “Something I’ve always tried to do is hands or kiss on the cheek for the fi rst the woods to describe the discordant place was raised where actions speak louder make it so people can visualize it, to take time. I’ve always wanted to be on stage she was at during this time last year. The than words, so I’m the type of person them to a different place, you know,” says with a bunch of bad-ass chicks, so this is difference now, as she sees it, is that she’s who wants to lead by example.” Grease. As a rapper, he uses his words my dream right here.” got a knapsack and a compass. Grease spent a half-dozen years of his as though the songs are his canvas, tools Before any clever Kathleen Hanna “I have been making ugly music for a childhood living in Atlanta, Georgia, and to bring characters and scenarios to life comments fi gure in, know that any direct long time,” she says. “My rock band, you can those years played a crucial role in the with rich, crisp details. “My father raised correlation with riot grrrl, the DIY ’90s look it up. I’m not ashamed of it. It’s not the other half of his musical equation, that me to be observant and just kind of sit feminist punk movement, is purely prettiest music. It was chaotic, it was rough, of a producer. It was in Atlanta that he back and watch what’s going on. I try to coincidental. “Our manager said to us, and I was rough. My whole thing has been got his fi rst taste of playing live music, just observe and then portray what I’ve ‘Hey, do you know what riot grrrl is? You about refi ning myself. I’m going to make fi rst as a singer in the church choir seen.” guys should look them up,” admits Sophia beautiful music.” Eris. “And when we looked it up, we were

12 CITY PAGES OCTOBER 16–22, 2013 CITYPAGES.COM # Lee — who performs under his middle 3 GRRRL PARTY name rather his last name, Peterson — has BY ERIK THOMPSON spent most of his adult life working to rediscover, and keep connected with, those the GRRRLs now before the PRTY gets a experiences. When he was 20, he moved lot bigger. to Austin, Texas, a place that reassured him such a life was still possible. “It was RANKIE LEE COMES OFF a like going to music school for free — or for lot like a drifter and a wanderer fi ve bucks a night,” he says. “Everybody in the mold of Woody Guthrie — plays, everybody sings [there]. There’s no F riding the rails with the clothes separation between a mom at a piano and a on his back and a guitar in hand. He sure band in a bar.” looks the part, with his cowboy hat, scrag- After spending seven years in Austin and gly blond beard, worn jean jacket, and another two in Los Angeles, playing mostly work boots. But the truth is altogether as a sideman, Lee returned to Minnesota different. For Lee and his music, it’s all in 2010. Last spring, when he released about finding a real and permanent place his fi rst EP, a collection of weathered, in the world. country-tinged folk songs, he called it “My fi rst memories,” says Lee, “are Middle West — an ode to John Steinbeck’s of being outside, and of farms.” He grew Travels with Charlie. Even then, he was up mostly in Stillwater but spent his intent on playing music and living life on GARRETT BORN earliest years on a dairy farm in Prescott, his own terms. Lee waited more than a like, ‘That’s awesome.’ And we feel like incorporated other local female rappers, Wisconsin. “There was a big front porch year to release the songs after they’d been we do embody that new wave of feminist including BdotCroc and the Lioness, and you had a beehive and the food was recorded. “The way those songs were movement, but in the hip-hop realm.” but they’re also teasing clues about their homemade,” he recalls. “My mom still has played, and the way I’d written them, they GRRRL PRTY have an ongoing forthcoming debut full-length. The latest a piano, and every time I go out there, we seemed like songs that would last. I said, residency at Icehouse. The nights have is a single called “Night Watch.” Get into play music.” ‘Let’s live with it a little bit.’”

HOUSANDS OF BANDS everywhere, Carroll # form at colleges every year, but must be having a 4 CARROLL only a scant few are serious band meeting. Every BY REED FISCHER T enough to grow up to be MGMT Tuesday evening, (Wesleyan) or Vampire Weekend (Colum- recent Mac grads Kulicke (’11), vocalist/ because at the end of the bia). But the indie-rock foursome Carroll, keyboardist/guitarist Brian Hurlow, drummer day we are guys who create named after the street they lived on while Charlie Rudoy, and bassist Charles McClung pop music, we bring that studying at Macalester, made a solid first (all ’12) organize at El Paraiso on Nicollet to element even when we’re step with their debut EP, Needs. With their talk shop. “Shop” can be a pretty loose term, writing Deerhunter-inspired tightly constructed hooks, reflective synths, however. In less than an hour, tangents jump shoegazey mud. We can’t and Brian Hurlow’s sensitive yet elusive to Stevie Wonder, Lorde, Michael Jackson, help but craft it in the most missives, these five songs were a preco- Sharon Van Etten, Radiohead, Rush, Mac deliberate way.” cious introduction. DeMarco, and Benjamin Britton, but usually Nearly everything about “For all the smart and talented people who back to Carroll. these guys feels deliberate. go to that school, there are a lot of people At the moment, there’s a split at the table They booked their fi rst tour who talk about the things they want to do and regarding the virtues of pop songwriting. themselves and recently don’t do them,” says guitarist Max Kulicke, Hurlow says he never shied from it, but demoed new songs at a JAMES CHRISTENSON while relaxing on an outdoor patio with his Kulicke admits a heavy blues past. cabin in Wisconsin. About bandmates. “What was so appealing about “Part of writing a really good pop song, an 10 tracks are in the works, and they’re mum four-headed excitement for their next this project was it was three people who I attribute of someone who does that — let’s regarding the respected producer they’re deliberate move. Rudoy volunteers, “These knew had talent and skill, but who were also take Carroll for example — our EP is like working with. “Defi nitely not Rick Rubin,” songs are the sound of the four of us living trying to actually go out and execute.” shimmery pop compared to the darkness of says Kulicke. But they insist they just don’t together, eating together, traveling together, Judging by the mariachi wafting gently what’s coming out now,” chatty Rudoy says want to jinx it until it’s set in stone. and crying together.” They all laugh again, in the background and the tacos and beers in between laughs and sips of his beer. “But What Carroll can’t hold in is a palpable, but nod in agreement.

CITYPAGES.COM OCTOBER 16–22, 2013 CITY PAGES 13 Indeed, there’s a timeless quality to the songs that Lee writes, songs that aim to break through any given moment to hit at the heart of something that’s both larger and more intimate in our lives. “Everything to me is a story. Wherever you’re coming from, you’re trying to connect that story to people,” Lee insists, motioning with his hands as though pushing a toy train. “Everybody knows what it’s like to be lonely, everybody knows what it’s like to be in love or to want to be in love,” he adds. “I want to be a link in that chain, I don’t want to be outside of it.” #5 FRANKIE LEE BY JEFF GAGE RYAN WILEY RYAN

PICKED TIE TO CLICK hon- A CHARLIE B. WARD AND GRAHAM TOLBERT oree who’s already “clicked” plenty, Ginkgo’s Josh Grier rocked the likes of Letterman and Coachella with his blog-buzzed rock band Tapes ’n’ Tapes during the late 2000s. That level of success typically leads to music-career tunnel vision, but appears to # have had the opposite 6 GINKGO effect on Grier. Growing dissatisfaction BY ROB VAN ALSTYNE with the touring grind led him to put Tapes ’n’ Tapes on ice and make Manopause, his the songs completely,” recalls Grier. one-man band debut as Ginkgo. “There’s that scary element of ‘Is this all A warped and woozy delight, Manopause going to fall apart?’ That out-on-the-edge irreverently blends disparate sounds feeling has always given me a rush.” and styles and is defi ned by gleeful Grier sounds like a man at peace with experimentation. There’s room at the table his past and fi rmly in control of his future, for both rinky-dink synth-pop goofs like which for now means focusing on friends, “Casiotiones” and the buoyant tropcialia family, and a stable day job over his music of “Moped Song.” These new sounds have career. Grier feeling liberated and energized. “The people that I’ve met who are really “To grow in life you have to challenge successful in the music business have yourself to do new things,” he explains. made a lot of personal sacrifi ces,” he says. “I’ve always written pop songs with tightly “They’re working really hard all the time defi ned arrangements and melodies. I and want it really bad. If you decide that’s really wanted to push myself away from not what you want out of life then why that and just see where the songs could go would you want to commit your whole if I allowed for more fl uctuation. I had no existence to doing just that one thing?” idea what anyone else would think of it, so the only criteria was really ‘Does this feel DON’T THINK WE’VE ever right to me?’” made a song in the daytime,” By Grier’s own admission taking that line says Pony Bwoy vocalist Jer- of thinking “to the extreme,” Manopause at “I emy Nutzman. “We weren’t times makes for jarring listening, as when looking for product, we were just hanging overdubbed stacks of stinging guitar lines out and having fun.” jostle for pole position on “Line Dancing The experimental R&B duo of Nutzman, With the Stars.” For Grier, the intentional who raps under the name Spyder Baybie chaos ultimately proved creatively Raw Dog, and producer Hunter Morley rewarding. mostly work together in an after-after- “I wanted to recreate that feeling of party haze, melding sporadic sounds and seeing a band live that doesn’t quite know ideas into tightly realized end results.

14 CITY PAGES OCTOBER 16–22, 2013 CITYPAGES.COM #6 PONY BWOY BY JACK SPENCER

progressions, and lyrics. The music retains some of the standard Spyder Baybie grit but is also hauntingly beautiful, utilizing moody minor-key melodies to create some powerful compositions. Their self-titled debut album’s lead single, “Ævum (time crawls)”, accompanied by a slow-motion video of Nutzman being covered in black liquid, is a prime example of how affecting the stark dark-pop soundscapes can get. “We were more surprised than anybody with how pretty-sounding it was,” Morley recalls. But this is still party-driven music, built from impromptu late-night studio sessions and chemically enhanced creative spurts that aimed to make it sound like a different vocalist was singing on almost every song. “I imagine throwing a pile of mud at a plate glass window and a rainbow comes out the other side,” says Nutzman. TIE MICHAEL E. PIERCE “It was concentrated, but it’s a dirty style.” Simultaneously free-form and intensely Within, you’ll hear Nutzman rapping, mulled-over, the lyrics feel stream-of- crooning, and pitch-warped warbling as the consciousness, while sonic structures underlying texture shifts subtly in multiple meander through electronica, soul, hip- directions. Morley’s past work with electro- hop, funk, and “sappy-ass love ballads,” as pop act Enola Gay made him initially Morley put it. hesitant to begin a full-fl edged new band, “We pick over it very harshly,” Morley but after quickly amassing three albums’ says. “We argue every little point. Every worth of material in the past year, it was little word, every little note, we sit there and clear Pony Bwoy was a beast of its own. go back and forth and eventually settle on “There’s defi nitely a workaholic attitude. something. It’s completely collaborative.” If we died next year, we’d both be happy They stress that their songwriting is with the stuff we wrote this year,” says not evenly divided along lines of producer Morley. “It’s actually kind of serious and and vocalist, as both parties develop refl ects where we were mentally and the song’s live instrumentation, chord physically during the making of it.”

OUTHWIRE HAVE EMERGED beyond the diminutive, piano-laden studio out of the fertile music scene in versions of this year’s self-titled debut. Duluth with a blend of plaintive “It’s been a good test to see how the songs Sfolk and a vibrant backbeat rooted live outside of a familiar environment,” in hip-hop. Songs that were born modestly Small explains. “I think it’s made our songs around the elegiac strains of frontwoman stronger and tighter. Playing more regularly Jerree Small’s piano blossomed in the studio has also allowed us to relax more and let the under the deft, gritty touch of Crew Jones songs change and expand with the mood of bandmates Sean Elmquist and Ben Larson. each show.” Along with bassist Matt Mobley, the group That exploratory nature within the music gives the gospel-tinged numbers a stylish, of Southwire is due to the different band pulsating rhythm. members searching for new ways to express Originally a side project, Southwire themselves. So the shift from hip-hop to a truly began to blossom once it got the members’ full attention, and they set their sights on the concert stages in the Twin Cities area and beyond. In a live setting, Small’s soaring, weathered vocals mix elegantly with Larson’s RICHARD NARUM gravelly spoken word, and the # band’s rhythmic 8 SOUTHWIRE churn swells far BY ERIK THOMPSON

CITYPAGES.COM OCTOBER 16–22, 2013 CITY PAGES 15 Southern spiritual type of folk music for us, that meant getting into the music that Elmquist and Larson is less drastic than it forms the underpinings of rap music, seems. the history of it — which led us towards “After doing hip-hop for six or seven the deeper roots of American music, years, you’re naturally searching for which includes folk music. And we began different kinds of music,” explains exploring actually playing that type of drummer/producer Elmquist. “And for music.”

DIY STREAK SURE A CAN speed up the recording process — just ask Fury Things. In one productive day last fall, the Minneapolis garage-rock three- piece recorded the five raw, guitar-driven numbers on their self-

titled debut EP at LAURA MORENO their practice space at # the Acrylic 9 FURY THINGS Fabricators BY ERIK THOMPSON warehouse. “It was all recorded fueled, and mixes ’90s-tinged angst with on a Sunday, and then mixed on a Tuesday,” some subtle pop sensibilities smoothing the explains bassist Devon Bryant. “We fi xed rough edges. something on Thursday, and then had it up They returned to the practice space online by Friday. It was cool. I’ve been in in early 2013 for another of-the-moment bands for a long time, but it was my fi rst session forming EP 2. “It’s a mixture of experience with Bandcamp, and that level economy, both mental and monetary,” of speed in getting something out. And we Werstein explains. “We can go into our got really good responses back right away.” practice space on a Sunday and say, ‘We “Yeah, it was really quick and dirty,” lead have these hours, should we just record singer/guitarist Kyle Werstein chimes in some songs?’ It’s a totally no-pressure proudly. environment.” Werstein grew up in Germany as the son After celebrating the band’s fi rst of a military man, and moved to Minneapolis anniversary in August, Fury Things upgraded three years ago. He eventually hooked up to Ed Ackerson’s Flowers Studio for a with a couple of scene vets in Chicago-bred forthcoming 7-inch. They have amassed 12 Bryant and Kansas City native Andy Carson new songs that are ready to be recorded at on drums. The three gelled immediately. an as-yet undetermined location. But the “You’d be surprised how many people Flowers experience was a good one. don’t get the Dinosaur Jr. reference in our “Ed really gets us, and I feel like that was name,” jokes Werstein. One listen and the the key element that got us out of doing it connection is easy to follow. The songs ourselves,” says Werstein fondly. “It was employ an untamed aesthetic that is guitar- really nice just having an unbiased opinion.”

NIMAL LOVER HAVE A including Gumbi and Høst. After self- sound that hits you in the fore- releasing a 7-inch and touring the Midwest head and gut simultaneously. a few years ago, they packed up and A Frontman Addison Shark’s moved permanently to our fair cities. The guitar explodes like a dirty bomb of feed- connections they made in the DIY tour back, and the pulverizing bass and drums circuit made the Twin Cities attractive, of Evan Bullinger and Nate Fisher add to its but they’re still out on the road several shrapnel spray. This is noise rock powerful times a year, to places as far-removed as enough to leave a lasting physical impres- Washington and New York. sion — albeit a confusing one for venues “We really like getting out of town and assembling punk nights. meeting people,” explains Shark. “It’s really “It does get pretty tunnel vision as far fun making friends and playing with those as being genre-specifi c,” Shark elaborates. bands again.” “We’ll wind up on a straight hardcore bill For now, they don’t have a well- because that’s kind of just what goes on in manicured Tumblr page, and almost no that particular scene.” internet presence whatsoever. But make Originally hailing from the Fargo punk no mistake, this is not a bad thing. Despite and metal scenes, Animal Lover met their online invisibility, their three short- while sharing bills in a series of groups run EPs still have received a healthy share

16 CITY PAGES OCTOBER 16–22, 2013 CITYPAGES.COM TIE Animal Lover seems to take a quiet joy in. Be it an incredibly faithful cover of the Who’s “Substitute,” or fl ashes of spiking melodicism within their noisy assault, the group’s unapologetic character recalls their DIY forebears in the #10 ANIMAL LOVER BY ZACH McCORMICK

COURTESY OF THE ARTISTS Minutemen. “There’s of accolades locally and even a Pitchfork the politics of doin’ it write-up. yourself,” says Addison. “But we don’t have There’s merit in shredding genre anybody knocking on the door to do it for pigeonholes, and that’s something us. That’s the only way we can.”

ANDAAM GIVE A DECIDEDLY Malamanya seems like a different world cagey interview. A conversation from Vandaam’s spacey futurism, but she with the experimental elec- shrugs off the divide and breaks all her V tronic three-piece — featuring music down to simply voicing compatible producers Sloslylove and Absent and vocal- sounds. ist Lady Midnight — revealed more about “I think a label can be somewhat their thoughts on movies and video games limiting,” she says. “To marry yourself to than anything about their down-tempo one particular thing is dangerous. The grooves. moments that I’ve enjoyed playing with “It’s the same as skateboarding, really,” Vandaam the most have been very spiritual says Absent, regarding their collaborations. and connected. Unlikely circumstances, but He also illustrates under his given name, destined outcomes.” Andres Guzman, for the Steakmob art The group’s profi le has risen in the collective. “Someone does a trick, the other past year thanks to word of mouth and an person watches and then they answer to it. increasing number of invites from bands Isn’t that kind of how everything is?” and venues, and with good reason. It’s Sloslylove has his own comparison: “It’s easy to lose yourself in Lady Midnight’s more like Street Fighter for me. You’ve been reverberated vocals fl oating above her playing Ryu for years, and you just discover bandmates’ knob-twiddling and bass- the Hadouken, that’s like new technology. heavy production. Vandaam’s self-titled You’re still using the same character, it’s just debut album ranges from the Miami different moves.” Vice slap-bass of “Fashion Week” to the Not the most descriptive of answers, stuttering drums and skeletal synth-wipes but they refl ect the trio’s laissez-faire of “Loop2.” It’s a collection that suggests music-making approach. The producers they’re hesitant to defi ne the band in terms have revolved around one another of genre or their process. socially and musically for years, releasing The record makes for a powerful, subtly a string of mixes for the Steakmob visceral listening experience. After several website individually and collectively. spins, the connection between Vandaam’s Lady Midnight’s role as lead singer of the atmospheric sound and skateboarding traditional and acoustic Afro-Cuban band slowly begins to makes sense. Making the practiced seem TIE like second nature seems to be at the core of both. “People don’t give error enough credit,” says Absent. “People experience one error and give up. The best things come when you wait for them.”ç #10 VANDAAM BY JACK SPENCER AMALIA NICHOLSON

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