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Dan Deacon, Prince Rama and Earth Universe @ The Church 4/11/2015

It can be super hard for me to explain why I like certain kinds of music. Dan Deacon and Prince Rama are big “WTF”-targets to anyone who’s not familiar with the sound... or the sights. I usually can’t listen to anything so obnoxiously poppy, cheesy and cracked-out around other people without feeling extremely self-conscious, like I’m the only person who’d enjoy that kind of thing. Although I try to avoid making myself look like the biggest nerdy loser on the planet, tonight, it was inevitable. I had to bring a classmate (a quiet, go-with-the-flow kinda gal) to with me to work on a video shoot (amazing product coming soon). 

I worried about leaving her to the dogs in the sold-out basement of the Church, and as a sweaty, dirty mist rose in the air. I thought about how I should have brought her a pair of ear plugs to save her from the piercing sounds of the speakers, that way at least her hearing would be saved, if the shifty shelf that held the speakers didn’t crush her first. NOT THAT I WANTED HER TO BE CRUSHED! It was just a possible fact of life. And it would have been all my fault.

Eventually, I forgot about my worries and totally sank into the crushingly euphoric sounds and lights brought by Dan Deacon, wishing that it wouldn’t end.  There was a boy who might have been like, 10, who was up there with Deacon singing into the mic, which was distorted to produce a super low-pitched sound. And then he lead the crowd by dancing on the stage. Seriously, the happiest moment ever, and best advocacy for more all-ages venues. There was no room to be worried.

I have so many photos from this semester to catch this blog up on! I go outside now, it’s different.

Today was fun. I followed Philly.com photographer Colin Kerrigan (very cool) around on an impromptu street portrait project, since our original plans to photograph a musician in a studio setting fell through. 

With only an hour to shoot, we found a nice handful of people who were willing to pose and talk to us. Each photo has a short caption with more information about the model. 

Flesh Prince @ The Pharmacy 3/15/15 

Here is the photo documentation of a day in January spent following around Mannequin Pussy, a band of childhood friends that has since evolved into a trio of face-melting fury. Don't ask them what the origin of the name is, because the answer is not that it's a tribute to their offensively ripping off the underwear of department store mannequins. At this point, Mannequin Pussy is a self-sustaining band, having successfully toured all across the contiguous United States, with no signs of stopping. MP is made up of Marisa Dabice, 27, Athanasios Paul, 27, and Kaleen Reading, 22. Their sound is heavily rooted in punk, grunge and everything in between. But Dabice makes all the difference with her vocals— jumping around from melodies like innocent nursery rhymes, to wonderful maniacal screaming fits. It is just as heartwarming as it sounds. 

We started the day at Dabice's place in West Philly near Friends of Malcom X Park, which made for a fitting band photo when strategically covered with the members of MP.  I was the lucky solo audience member of a tea party and basement rehearsal, witnessed the turnaround of funky old thrift duds into coveted Mannequin Pussy merchandise and surfed the web for tuxedo shirts only suitable for their mock-prom Valentines Day show. We headed out to Everybody Hits on W Girard Avenue to set up and listen to a roster of local and touring bands play. Meanwhile, we passed the time by playing free games of pinball and dodging icing-covered hot dogs, because it was somebody's birthday, and hot dogs and batting cages obviously go hand in hand. But the night really blasted off when Mannequin Pussy took the stage around 12 a.m.