January 9th, 2013
By Mike Breen |
Music |
Posted In: Live Music, Music News, Music Video, New Releases
Jamaican Queens (Photo: Andi Hedrick)
Music Tonight: Jamaican Queens, Elia Goat and More
Jamaican Queens (Photo: Andi Hedrick)Detroit producers/Electro musicians Ryan Spencer and Adam Pressley formed its new project Jamaican Queens last year, following the demise of their previous band, Prussia. The pair bonded over a mutual love for Hip Hop production, something that would find itself central to Jamaican Queens winding sound. Together less than a year, the twosome's single "Kids Get Away" introduced the newcomers with a sound that blends EDM, Hip Hop sounds and rhythms and a somewhat psychedelic brand of Indie Pop.
The band calls its music "Trap Pop," a reference to the Trap style of Hip Hop that is something of a successor to the old Southern Crunk style. Still, you won't mistake Jamaican Queens' music for T.I.'s — JQ's unpredictable, fluttering style recalls MGMT's last two albums had the Electronic aspects of their music been more prominent.
Jamaican Queens' first full-length, Wormfood, is due in February and was mixed by Christopher Lazlo Koltay, a former Cincinnati musician who has been enjoying a successful engineering/production career in Detroit the past several years, working with artists like The Dirtbombs and Akron/Family. Here's the song that has garnered the band the most attention so far, "Kids Get Away."
Jamaican Queens is joined by thrillingly creative and dynamic rockers Automagik out of Covington for tonight's free, 10 p.m.
show at MOTR Pub in Over-the-Rhine. The band's elastic, left-field Rock, which at times sounds like a crazier, New Wavy Foxy Shazam (pals of the Automagik dudes), is on glorious display on the trio's just released new album, Black Sundae. Give the album a sample listen below.
• Indie Folk Pop Rock troupe Swear and Shake are starting out their 2013 with a bang, hitting the road for the band's first North American tour. It helps when the headliner is the perpetually young, still quite popular G. Love and Special Sauce. The tour kicks off tonight here in Cincinnati at Oakley's 20th Century Theatre. Tickets for the 8:30 p.m. concert are $25 at the door.
Formed in 2010, the group spread its first release, the EP Extended Play, around widely for free online, notching nearly a quarter million downloads for the release. The band asked for a return favor when it went into make its first full-length; the Maple Ridge LP was funded entirely through fans via Kickstarter and released to wide acclaim last spring.
Here's the official video for the latest album's track "These White Walls."
• The January edition of Mayday's "Unsung" showcase, which features a new local band each month, takes place tonight at the Northside club at 9 p.m. This week's Unsung artist is Elia Goat.
Goat was born in Moscow but moved to Cincinnati with his family when he was a baby. He studied music a bit in high school and started to study Jazz in college when he decided he'd be better served hitchhiking around North America. That period in his life was inspirational, converting Goat from aspiring bass player to eager singer/songwriter and he honed his craft during his travels. In 2011, Goat moved back to Cincinnati with a batch of songs ready to be recorded and performed live with some pals — including a euphonium player and tenor saxophonist (Goat's band, featuring drums, bass guitar, carnet and harmony vocalists, would go on to be dubbed the Natural Horns). With an Americana/Folk sound dusted with traces of Jazz, Pop, Soul, Blues and Rock, Elia Goat fits right in with Cincinnati's varied yet often traditionally rooted music scene.
Check out Elia Goat and the Natural Horns' 2012 release, the half-live/half-studio effort Acorns, below.
