Appropriate Grammar
Artists on Trial: Morningglories
Morningglories will be at Vandals for the Summer Kamp Fest this Sunday on the indoor stage at 9:45 pm. You can see them and 30 other bands for only $10 each night. Facebook event page.
Show review: Crossroads Music Festival, 9.8.12
(Photo of Rural Grit All-Stars at The Brick, taken by Michelle Bacon)
By the time I had made it to the Crossroads Music Festival, entertainment was in full swing. I had opted to take the "knowledge" approach to the fest, seeking out only bands that I had yet to experience. Thankfully, the lineup was packed with fresh names, mostly due to my overwhelming tendency to not leave my house.
Due to a pants/dryer fiasco that had plagued me for the better portion of the evening the first set I was able to catch was The Hillary Watts Riot at the Midwestern Musical Company stage. The first thing I noticed while walking in was the room. With guitars at every angle and pop art and vintage toys lining the walls, the space is easily in the running for Kansas City’s best hidden gem. Shove the extremely energetic Hillary Watts Riot in the room and you’ve got a winning combo. Though the band will fuck with your mind like a drunken kitten, the Devo meets B-52 mashup is the type of music you have to stop, think over, digest, process, then accept. However, unique is the fact that while deep and complex it remains fun and approachable on the surface. With a pinup doll look and sunglasses-at-night image, the pedal-heavy band kicks in your teeth with plenty of reverb and a chaotic sound. With glimpses of punk reflecting off the glitters of glam, the band’s sound bounces all over the place. 1990s sound bites bleed through the 1980s influences. Mixed with their witty banter, this band is entertainment at its best. Show up to catch them if not only to catch their drummer (Sergio Moreno) rock his flashlight hands mid-set.
From there, I wandered downtown towards The Brick to catch Victor & Penny. I had wanted to catch their antique pop set for a while, but could never manage to get their schedule to align with mine. In addition, their tour schedule has been nothing to scoff at. Neither is their live act. Victor (Jeff Freling), who runs his vocals through a vintage throwback radio, is a treat to watch. His guitar chops are stout and his rockabilly licks are well-rehearsed and down pat. Paired with the beautiful Penny (Erin McGrane), who rocks a tiny uke and a sunshine smile, the group is unstoppable and refreshing. Her act has a bit of snarl to it, growling when you least expect it. She is also in full control of her facial expressions, turning them on at all the appropriate moments. She is the perfect front lady and in full control of her craft. She knows her charms and makes certain that her audience is enlightened of them as well, as she swims through her 100-year-old material. Of all the sets of the night, this one was the hardest to leave early.
Begrudgingly, I meandered toward the Czar Bar to catch John Velgne & The Prodigal Sons. Sadly, I wasn’t able to get a fair judgment of their sound due to an overwhelmingly extreme use of soundboard. Turned up to 11, the band’s layers and depth were missing, buried somewhere in a clutter of echo and earplugs. You could, however, gather the way the horns filled the room. Making note of their E Street ways, I gave my ears a break and headed back toward Midwestern Musical Company’s setup for Dim Peepers.
Sporting a suitcase bass drum, kazoos, a homemade washtub bass and tiny horns, Dim Peepers won my heart and the award for the fest’s most unique band. With a fantastic do-it-yourself sound, the band owned the room, the crowd, and in my humble opinion, the fest. Requesting that I not be afraid to get drunk and make a fool of myself, I lived wildly. I didn’t take notes and instead danced a little. Just a touch. Not enough to be noticed or lose my reclusive wallflower status, but enough to feel silly. Good times.
From there, I lurked at the Midwest Music Foundation tent, listening to Hearts of Darkness and watching cougars shimmy across the parking lot. Even from my lawn chair, I found the set enjoyable. The female vocals belted across the city skyline as people danced (poorly and drunkenly) in the wood chips. After a nice break, I bolted for Appropriate Grammar down the street.
Shifty eyed and crooked smiled, the band brought its best chops and left their R-rated jokes at home (due to parents in the room). With great guitar riffs and power-pop hooks slamming into the occasional alt-country structure, the band is somewhat unique to Kansas City. Think Rhett Miller without the band bleeding all over the stage emotionally. The charming female "ohs" blended well with the male vocals and seemed to fit flawlessly over the band’s epic drum usage. Sadly, battling Hearts of Darkness, the band played one of the fest’s most promising sets to an almost empty room. Take note of that and catch them when you can.
Starhaven Rounders would serve as my next adventure of the evening. I mean, can you think of a better follow up to power-pop than a country cover band? Nope. I didn’t think so.
There is a bit of irony to my catching this set. As I sat in The Brick in a purple emo hoodie, rocking a fairly impressive-sized jewfro, one would never assume me the type to catch the latest gossip at the honky-tonks of Nash Vegas. But honestly, is there anything better than a good, solid country band? With slide guitar, violin (called a fiddle in this case) and sad bastard lyrics. The interactions of a good country band are without question better than anything that any other genre can offer. There is nothing more real in music. Hearing our local member crank out Don Williams, Merle Haggard, and Johnny Cash makes me both proud and disappointed in Kansas City. This sound is something we could use more of (says the emo kid). We can debate this if you want, but before we do, I challenge you to catch this band and tell me that they don’t possess some of the finest instrumentation in the 816.
If you can debate convincingly, I’ll buy you a beer. I’ll be the one wearing the cat shirt.
The Hillary Watts Riot at Midwestern Musical Company (Photo by Michelle Bacon)
Bill Sundahl, Crossroads Music Fest organizer (Photo by Todd Zimmer)
Kasey Rausch, Mikal Shapiro, and Shane Ogren at Czar (Photo by Michelle Bacon)
Thom Hoskins at Midwestern Musical Company (Photo by Todd Zimmer)
The Supernauts at Crossroads KC at Grinder's (Photo by Todd Zimmer)
--Joshua Hammond
| After stints drumming for both The Afternoons and Jenny Carr and the Waiting List in the Lawrence/Kansas City music scene, Joshua Hammond found his footing as a music journalist, launching the national publication Popwreckoning. After running the show as Editor in Chief for 6 years, Hammond stepped away from the reigns to freelance for other publications like Under The Gun Review and High Voltage Magazine. This shift allowed the adequate amount of time for him to write passionately, allow the Kansas City Royals to break his heart on a daily basis and spoon his cats just enough that they don't shred his vinyl. |
On The Beat with Steve Gardels
Wanna hear about split infinitives? How about the proper usage of "who" versus "whom"? Okay, maybe not. But this week we'll be hearing from Appropriate Grammar's very own Steve Gardels. He tells us about his self-taught approach to drumming, his career with the Hopeless Destroyers, and the KCAI "fart box." Catch the beat right here!
On The Beat is a weekly interview brought to you by drummer Sergio Moreno (of Hillary Watts Riot and Alacartoona), and features some of the many talented drummers in the Kansas City area.
On The Beat with Steve Gardels
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On The Beat with Steve Gardels
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This week we chat with Appropriate Grammar’s Steve Gardels. Join us as we find out how he keeps his subjects and verbs in agreement, his infinitives un-split, and his prepositions away from the ends of his sentences as he strives to boldly drum…oops…to drum boldly like no man has drummed before. The Deli: Just so you know, I will be scrutinizing your answers and pointing out any inappropriate grammar. Cool? Steve Gardels: I should hope so. We're sticklers for that sort of thing, it's not just a name. Beyond a few run-on sentences and some awkward punctuation, I think we'll be just fine. The Deli: Okay, now that we've gotten that out of the way, tell me about how you came to join Appropriate Grammar? Steve: I had just graduated KCAI and had been band-less for about 4 months, which was a new thing for me. Not having a set time to sit down and play for a while was making me unhappy. I ran into Nick McKenna one night and he asked me to help him find a new rhythm section. Alex Dunsford, who had played in my previous band, had just moved back to town. We all jammed twice and decided to stick with Nick's tunes, but with some bite. We did the three-piece thing for about a year until Nick found Claire Adams, and she really took us to the next level by filling out our sound and giving a whole new dynamic to already familiar songs. We put her on bass, swapped Alex to his native lead guitar spot and we've been pushing ourselves ever since. The Deli: What was your recording experience on Lies and Stories? Steve: This was my first "real" studio environment as opposed to the tiled bathrooms, basements and the dreaded KCAI fart box I had recorded in before. Duane Trower was amazing; he made me feel really comfortable, but wasn't afraid to make me retake things I wasn't nailing. He also encouraged us to play with the space and all of the toys he had in there. There's a part on "High and Lonely" where I'm hitting this giant John Bonham bass drum with a timpani mallet. I overdubbed about 4 different vintage drums for that one part and he got the mix down so well that it's not overbearing yet you can still hear all of the drums. That sort of encouragement, hospitality and talent really helped me get comfy and get to work. The Deli: Live or studio? Go! Steve: Live. No contest. I need that energy! Seeing people get into what we do makes me play even harder, especially on the road. I'm there to drop it either way, but if a conga line breaks out, I get real hyped and start really throwing myself into it. The Deli: Speaking of playing, how do you approach drumming? Steve: I'm self-taught, so a lot of it comes out in practice. I sit down, set my iPod to shuffle and get as close as I can to what's on. I'll hear something I really like and break it down; start slow, learn the beat and then throttle it. Sometimes something totally new will come out of it, but the important part is to keep pushing myself to learn new stuff. I listen to a lot of heavy metal, anything from Maiden and Sabbath to Valient Thorr and Municipal Waste. I have a long list of hometown heroes and I'll just go out and watch. I'm a visual guy, if I can see it, it's easier for me to translate the part and make it my own. Writing my parts begins with Nick. He'll start playing a riff and I'll pick up where the accents are, where I can put fills and keep it real basic. Then I'll throw in a lick here, maybe a slowed down version of a tom pattern I found in a Slayer song there, and it starts building. I'll start tuning in to Claire's bass lines and start matching my boots to her roots. It's really collaborative and very organic. The Deli: You're a Hopeless Destroyer!? Steve: I moved to town in 2005 and formed a punk band called Hobo Zero. We played a lot, time went on, we broke up, and I stopped going to punk shows. Some years later, I started dating Britt Adair and we had a lot of the same friends from back in the day, so I started hanging out at shows again. That's when it hit me, I wanted to play fast again! Brittain Lawless asked me to join Hopeless Destroyers about a year ago. I was floored. My first taste of local music in KC was Idiot Box, The Rippers, The Skate-O-Masochists and Hopeless Destroyers at El Torreon. It was my turn to join the legacy. Just listening to Hopeless in my car gets me stoked; all hopping around and screaming about kicking vampires in the nuts. I still can't believe I'm in one of my favorite local bands! The Deli: When you're not making music, what keeps you busy and creative? Steve: Making more music! But seriously, my favorite thing at the moment is all the cool stuff I've been doing with XO Blackwater TV Party, my video collective. We did the stage show for this years' Midcoast Takeover, we've done a music video for Meat Mist, and we just did a VJ set for DJ Sheppa's Body2Body at the Pitch Music Showcase. There's only about 6 of us, but we go as big as we can and we usually wind up blowing a few minds in the process. I'm also going to be collaborating with former Opera Omaha director Hal France on developing a music program for kids. Leave your split infinitives at home and come on out to hear Appropriate Grammar at the Crossroads Music Fest on Saturday, September 8; prior to that you can hear Steve with Hopeless Destroyers at the Pizza Party Massacre record release show on August 25; the location is undisclosed, so ask around! -Sergio Moreno
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Album review: Appropriate Grammar - Lies and Stories
There’s some music that’s intricately intertwined with the feeling you get from a weekend whiskey binge. From the initial burn of the first drink to the last sip of the bottle, the emotions and thoughts that drive that binge are have long been subjects for great storytelling and songwriting. Appropriate Grammar’s release Lies and Stories is the musical equivalent to a weekend whiskey bender, if there was a universe where you could drink whiskey all weekend and still speak with eloquent clarity.
This 10-song set rambles on like the smartest heartbroken drunk you’ve ever met. Lyrically speaking, this is one of the better releases I’ve heard in awhile, so much so that I stopped during some songs to go back and catch a line again. With varied stories of fighting all night with a significant other ("Lover’s Quarrel") to dealing with an existential crisis ("Chosen Children"), the lyrical palette of this album reflects a wandering spirit coming to terms with the human experience. And it rocks.
Fast-paced shuffles by drummer Steve Gardels and jangling, well-placed guitar hooks by Alex Dunsford provide an inspiring platform for Nick McKenna’s cool and seemingly calculated vocal delivery. Bassist and vocalist Claire Adams adds color to many of these songs, particularly "High and Lonely," which gives the album some breathing room with a beautiful duet. In a weekend binge scenario, this is the song you’re listening to when the bottle runs dry, it’s time to go to bed, but you have no idea where you are or how to get home.
Not many bands can pull off rollicking, melodic songs that are emotional, smart and fun without coming off as being pretentious or downright aggravating, but Appropriate Grammar seems to have a formula down that works well for what they are doing, like an Old-Fashioned served with just the right amount of bitters.
-Mike Tipton
| Mike is a KC native that enjoys new music and playing with his band, Molly Picture Club. He also enjoys people watching and documentaries by Ken Burns. |