Category Archives: Bands & Music Artists

Concert Review – Walk the Moon & The Griswolds at the House of Blues (Boston, MA)

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On, April 11, 2015, I jumped up and down like an idiot at the House of Blues as Walk the Moon commanded the stage to a sold out crowd.  For those of you who don’t know who Walk the Moon is, they are a pop-rock band from Cincinnati, Ohio  and consists of members, Nicholas Petricca, Kevin Ray, Sean Waugaman, and Eli Maiman.  Their name comes from the song ‘Walk on the Moon’ by The Police and gained their first hit on the radio airways of the alternative stations with ‘Anna Sun’ in 2010.  In 2014, their sophomore album ‘Talking Is Hard’ was released where the first single to hit the billboard 200 charts was ‘Shut Up and Dance.’

Now that you are educated back to the concert.  The opening act was an Australian group named The Griswolds.  This young band far from home has a young sound, but their music has a real 80s flare.  That techno sound with a mix of rock n’ roll of guitar, bass, and the drums as the musicians add in lyrics and simple backup vocals to give it that danceable beat.  A personal favorite of mine that they opened with was ’16 Years.’  A synthisized type keyboard with various rhythm instruments such as a tambourine and drums as you hear an elegant bass line and the guitar came in strong as they break into the chorus.  These Aussie boys I’m sure will be making waves soon in the states as they gain more confidence on stage and really learn to command the crowd at live shows.  What a band to learn from like Walk the Moon!

Walk the  Moon is the whole package.  They are not only great musicians and songwriters, but they are fantastic entertainers.  The start of the show had these crazy neon lights of various shapes and sizes, as well as neon lights that surrounded many of the instruments.  These lights exploded on the stage in strobe like form as they opened with a song from their new album, ‘Different Colors’.  As I watched the crowd you could tell that almost everyone there were such devoted fans from the lip syncing of the lyrics, to the the dancing around, clapping to the beat, and the waving of arms side to side as each start of a song got the audience more and more excited.

Nicholas Petricca (Lead singer) was constantly interacting with crowd through each song transition.  As Petricca asked who was a Walk the Moon show virgin it felt like we were joining a cult.  As he asked all us to put our hands up in the air and let all the bullshit fly out and to just dance it out.  This led into their hit song ‘Shut Up and Dance,’ which is awesome.  They closed the show out with ‘Anna Sun,’ which goes to show that no matter what happens we always end up back at the beginning.

Check out the video below that MsTabularasa put together of some epic movie dance scenes as it is intertwined with Walk the Moon’s ‘Shut Up and Dance.’

Peter Pan – Is It Really A Children’s Story or Life?

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When you tell someone they have Peter Pan syndrome it is looked at as a negative connotation, but in my opinion it just means you are still young at heart.  The story is about a boy who never grows up, but he is more then that.  He is a leader, a defender of all that is good, supportive of his friends decisions, and has a sense of humor that can cheer up anyone who is having a bad day.  J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan is a classic story and has been one of my favorites since I was a child.  The fantasy of a world where you never grow old, where you can have adventures everyday, and the ability to hangout with your friends all the time sounds like a great place to me.  It seems that I’m not the only one who has an obsession with it because the story pops up in today’s music.

In 2013, All Time Low released a song called ‘Somewhere in Neverland,’ which explores the concept of two people who have grown up and life has not turned out the way they had hoped.  Their lives have become mundane and living in the past.  But the song is truly about falling in love with someone that can bring you to another world and where it could be a better reality together. “Wendy run away with me, I know it sounds crazy don’t you see what you do to me?  I want to be your lost boy, your last chance, a better reality.”  Also in 2013, VanLadyLove released a song called ‘Neverland.’  When you want success to happen you have to be positive, have motivation to an end goal, and be willing to do what ever it takes to succeed.  In ‘Neverland’ the lyrics say, “If you want to fly think happy thoughts.”  Happy thoughts are what makes you fly to another world of success, where fears and sadness are left on another planet.

In 2008, the Jonas Brothers released a song called ‘Fly With Me,’ which also uses Peter Pan concepts.  In the chorus they sing, “We’re chasing stars to lose our shadows, Peter Pan and Wendy turnout fine, So won’t you fly with me?”  It’s about taking risks, believing someone is going to catch you if you fall, and knowing that in the end it is all going to be alright as long as you continue to fight everyday to find where you belong.

The list of songs goes on, 5 Seconds of Summer’s ‘Lost Boy’ and Ruth B’s ‘Lost Boy.’  Peter Pan isn’t just a children’s story it is a story about life.  We are lost children growing up, hoping that there is something more out there for us, hoping that we are meant to do something amazing, but Peter Pan was the creator of his own destiny.  A leader full of happiness and positive thinking that always led him to success from fighting the pirates, to protecting the lost boys, to understanding when it is time for his friends to grow older.  Growing older doesn’t mean that you forget.  It just means that you need to think differently, and that chasing stars to lose our shadows is what we need to do every day.

Boy Bands – The Music that Gets you Dancing

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keep-calm-and-love-boy-bands-6We all know that boy bands have a life span.  The popularity of any boy band that has been in existent hasn’t lasted more then four or five years.  They tour like crazy to maintain their popularity and be in the public eye, but in the end their fans grow up and releases the drama that goes a long with liking this kind of a group.  Now, I am not saying that you stop liking their music or if the group comes back from a hiatus you don’t buy tickets to their reunion show, I am talking about the hype that comes along with a boy band.

When I was a teenager a lot my friends liked NSYNC.  So, at thirteen years old I went to a concert and all any girl was doing was screaming.  I was screaming too, but only when they finished a song, not while they were actually singing and dancing.  I was to memorized by their moves, and I was busy dancing into the girl next to me and lip syncing to my friends in our little circle of joy.  All screaming girls and boy cuteness aside, no one can say that boy bands don’t have some of the best dancing music dating back to the Jackson 5 to today.

Every boy/ man I know out there will say that boy bands ‘suck’ and ‘why do you listen to that?,’ but lets be serious for moment.  If you grew up in the 90s you know every word to ‘I Want It That Way’ and ‘Bye Bye Bye.’   Boys around today (including my little brother) know every word to ‘What Makes You Beautiful.’  Would my brother admit that?  Probably, but he is of a different breed and doesn’t really get embarrassed easily.  When a song is popular and is played on the radio 24/7 you learn the words whether you want to or not because it is constantly around; it’s like in your face propaganda with all that boy cuteness and pop style.

Needless to say boy band music just has that great danceability.  I’m sure it has something to do with the four four count, solid consistent beat, and the catchy lyrics that brings everyone to the dance floor.  First you got the beat, which includes a combination of instruments and/ or a sound machine that brings in the counts.  Let’s look at ‘I Want You Back’ by the Jackson 5.  The first thing you hear is the piano with the break through of the cymbal as the guitar and bass come in to give you a nice rhythm.  The drums slowly come in to give you that solid beat as the continuing of that four count beat that was created in the beginning.  The lyrics are catchy and simple.  The most typical word in any boy band song is ‘baby.’  From ‘I Want You Back’ by Jackson 5 to ‘Tearin’ Up My Heart’ by NSYNC to ‘Kiss You’ by One Direction they all have the word ‘baby’ throughout each song.  So the next time you don’t know the words to the hot new boy band song just fake it by not singing it, but dancing to it instead.  Also, I bet if you throw the word ‘baby’ in there a few times you would probably be half right throughout the song.  Click here for some great boy band tunes!

Music Peer Pressure

Posted in Bands & Music Artists, Music Business by

As a teenager we all felt the peer pressure of our friends and society about the kind of music we should like, or what is considered ‘good’ music.  As an adult, we read reviews, follow trends, and still allow society to dictate what we buy and listen to throughout our lives.  So what is it about society and the need to follow the crowd?  Recently, I have been reading a book entitled Blockbusters: Hit-making, Risk-taking, and the Big Business of Entertainment by Anita Elberse, who talks about how people want to follow winners, whether it is the head of a record label pushing an artist to superstar status, to targeting a group of people to grow the popularity of said artist.  The goal and need of the label is to make this artist a winner and to gain followers and momentum within their career, because if they don’t, the artist is dropped and everyone fails, including the artist, the label, and the fans.

A big controversy when I was a teenagers in the late 90s to the early 00s was the battle of the two biggest boy bands in the world – N’SYNC and the Backstreet Boys.  You couldn’t like both.  Nope, you only had the option of liking one or other.  As a teenager I had a secret, which was the fact that I had albums of both bands, and yes I broke the rules.  Do you think I would have ever told my friends?  No way.  As I got older, and got more into the liner notes of the albums I bought, I realized that the  music was written by the same person!  So why couldn’t I like both bands when the music was not only written by the same person, but the same manager developed both groups too?  Another hater group when I was growing up was the group of kids into hip-hop.  The years of the popularity of the Wu-Tang Clan, the Beastie Boys, Diddy, the Fugees, and the starting of Eminem.  Basically, anyone who liked pop music was not in any kind of agreement on what constituted as good music.  Again, I had albums of both the Wu-Tang Clan and Beastie Boys and I can still recite every lyric to ‘Intergalactic.’  Finally, you have the group that is into alternative music, like Jimmy Eat World, Less Then Jake, Goldfinger, Radiohead, Oasis, and Fall Out Boy.  I’m sure you have started to see my pattern here, but this group was more opinionated then anyone.  If this group of teens found out you listened to pop music then they had more then a few words to make you feel degraded and question your own taste.

Like everyone, I had a big fear of what my friends thought of my choices from music to fashion, but why does it matter if the music you listen to is considered winners?  Can’t individuals like music because they like the song?  The voice of the artist?  The technique and the sound of the band?  Back in 2010, when I first heard of Ariana Grande, she was a reoccurring character on a show called Victorious, and everyone of my adult friends made fun of me for watching it since it was a kid’s show.  Now, the majority of them listen to her since she is a superstar.  Leading the trend is always better then following it.  So, sing those songs that get you dancing in the car, or better yet grab that hair bush as you are getting ready for work and become that pop star singing your favorite jam, because guilty pleasures never go out of style.

Love this song, Elizabeth Gillies, and Ariana Grande – circa 2010

Girl Power!

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If you haven’t noticed, I love to highlight women who have made a mark on society in music and dance.  There have been many women who have created a legacy, changed the world for future generations, and developed magic for others to experience everyday.  International Women’s Day was on March 8th, but in my opinion everyday is Women’s Day!

Pop music is one of my favorite music genres.  It has broken boundaries and changed over decades, but one thing that hasn’t changed is the harmonizing quality girl groups have incorporated into their sound.  Starting in the late 1930s when the Andrews Sisters changed the music scene and the up-and-coming popularity of girl groups began.  In 1955 was the year that girl groups started to grow.  In 1960-1966 over 750 girl groups charted songs in the United States and the United Kingdom.

While listening to girl groups over the decades, I came across a group called “The Chantels” which was formed in the 1950s.  No words can express how excited I was to find this group.  I have a weird obsession with my name that date backs to when I was a kid.  When you don’t have a common name, you can never find cool things with your name on them.  Having a younger brother who has the most common name to man I was jealous.  Anyways, this girl group was revolutionary since it was the second African American girl group to have success after the Bobbettes.  Their first song to hit the billboard charts was “He’s Gone,” but their most popular hit was “Maybe.”  Many of the girl groups such as the Chantels, the Bobbettes, the Shirelles, and the Marvelettes have that doo-wop groove including the harmonized vocals, the simple instrumentations, and those claps that help to keep the rhythm tied together.

Jumping a few decades to the 1990s through to today, girl groups still have a hold in popular music.  During the 90s the sound of girl groups changed.  TLC brought a contemporary R&B sound to groups.  The harmonies were still there, but the style had more of an edge.  After TLC, one of the top selling girl groups ever hit the scene, the Spice Girls.  The Spice Girls is not only embedded in my childhood, but they were the women who taught the 90s generation about girl power and how important friendship is to your life.  Emma, Victoria, Mel B., Mel C., and Geri created a huge fandom and their legacy still lives on in popularity as the best selling girl group ever.  Their mix of dance party type songs like ‘Wannabe’ and ‘Spice Up Your Life’ to their soft ballads ‘2 Become 1’ and ‘Say You’ll Be There’ resinated with the 90s generation connecting their music to life.  The girl groups continue through today with the up-and-coming group Fifth Harmony who have some of the most amazing voices together.  Their vocal range, projection power, and instrumental simplicity to highlight their voices is something exhibits true talent.

In the US, we rarely see artists from foreign speaking countries (besides EDM) in the general popular music scene, but girl groups are huge in Japan (J-Pop) and South Korea (K-Pop) and have hit the music scene hard in the late 2000s with some catchy dance club tunes which include artists Morning Musume, 2NE1, and Girl Generation.  These girl groups bring in techno sounds of EDM, the R&B edge and rap style that TLC had back in the 90s, and power vocals such as Fifth Harmony and Little Mix.  This sound is going to continue to blow up especially now that EDM is hitting the pop scene with artists like Zedd working with numerous female vocalists such as Selena Gomez and Ariana Grande.

Watch out One Direction, Rixton, and The Wanted the girls are coming for your music crown and I think they have the power to take over.  Click here for a list of girl groups that have affect the music scenes from the 1930s through today, and celebrate the power of women everyday.

*All date information found through wikipedia.