Bowery Ballroom
Venue archive / 16 posts
Viagra Boys
Black Midi
Teenagers have shown us on many occasions that they’re capable of making fresh, exhilarating music, but that music is usually rooted firmly in an existing paradigm: hip-hop, punk, etc. Teenagers are students and students are formalists. One of the most striking things about Black Midi’s fresh, exhilarating, teenage music is its lack of an obvious reference point. It is at times reminiscent of Slint and their math rock descendants, and the funk-tinged post punk of… See more →
Laura Jane Grace & The Devouring Mothers
2015 US Air Guitar Eastern Conference Finals
Colin Stetson & Sarah Neufeld
2014 US Air Guitar Northeast Semifinal
Slint
Chelsea Wolfe
2013 US Air Guitar Northeast Semifinal
Swans
I recently saw the band Swans live for the second time. They were promoting a stellar new album (The Seer) which essentially encompasses all of the varied and challenging music that bandleader Michael Gira has made under a few different monikers over the last thirty years. In the two years since I saw them last, I had gotten to know their oeuvre better, and coming to this show with a more educated ear paid off.… See more →
Quicksand


Tonight, my glasses spent about twenty seconds on the floor of a crowded and rowdy Bowery Ballroom. Then they were returned to me, unharmed.
2012 US Air Guitar New York Regional
There are two things that make New York City one of the toughest markets in US Air Guitar:
- The staggering amount of top tier talent, both local and imported, and
- The Daily Show’s Jason Jones, whose commentary has reduced all but the most thick-skinned competitors to quivering heaps in the backstage bathroom.
Alongside ACLU lawyer Ben Wizner and music biz free agent Leigh Lust, Jones returned on Thursday night to his perch in the… See more →
Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter
Someone left $20 in the ATM, so I’m getting paid to see Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter and The Sadies tonight. I like this arrangement.
When music is great, there’s nothing better.
2011 US Air Guitar New York Regional
Low
Cynic
Next time I am in a bad mood, remind me of tonight, when Cynic played the entirety of Focus, in sequence, a few feet away from me.