By now, you know what to do.
Read on for our coverage of all 19 Lincoln Exposed acts from Friday. Catch up with our Wednesday and Thursday coverage at the links. Saturday coverage comes later today.
* * *
Producers of the Word at Zoo Bar
The Background: The five piece is notable for centralizing its act around genre idiosyncrasies, playing power pop, surf rock, bizarre country metal and baroque folk. Producers of the Word released its first official LP this past summer with Precinct XYZ.
The High Point: The best of Producers is a mix of airy big budget tastes and whimsical Midwestern-ness. Meaning, somehow singer Chany Stovall’s Han Solo/Princess Leia necktie and their song “Nightwing” — which sounds like Joy Division with no underbelly — seem perfectly connected. But “Star City Shores” was the most winsome of the set, a surf sing-along about a cherished public pool. There’s nothing else like it, or trying to be like it, in their body of work.
The Takeaway: Producers was a great choice to start Friday’s shows (around 6 p.m.) because everyone’s palate was completely clean. So their dabbling-bordering-on-decontextualization — we’re talking multiple songs that feel pulled off concept albums that don’t exist — hit with real freshness and joy.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Evan Bartels and the Stoney Lonesomes at Zoo Bar
The Background: As we’ve noted many times before (including Lincoln Calling 2014), Bartels has one of the most ear-catching voices in the state: at a unique meeting of dangerous and highly self-trained. The Tobias, Neb., native has yet to put out a proper record, but released a music video on Sower Records a few months back. Last night marked Bartels’ first significant Lincoln show with drummer Andrew Standley in the fold.
The High Point: My favorite Bartels moments outside the music happen when his off-hand residency as a 21st century young person meets his seemingly innate classical showmanship. A mid-song “What the hell are ya’ll standing around for?” evokes a ‘50s country bandleader brimming with confidence. But then before belting out “Shallow Water,” he admits Google fed him a mistranslation of the word “Nebraska.” It’s actually “flat water.”
The Takeaway: With Standley whacking away and Jake Brandt’s guitar soloing taking an even more prominent role, the increasingly solidified Stoney Lonesomes seem destined to change the tone of Bartels work for the heavier. (Though Bartels did give the band a break for “Send My Love To New Orleans.”) As a vocalist, he certain has the wind to handle it.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Gabe Nelson with Pants at Duffy’s Tavern
The Background: Gabe Nelson’s band has only been playing in the Lincoln scene for about a year, but Nelson has been on stages since the late ‘90s. Drummer Kevin Korus plays with Stonebelly. The band released its debut full-length, Up the Dosage, in June.
The High Point: While Korus, bassist Torrey Rasfeld and guitarist Travis Hagge each make important contributions on stage, it doesn’t take long to see why it’s Nelson’s name out front. As a frontman, he’s the archetype: both charming and humble, energetic and poetic. Whatever genre, and the band plays in many, from folk to blues to world music, Nelson would be at the fore, excitedly making eye contact to connect his world-weary stories on a personal level.
The Takeaway: Few bands resist classification like Gabe Nelson with Pants. The set-up is familiar: two guitars, one vocalist, drums, bass. But rather than let the instruments determine the sound, Nelson and company explore every nook it offers, sounding like Jimmy Buffett one song and Jonathan Richman the next.
—Jacob Zlomke | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Pure Brown at The Bourbon
The Background: Maybe even more than describing how the music comes off, it might be appropriate to hash out Pure Brown’s tastes. Whether smithed from video game themes or not, the four piece seems to like a kind operatic rock ‘n’ roll. The originals seem to come from the same creative well as the instrumental covers.
The High Point: Pure Brown is at its best when really sinking its teeth into the drama of the music. Octave jumps. Key changes. With flying dual guitars, they thrive in the moments of musical transition. And with another nod to Nintendo music, those themes are very tightly written, in terms of melody.
The Takeaway: Pure Brown, for my money, is an ideal Lincoln Exposed band: not hyper-regular Lincoln players, and doing something unlike any other band at the festival. There’s some pop and prog metal in there and some surf (fleshed out by the recent addition of Thundersandwich’s Jesse Butterfield on guitar), but both are manifestations of Pure Brown’s pace and energy, more so than its chosen style.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Magma Melodier at Zoo Bar
The Background: The Americana rock quintet released its debut album, Funeral Café, on Tremulant Records in November. All five members came on our radio show to talk about it at the time. Listen here.
The High Point: Probably bassist Tery Daly leaning on the Zoo Bar’s north stage wall for minutes at a time. The image spoke well to the absolute ease with which Magma Melodier sways through its Americana. With three recording engineers in the band (Chris Steffen, Mark Hansen, Vince Ruhl), the ensemble feels like all the spacing, structuring and writing was done somewhere many years ago. Once on stage — with a sound three guitars wide — it looks effortless.
The Takeaway: There’s also a real savoring of the guitar lines going on. There was a moment during the outro of one big, chordy song that a less attentive band would have let dissolve in haphazard feedback. Instead, Hansen’s guitar hummed high like a synthesizer coming from somewhere offstage. And Steffen’s, in tandem, rumbled in a long delay chord that flourished away the song’s last moment of life.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Tie These Hands at The Bourbon
The Background: During the last decade, Tie These Hands has transitioned from being one of Lincoln’s most visible bands to a different phase of its life: as members have entered fatherhood and recording efforts slowed a bit. The band released a couple one-off songs last year, “Trampoline” and “Weekends,” which were both on the setlist Friday.
The High Point: The mirror imagery at play in Tie These Hands goes beyond the faces of twin brothers Aram and Naum Stauffer. The twins both write, sing and play guitar. So there’s always a trading of the helm from song to song. This is most interesting during the guitar breakdowns when the non-singing brother begins to solo, actually usurping the song away from its original owner.
The Takeaway: As far back as I can remember, most conversations around Tie These Hands hit a point where someone remarked they must really like early Death Cab for Cutie. Both brothers do have a tendency to swallow their words like Ben Gibbard. But the comparison only holds water if the band shows its softer side. Friday night, Tie These Hands was simply more like an expansive emo band, with cymbal crashes leading every turn. There was no going back with the song “Atlas,” which despite the smallness of the lyrics — “I am a simple man, I don’t know what to say” — felt like the whole band hoisting with all its might.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Dylan Bloom Band at Duffy’s Tavern
The Background: Country act Dylan Bloom Band has only been based in Lincoln for a few months, but the group has been establishing a loyal following since 2012 when they began releasing music from Norfolk. Radio-friendly country tracks like “Strong in a Small Town” and “Turn the Radio Up” have garnered Bloom some national radio play.
The High Point: Of all the Lincoln bands named for their bandleader, Bloom is among the most gracious to his players. He’s at the front, of course, but when it comes time for Blake Beiermann to rip out a guitar solo or Jake Kramer to shine on his fiddle (as he did on a cover of Tom Petty’s “Mary Jane’s Last Dance”), Bloom literally steps back.
The Takeaway: It can be easy to forget that Lincoln is only a few miles away from washed out county roads small farming towns. Even the town’s roots scene leans more into folk, rockabilly and bluegrass. Dylan Bloom’s presence, and the dedicated crowd it brought to Duffy’s, is a taste of variety in a scene that often eschews contemporary pop sounds.
—Jacob Zlomke | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Weldon Keys at Zoo Bar
The Background: Weldon Keys might still be a new name for some Lincoln concertgoers. The Americana guitar band put out its debut LP (on warm vinyl) a little more than a year ago.
The High Point: I was most struck by the way Ted Alesio struck. Alesio still drums like he’s in Ideal Cleaners, the defunct Lincoln favorites through the ‘00s. While Weldon Keys singer JD Kuskie’s 4/4 Americana writing seems like it would elicit well-placed fills from any drummer, Alesio seemingly ignores the spots that would be too easy. Instead, he found aggressively small pockets in the songs to emphasize, or sometimes hit the first beat of a measure the hardest, adding interesting strain to the songs.
The Takeaway: Magma Melodier and Weldon Keys back to back at Zoo Bar might have been Lincoln Exposed 2015’s most obvious sound-similarity pairing. But that opened the door to find their differences. For as closely as Kuskie and Magma’s Jeff Iwanski seem to write and sing, the Weldon Keys players really seem to lean more toward stress in their live show than ease. Where on the record Mark Bestul’s lead guitar is noticeable for its movement and adoration of complicated riffs, there were multiple songs on Friday where he simmered one screechy pattern for minutes at a time, giving the feeling the songs were trying to run away from all restraints.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Sputnik Kaputnik at The Bourbon
The Background: Sputnik is a bonafide Lincoln passion project for Justin Firestone, and it released two albums at the same time late last year. A concept band, a novelty, with some real talent for techy melodies.
The High Point: Nothing exemplified their animatronic showmanship better than the cover of Roy Orbison’s “Pretty Woman” that was just the musical wind-up to the title over and over, but never the verse. A racing chord progression, not easy to play, but Sputnik withholds the moment of big kitsch.
The Takeaway: Sputnik is always a little tighter than expected (when your memory hinges mostly on its alien fun), with Justin Kohmetscher (Dirty Talker) and Josh Miller (Powerful Science) biting off a few hard parts and Peter Kapinos drumming with a really soft touch. The singer-keyboardist Firestone played this Lincoln Exposed set pretty cool, only hamming it up to Muppet-Tom Waits vocal tones once or twice. As opposed to last year’s Lincoln Exposed, this go-round was more one to showcase the musically-sound new songs.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by JP Davis
* * *
Emmett Bower Band at Duffy’s Tavern
The Background: Emmett Bower Band has been playing its country-based rock since 2010. Those five years have included three albums and some mainstream radio play around the country.
The High Point: Emmett Bower Band would be less memorable were it not for flourishes of less common instruments. Prominent harmonica, mandolin and fiddle parts lend the band’s rock songs a freewheeling attitude and folk-artistry to straightforward compositional structures.
The Takeaway: Who benefits more from Lincoln Exposed? A band like Bogusman who played the same stage later and probably doesn’t share many fans with Emmett Bower Band? Or is it Emmett Bower Band for catching Bogusman’s early-arrivers? Certainly, it’s at least a little of both. On Friday night, Duffy’s was packed early with people there to see Emmett Bower and Dylan Bloom. If those people stuck around for some hard rock and prog punk, then everybody wins.
—Jacob Zlomke | photos by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
The Whiskey Drinkers Union at Zoo Bar
The Background: The Whiskey Drinkers Union is currently working on an EP, the band’s first proper recording. They’ve been playing as WDU since 2013, but before that were known as A Modern Prometheus.
The High Point: It’s always a pleasure to see something familiar reworked, as WDU does with its ‘70s rock formula. The band is a trio, but it’s essentially replaced the bass guitar with a piano, adding a new texture to a worn-in pallette.
The Takeaway: We’ll call it roots rock, but that ignores the overt country music influence. Patrick O’Donnell sings and writes like an outlaw country musician who was handed an electric guitar and a supporting band that loves Cream and Creedence Clearwater Revival.
—Jacob Zlomke | photo by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
Bud Heavy and the High Lifes at The Bourbon
The Background: Bud Heavy is the live wire of the Sower Records stable of artists, bringing wild showmanship to traditional old timey songs. With banjo, mandolin, upright bass, guitar and fiddle, they dazzlingly trade off parts, and sing in anywhere from two-to-five-part harmony. The band put out its debut EP in the summer of 2014.
The High Point: Jack Hotel and Bottle Tops bassists Marty Steinhausen and Mark Wolberg play with more dexterity, but Bud Heavy’s Kenny Kinlund supplies the exact right forcefulness the band needs on the upright. With a low-end-favoring live mix on Friday, his deep two-note swoon made the frantic band seem even bigger than it was. And that groundedness is what makes the band’s performative risk-taking so possible: guitarist Jeremy Wurst’s athletic knees-on-the-floor backbend, mandolinist Casey Hollingsworth’s mock-stumble around with sharpie on his front tooth, and a sneaky in-song cover of Springsteen’s “I’m On Fire.”
The Takeaway: This was the third time (after Lincoln Exposed last year and the Nebraska Folk & Roots Festival) I’ve seen a packed crowd have a bonafide moment with Bud Heavy. In some ways, this one may have been the best for the band, as Friday’s crowd wasn’t a traditional bluegrass-loving Sower audience, and was all in on the band’s stomping, soloing and mugging. Three such shows in a year just isn’t the norm for a Lincoln band. If you’re keeping a list of Lincoln’s most engrossing live shows, Bud Heavy has leapt into its top ranks.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photos by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
Laughing Falcon at Duffy’s Tavern
The Background: Laughing Falcon has probably been the loudest band in Lincoln since 2013. Kevin Chasek, Matt Kaminski, Nate Christiancy and Kyle Gibson have each been playing music in Lincoln for about 20 years. They’ve got an EP on the horizon.
The High Point: It’s hard to call sheer volume a quality of a band, but Laughing Falcon has almost made it a fifth member. At Duffy’s on Friday, that meant standing in front of the stage sounded the way gusts of wind feel. It is intense, immersive and invigorating.
The Takeaway: A hard rock band like Laughing Falcon could only exist in a place like Lincoln. A place with a prominent, collaborative music scene, a scene where drummers of pop punk bands fraternize naturally with stand-up bassists of bluegrass bands. Because, yes, it’s hard rock, but behind the masterful instrumentation and in-your-face songwriting lies a genuine appreciation for the audience. As in, “thank you for letting us make your eardrums ring.”
—Jacob Zlomke | photos by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
Once A Pawn at The Bourbon
Background: After a few half-year hiatuses in recent years, Once A Pawn came back into the spotlight in 2014. The 12-year-old pop punk band released a new EP, a well-received music video and played a handful of Omaha and Lincoln shows.
The High Point: It seems like the band’s writing is at a new and more sophisticated place. C Balta’s drumming and commanding voice are the centerfold of every song. Unburdened by the chords telling the structural story of the songs, bassist Mike Flowers and guitarist Eric Scrivens wildly walk up and down the melodies together, making the uplifting songs feel like they’re taking off and the more emotive somber fare feel like it’s sinking.
The Takeaway: When Once A Pawn came back at Lincoln Exposed last year, they felt terrifically new, vulnerable and reborn. On Friday night, they were tighter than ever, and voluminous sounding, like the last eight months of record-releasing and playing has endowed supreme confidence. The songs from the new EP attacked heavy and pure.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
Her Flyaway Manner at Zoo Bar
The Background: Her Flyaway Manner has been playing together off and on for 20 years now. It’s a highly influential fixture in Lincoln’s music scene. The band practically fathered Lincoln’s prog punk sound, played in some way or another by the likes of Bogusman, Crayons, Powers, Halfwit and more. Adam Anderson and Brendan McGinn also play in Dirty Talker.
The High Point: Her Flyaway Manner is like a punk rock exercise in minimalism. How much space can we leave between instrumental parts and phrases before songs are just deconstructed pieces? Quite a lot, in HFM’s case. No one is competing and the structure leaves plenty of room for McGinn’s acrobatic vocals.
The Takeaway: Seeing HFM play isn’t as novel as, say, The Machete Archive reuniting for a night at Duffy’s. The band plays regularly. But it’s just as rewarding to see one of Lincoln’s best and most historic bands live, knowing it had an influential hand in shaping many of the bands that share the festival billing.
—Jacob Zlomke | photos by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
Bogusman at Duffy’s Tavern
The Background: Bogusman released a debut EP one year ago and has been a regular on Lincoln and Omaha bills since then. There’s also a full-length well in the works.
The High Point: Add Bogusman to the list of bands trying out new material last week. The band’s brand of prog punk has always thrived on shouted, unison vocals, but newer material shows more of an effort at vocal harmonics. Guitarist-vocalist Nate Luginbill still strains his throat with the best, but new songs seem to live in the space between stretching out into pieces and snapping back together.
The Takeaway: Also, add Bogusman’s forthcoming album to the list of highly-anticipated 2015 Nebraska releases. After a year of honing the craft, the band’s sound is a sharper, dialed-in vision. It’ll be good to hear songs like “Cribbage Sexual Society” on record.
—Jacob Zlomke | photos by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
Halfwit at Zoo Bar
The Background: For at least a year, Halfwit has been rivaling Universe Contest, The Bottle Tops, Josh Hoyer and the Shadowboxers, AZP (and a few others, you could argue) as Lincoln’s most celebrated band. In August, the band released four intense, muddled garage punk tracks to Bandcamp, and has a full-length on the way.
The High Point: You could call Halfwit metal or you could call Halfwit punk and either way you might not be wrong. The instrumentation is skillfully reminiscent of metal, guitars twisting together. But the concise song structure, lack of indulgences and Dan Jenkins’ near droning voice makes dirty punk an easy association.
The Takeaway: Another forthcoming release and, at least compared to the recordings, Halfwit’s new material seems to lean more psychedelic. It may just be a side effect of studio sound versus live sound, but Friday night it was easy to get lost in a guitar-driven headspin.
—Jacob Zlomke | photos by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
Foam Form at The Bourbon
Background: Nebraska music hasn’t heard much from Conner Goertzen in the last year since he moved to Portland. Before that, you would’ve known him from his work in Time Hammer, as well as Foam Foam’s experimental electronic music and distinct Mobitar.
The High Point: The mid-set addition of a live drummer stimulated the non-Halfwit crowd (Dan Jenkins’ hardcore punk band was across the street at Zoo Bar) even further. This added punch to the middle of Goertzen’s set, and freed him up to tinker further with the bed of washed-out, old school hip-hop beats.
The Takeaway: Tall, thin and humble if you’ve seen Goertzen live, he typically has the appearance of a quiet inventor standing behind his creations and gadgets: the mobitar, an effects board and a turntable on Friday. For Friday’s crowd, he was (by necessity) more motivation to cut loose in the waning hours of the night than a sonic study. Hear him him at him full wizardry on his SoundCloud.
—Chance Solem-Pfeifer | photo by Andrew Dickinson
* * *
The Bottle Tops at Duffy’s Tavern
The Background: Fronted by husband-and-wife duo Mike and Kerry Semrad, The Bottle Tops carry Lincoln’s roots music scene banner, which is, essentially, the Sower Records banner. The band released a full-length in March, and an EP is due out this year.
The High Point: As is the case at almost every Bottle Tops show, the Semrads chemistry, both between the two of them and with the audience, outshines even a talented band that includes some heavyweight Lincoln players and even the catchy, swinging songwriters. And it spreads. The Bottle Tops has never played a show it didn’t throw itself into completely and it’s always infectious.
The Takeaway: Lincoln fans turn out for any band that facilitates an exciting or fun concert experience, whether it’s Universe Contest promising a strange experience or Josh Hoyer offering a soulful baptism. And that’s true for The Bottle Tops. Maybe none do it better. Mike Semrad is happy to officiate a rockabilly dance party, but it seems like he’d be just as happy to be dancing on the floor.
—Jacob Zlomke | photos by Andrew Dickinson
