Pains, Guild and Guitars play at Chum's
by Rashel Burgman and Charlotte Eagle
Arts | 9/8/09
Posted online at 11:04 PM EST on 9/7/09
/ Last updated at 3:50 AM EST on 9/7/09
Cholmondeley's was filled Friday night with eclectic youth eagerly awaiting the evening's lineup of some of New York's finest indie music: Cymbals Eat Guitars, the Depreciation Guild and the night's headliner, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, brought to you by Brandeis' own Punk, Rock n' Roll Club.
The show began with Cymbals Eat Guitars from Manahawkin, N.J., composed of high school friends Joseph D'Agostino and Matthew Miller. Cymbals Eat Guitars has risen over the past few months, gaining notoriety from indie music blog Pitchfork.com. Their set sounded like an amalgam of '90s alternative rock, beginning rough, and sending some concertgoers out the door, but moving to a smoother set toward the end once the lead singer's knitted cap came off. Coincidence? I think not.
The Depreciation Guild, in comparison, were more akin to The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. Clad in mostly black and grey tones embodying the Williamsburg hipster image, the Depreciation Guild produced a constant stream of slow yet upbeat and melodic indie rock masterpieces, climaxing with the dreamy single appropriately titled "Dream About Me."
The crowning moment of the night was The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. The adorable lineup of lead singer Kip Berman, a 29-year-old self-professed Jewish guy from the suburbs, Peggy Wang-East, the keyboardist and token female tambourine player, Kurt Feldman, drummer and lead singer of the Depreciation Guild and Alex Naidus, the bassist, round out this quirky Brooklyn-based quartet.
They started their powerful set with "This Love Is F*cking Right," a song that immediately got the crowd dancing and bopping along to the undeniably addictive indie-pop tune. Moving seamlessly from one song to another, leaving little time for energy to wither, The Pains of Beng Pure at Heart blasted elegantly into "Young Adult Friction." The song is about not wanting a sexual encounter in the library to come to an end, making the lyrics, "Don't check me out," ironic and undoubtedly dorky.
They moved through the rest of their set, hitting high points with the catchy single, "Tenure Itch," giving a sarcastic shout-out before the song to Asher Roth's hit "I Love College." Other songs included the anthemic "Stay Alive," from the band's self-titled first album, which roused the crowd to shout the chorus right back to Berman's face, and "Higher Than the Stars" off their newest EP and "Come Saturday," a sweet love song about ignoring parties for a trade-off of a summer spent indoors.
The show ended with their eponymous song "The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart," yet another anthem to which the crowd chanted the defining sentiment of both the band and the night: "We will never die / No, we will never die."
After the concert, we sat down with Kip Berman for some insight into his world:
JustArts: What did you grow up listening to?
Kip Berman: Stuff I really love is Scottish indie-pop stuff. I loved a lot of bands from Glasgow: Belle & Sebastian and other bands from Glasgow like Orange Juice, Teenage Fan Club and the Pastels. For some reason the city Glasgow had all these bands that were kind of noisy and kind of good guitar pop. It's like for whatever reason it's hard to explain why it's good but it kind of is, like good melodies and noisy. I grew up in America so I listened to a lot of American classic indie rock, like Pavement and Yo La Tengo, and I would just buy anything if it was on Matador Records. … I'd be psyched if there were more bands that sounded like the '90s because that's when I grew up.
JA: Do you think you guys sound like a lot of the bands you grew up listening to?
KB: Yeah, I think it's inevitable that you sort of want to start a band that sounds like the bands you liked when growing up. It's like that first heroic worship of music. Whether you want to or not it's just kind of stuck in you. You always think that, like, the Smashing Pumpkins sound cool when they're on the radio, like, "Oh, I'm sorry, Billy Corgan went crazy."
JA: I met him at his book signing for his born-again Christian book.
KB: He's got a born-again Christian book?
JA: Oh you didn't know that? Yeah, he wrote a book of poetry praising God.
KB: Oh see, I knew he did a book of poetry. [Courtney Love] was always getting accused of letting Billy Corgan write her albums. I'd let Billy Corgan write my albums. I'd be like, "Billy, you can do this."
JA: He had a really bad band. Zane?
KB: Oh Zwan.
JA: It was like elevator music.
KB: It was bad. But you know he wrote "Cherub Rock" and "Today." He had like all of these guitar solos that went [imitates guitar sounds]; it was so cool-sounding.
JA: "Today" is one of the greatest songs.
KB: Probably the greatest song of the '90s. And also, one part when he had hair, and the girl dressed like a boy, the boy who looked like the girl, and James looked like a blasian.
JA: Like a blonde troll?
KB: He looked like a girl, she looked like a guy, drummer was on heroin, and they wore shiny pants.
JA: I love '90s videos
KB: I can pretend to be Billy Corgan, and you can be like "what was it like to have sex with Courtney Love?"
JA: So what's it really like to have sex with Courtney Love? What was she like in bed?
KB: She's kinda crazy, but in a good way. And you know she takes a lot of slack in the media, but she has always been true to herself, and she's an accomplished songwriter. She's had to deal with a lot of things that other people haven't dealt with.
The show began with Cymbals Eat Guitars from Manahawkin, N.J., composed of high school friends Joseph D'Agostino and Matthew Miller. Cymbals Eat Guitars has risen over the past few months, gaining notoriety from indie music blog Pitchfork.com. Their set sounded like an amalgam of '90s alternative rock, beginning rough, and sending some concertgoers out the door, but moving to a smoother set toward the end once the lead singer's knitted cap came off. Coincidence? I think not.
The Depreciation Guild, in comparison, were more akin to The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. Clad in mostly black and grey tones embodying the Williamsburg hipster image, the Depreciation Guild produced a constant stream of slow yet upbeat and melodic indie rock masterpieces, climaxing with the dreamy single appropriately titled "Dream About Me."
The crowning moment of the night was The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. The adorable lineup of lead singer Kip Berman, a 29-year-old self-professed Jewish guy from the suburbs, Peggy Wang-East, the keyboardist and token female tambourine player, Kurt Feldman, drummer and lead singer of the Depreciation Guild and Alex Naidus, the bassist, round out this quirky Brooklyn-based quartet.
They started their powerful set with "This Love Is F*cking Right," a song that immediately got the crowd dancing and bopping along to the undeniably addictive indie-pop tune. Moving seamlessly from one song to another, leaving little time for energy to wither, The Pains of Beng Pure at Heart blasted elegantly into "Young Adult Friction." The song is about not wanting a sexual encounter in the library to come to an end, making the lyrics, "Don't check me out," ironic and undoubtedly dorky.
They moved through the rest of their set, hitting high points with the catchy single, "Tenure Itch," giving a sarcastic shout-out before the song to Asher Roth's hit "I Love College." Other songs included the anthemic "Stay Alive," from the band's self-titled first album, which roused the crowd to shout the chorus right back to Berman's face, and "Higher Than the Stars" off their newest EP and "Come Saturday," a sweet love song about ignoring parties for a trade-off of a summer spent indoors.
The show ended with their eponymous song "The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart," yet another anthem to which the crowd chanted the defining sentiment of both the band and the night: "We will never die / No, we will never die."
After the concert, we sat down with Kip Berman for some insight into his world:
JustArts: What did you grow up listening to?
Kip Berman: Stuff I really love is Scottish indie-pop stuff. I loved a lot of bands from Glasgow: Belle & Sebastian and other bands from Glasgow like Orange Juice, Teenage Fan Club and the Pastels. For some reason the city Glasgow had all these bands that were kind of noisy and kind of good guitar pop. It's like for whatever reason it's hard to explain why it's good but it kind of is, like good melodies and noisy. I grew up in America so I listened to a lot of American classic indie rock, like Pavement and Yo La Tengo, and I would just buy anything if it was on Matador Records. … I'd be psyched if there were more bands that sounded like the '90s because that's when I grew up.
JA: Do you think you guys sound like a lot of the bands you grew up listening to?
KB: Yeah, I think it's inevitable that you sort of want to start a band that sounds like the bands you liked when growing up. It's like that first heroic worship of music. Whether you want to or not it's just kind of stuck in you. You always think that, like, the Smashing Pumpkins sound cool when they're on the radio, like, "Oh, I'm sorry, Billy Corgan went crazy."
JA: I met him at his book signing for his born-again Christian book.
KB: He's got a born-again Christian book?
JA: Oh you didn't know that? Yeah, he wrote a book of poetry praising God.
KB: Oh see, I knew he did a book of poetry. [Courtney Love] was always getting accused of letting Billy Corgan write her albums. I'd let Billy Corgan write my albums. I'd be like, "Billy, you can do this."
JA: He had a really bad band. Zane?
KB: Oh Zwan.
JA: It was like elevator music.
KB: It was bad. But you know he wrote "Cherub Rock" and "Today." He had like all of these guitar solos that went [imitates guitar sounds]; it was so cool-sounding.
JA: "Today" is one of the greatest songs.
KB: Probably the greatest song of the '90s. And also, one part when he had hair, and the girl dressed like a boy, the boy who looked like the girl, and James looked like a blasian.
JA: Like a blonde troll?
KB: He looked like a girl, she looked like a guy, drummer was on heroin, and they wore shiny pants.
JA: I love '90s videos
KB: I can pretend to be Billy Corgan, and you can be like "what was it like to have sex with Courtney Love?"
JA: So what's it really like to have sex with Courtney Love? What was she like in bed?
KB: She's kinda crazy, but in a good way. And you know she takes a lot of slack in the media, but she has always been true to herself, and she's an accomplished songwriter. She's had to deal with a lot of things that other people haven't dealt with.
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