Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Sohn and Drenge : SXSW Preview 1

Yes yes yes! It’s that time of year again; the time where I run to my doctor for some allergy relief and instead of my actual health, we spend the entire time talking about SXSW. This is good in the sense that I have a cool doctor but bad in the sense that I could be growing a third ear and he wouldn’t even notice because he was too busy listening to my story about Weenie Hut. Weenie Hut is this super nerdy kid that I discovered at an underground Austin hip hop show. He looked like the 16 year old version of Napoleon Dynamite and said weird things like “Um…I’m gonna do rap stuff while you stand there and listen”. Riiiiiight,I thought that there was no way this kid would make it through a single song let alone be any good but as it turned out he kind of killed it! He didn’t even let this weird girl who was heckling him and dancing off beat take him off his game! He in that one moment pretty much summed up everything I love about SX and that’s the fact that you can walk into a show with little to no expectations and walk out with a new favorite artist. Now I’m not saying Weenie Hut is  a new favorite of mine but after combing through the initial 1700 bands that the festival has released, I have found some serious potential.

First up is Sohn, a soulful white brother from Vienna who was born in London just like James Blake. Why do I bring up Blake? Because they are similar in so many ways; however when I first heard the comparisons between the two, I was instantly ready to write Sohn off due to the fact that I didn't think anyone could match Blake's unique ability to make dark soulful indie music cool. But just like with so many other things in life that aren't related to the Cosby Show, I was completely wrong. While his beats aren't as dark and quirky as Blake's, they are synth heavy and have spastic drums that make you think that he listens to a lot of Timbaland in his down time. He makes depressing songs about crazy exes that he keeps going back to like the Offspring's Self Esteem (when's the last time you heard a reference to that song) and songs about chasing girls that don't love him. Now this is stuff that scrubs like me can relate to. Check out his highlights in Lessons and Bloodflows as I rate Sohn and his music as FRESH!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e17iXDf0NGE

Next up is Drenge, two kids who are from Northern England that seem to have a desire to keep the grunge movement alive and kicking. Just try and imagine what Silverchair's sound would be like after they went through puberty and didn't become anorexic. The only thing is, I actually listened to some post puberty Silverchair and Drenge doesn't suck like they did. I would listen to Face Like a Skull and Backwaters to get a sense of what they bring to the table. I rate them as FRESH!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AdfZ2rhZmc

No comments:

Post a Comment