Concert Round Up, Concert Roundup, Entertainment, Essential DC, Get Out & About, Life in the Capital, Music, The District

November 2013 Concert Round Up

Heeeyyyyyyyyyyy kiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiddddz! It’s time for Mickey, Rachel and I to give you our thoughts and recommendations for the DC shows you should check out this month. I have to admit that October was a killer month in the DC music scene. But we think November can hold its own as there are WAY too many solid acts and they all seem to be coming back-to-back. So, get your daytime naps in, get your proper nutrition and hydrate well because you’re going to need to be in peak concert going form.

After the jump, Albert Hammond Jr., The Limosines, Kate Nash, Steven Kellogg with St. John, Minor Alps, Tiffany Thompsen, and many, many more.

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Arlington, Entertainment, Interviews, Music, Night Life, People, The Features, We Love Music

Q&A with Justin Trawick

Justin Trawick is a local singer-songwriter, band frontman, and musical entrepreneur.  In addition to his exhaustive solo performance schedule he has created a series called The 9, that packages nine singer-songwriters into one show, joining their forces to create a theatrical and diverse night of entertainment. We Love DC’s Alexia Kauffman sat down with Justin to talk about his endeavors.

Alexia Kauffman: So first can you tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do, and what is on your plate right now?

Justin Trawick: I’m a musician in the area. I’ve been doing music full-time for about four years. I live in Arlington, and I play most of my shows in the Washington, DC area, and then I go out of town, a lot of east coast shows up and down from Boston down to Georgia. And I play in a lot of cities around the country via airplane- I go to Austin and L.A. a lot. Continue reading

We Love Music

We Love Music: Toh Kay/Timothy Bracken @ Iota, 5/7/11

Photo courtesy of
‘Streetlight Manifesto – Tomas Kalnoky’
courtesy of ‘Evan Wohrman’

On Saturday evening Toh Kay rolled into the Iota Club in Clarendon for a show with Timothy Bracken. The small audience of loyal Toh Kay fans waited patiently for the one man band and his 6-string. The show started about a half hour late – the bartender said they were waiting for the place to fill up. It didn’t. But this space added to the intimacy of this already homey venue, with only 40 or so people scattered about the room. Continue reading

The Features, We Love Music

December Concert Preview

Photo courtesy of

courtesy of ‘Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie’

Some people may be inclined to warm up by a fire during the cold months, but if you’re like me, you prefer to get the feeling back in your hands and toes by dancing it out. Or at the very least, getting your mind blown by some amazing musicians (local and not) in the month of December. The Roots, Erin McKeown, and even some crazy kids who call themselves The Phenomenal Handclap Band will be gracing our city in the next 30 days, so let’s get to the preview!

Right at the beginning of the month, local musician Andy Zipf (and pfriends) will be celebrating the release of his new album, The Long Tail, at the Arlington Cinema & Drafthouse on Wednesday, December 2 ($10, $50 VIP).

Saturday, December 5 The Big Pink is coming to Black Cat ($13). I have to admit, their name didn’t immediately ring a bell with me, but I recognized their song “Dominoes” as soon as it started playing, and I bet that will happen to some of you, too. If you like Matt & Kim, mixed with a little bit of Kings of Leon, and topped off with a British accent, perhaps you should check these guys out. Continue reading

Music, We Love Arts

This Week in Music: Play it Loud: The Antlers/Cotton Jones @ IOTA


DSC08369 by musicalhedonist

Love can’t buy a full room, no matter what the prophets of new media might say. Even when the gushing adoration gets issued from the fast-typing manicured fingers of a name-checking rock critic, it’s not enough to ensure that there will actually be warm-drinking bodies filling the club when the band finally walks out — at least not at Iota.

The Antlers shuffled into Iota on the last languid Thursday night, dragging the sonic fruits of an inaugural album, “Hospice,” and the slow-snowball of a slew of positive reviews and early “best in 2009” lists, stretching from Pitchfork to NPR. It’s the type of trilling whisp-heavy work, managing to build and stretch droning little pop songs into eerily depressing, slow building atmospheric foothills. The dark little missive may enchant and bewitch, but make it through the ten tracks, and a very strong chance that you probably won’t be in the state of mind known as happy.

It’s an album that plays better in the headphones than the speakers — the canvasses quaver but rarely overwhelm — but on Thursday when I sat down with front man Peter Silberman, drummer Michael Lerner and keyboard stroking effects-slathering master Darby Cicci, the trio promised that the sound would be brought.

“We try to make each song as dense and expansive as we can,” said Silberman. “I don’t always know who’s making each sound or where it’s coming from, but we try to build each song as full as we can.”

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Music, The Daily Feed

Toby Lightman at Iota tonight

Photo courtesy of
‘IMG_1914’
courtesy of ‘cnraether’

You might remember Toby Lightman from her 2004 single “Devils and Angels,” but even though her songs haven’t seen radio play since then, she hasn’t stopped making music. Her new stuff is soulful, often sultry and jazzy but sometimes pop-y and upbeat, plus she really knows how to put backup singers to good use. Catch her at Iota in Arlington tonight with local Shane Hines ($12).

Arlington, Entertainment, Music, The Features

Concert: Ten out of Tenn

Ten Out of Tenn at Iota, photo by Jasmine ZickTen Out of Tenn at Iota, photo by Jasmine  

I hadn’t heard of Ten out of Tenn until recently, and I don’t know exactly how that happened. TOT is a group of awesome indie folk/rock artists from Tennessee who play together and release CD under the Ten out of Tenn name, even though each one is trying to make it big on their own. The result of this collaboration is something like a mix CD on stage, which is just about the greatest idea ever.

Ten out of Tenn came to Iota Saturday for their Christmas tour, and the venue was definitely decked out to reflect that–white Christmas lights on the ceiling, giant red bows on the mike stands, and stockings in the back with each TOT artist’s name on it. I was ready: bring on the holiday cheer.
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