Welcome to Lazy-i, an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news.
The focus is on the indie music scene. Yes, there’s a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area, but Lazy-i also offers interviews, stories and reviews about national indie bands.
Most of the feature stories and columns in Lazy-i will have previously been published in The Reader, Omaha’s monthly alternative newspaper.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
Only one show on the radar for this weekend:
Omaha noise-rock four-piece Violenteer is headlining tonight at The Sydney in Benson. They top off a four-band bill that includes Kansas City noise/art-rock band Jorge Arana Trio, Lawrence Kansas punkers Jackoffs and Omaha art-noise duo Pagan Athletes. 8:30, $10. It’s gonna be a long night.
And that about does it for shows. No touring indie shows. Nineties rockers Primus and Coheed and Cambria are playing at The Astro Sunday. Who remembers “Jerry was a Race Car Driver”? Great song. I bought Primus’ Sailing the Sea of Cheese CD in ’91 on that strength of that song. It was an era when buying albums was a gamble, and I certainly lost on that bet. $55, 6 p.m.
Meanwhile, Benson Days is going on this weekend — it’s the usual parade Saturday morning, pancake feed and street vendors. I don’t see anything about live music. More info here.
And that’s all I got. If I missed your show, put it in the comments section. Have a great, hot weekend.
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
Massachusetts post-rock instrumental outfit Caspian headlines tonight at The Waiting Room. The band has been kicking around for more than 20 years; in fact, they played a headlining gig way back in 2016 with The Appleseed Cast as an opener. Their latest, 2023’s On Circles: The Complete Sessions (a follow-up to 2020’s On Circles), was released by Triple Crown Records. Their style is classic start-small-and-build-mountains instrumentals a la Explosions in the Sky. You know the drill.
Opening is Belfast-based prog rockers And So I Watch You from Afar. While the band also mostly does instrumentals, there’s some spoken word mixed in for good measure. They’ve had music released on Sargent House and Equal Vision. Their latest 3-song single, Years Ago, came out just a couple weeks ago on Pelagic Records and combines intricate guitar lines with Mogwai-style wall-of noise goodness. $30, 8 p.m.
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
When nothing’s going on, I like to update the list of upcoming touring indie shows. Not much has changed over the last update except the addition of MJ Lenderman & The Wind at The Waiting Room Oct. 10. The Asheville, NC, singer/songwriter has a new album coming out on Anti- Sept. 6 called Manning Fireworks. The first single, “She’s Leaving You,” is burning up college radio. You may remember him from playing in the band Wednesday back in May at The Slowdown.
Other adds include Foxing Sept. 26 at Slowdown; Odie Leigh at The Slowdown Oct. 1; Saturdays at Your Place at Reverb Oct. 7; Boris at The Waiting Room Oct. 8; Melt at The Slowdown Oct. 10; The Red Pears at Reverb Oct. 12 and Kate Nash at The Slowdown Oct. 23.
Hottest up-and-coming is SNÕÕPER at Reverb July 31. And Outlandia is just around the corner Aug. 9-10…
Am I missing something? Let me know…
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
The above headline is like tossing a lit grenade in the room full of indie kids. I have no idea what Maha Music Festival’s current status is. The rumors are that Maha is over, done, won’t be back next year. I’m not so sure, though, and see no reason why it would end except that the Maha folks have yet to provide any updates on the festival’s status for 2025.
But if Maha is over, Grrrl Camp could easily slide in and take its place. In many ways, it reminded me of Maha – its lineup, the vendors/festival atmosphere, the laidback feel of the crowd, even the location, which brings me to Falconwood Park in Bellevue.
This was my first time inside the confines of the Falconwood compound, having skipped the last couple years of Outlandia, partially out of concerns about the facilities and access. Though it’s only a quick 25-minute drive via the Interstate, there’s always been a “do-I-really-want-to-drive-all-the-way-out-there?” sort of feel about it. All the photos I’d seen made it look like Falconwood is an empty field near the banks of the Platte River – muddy, mosquitos, parking in a grass field, etc.
Well, I’m here to tell you, Falconwood was worth the trip. They have a pretty amazing set-up. Getting there is easy via a two-lane county road off the interstate that takes you to a very narrow access road (easy, but I wonder how easy if, say, 8,000 people headed to the concert). Signage makes it hard to miss, though we did go in through the camping entrance by mistake. Parking was, indeed, in a grassy field near the campgrounds but was only a few yards from the concert area.
One of the first buildings you encounter is the facilities’ west lodge, a very cool structure with a stage, a full bar and probably a kitchen (though they weren’t serving food), with bathrooms and booths along one wall. I asked one of the organizers what would happen if there was a heavy rain during the concert, and she told me they’d take it into the lodge, but the structure’s capacity could be more than a few hundred.
Beyond that was the festival area, with more vendors than I’ve seen at any other local music festival. There must have been 100 vendor tents, most selling clothing, jewelry, art and tchotchkes (I saw one selling shoes!). Food trucks were set up along the back – maybe a half-dozen of the usual suspects (the El Churro Spot had the longest lines).
More vendor tents and picnic tables ran along the edges leading up to the stage area, and, just eye-balling it, I’d guess that the footprint for this section of Falconwood is smaller than Stinson Park at Aksarben Village (but this is just a fraction of Falconwood – more on that later).
Maybe it was the fantastic weather, maybe it was the bands, maybe it was the size of the crowd, but the whole thing felt very chill and fun. We got there on Saturday afternoon right before Girl Ray took the stage, found a spot about 30 yards from the stage, and dropped our folding chairs complete with a Modelo tallboy in hand (alas, I didn’t see any Rolling Rock in their coolers).
I’d guestimate the crowd was around 200 not including the army of vendors. Organizers say Grrrl Camp attracted 1,000 people over the course of the weekend (again, not including vendors), which is much less than your typical Maha festival. That said, for its second year (and first with national touring bands), it’s a good start.
Leeds, England, band Girl Ray played tunes off their latest LP, Prestige (2023, Moshi Moshi), which were fun, un-cheesy disco rock songs. I don’t think they play many U.S. festivals, and said they were surprised to get the call for Grrrl Camp. With the weird CrowdStrike outage impacting airports earlier, they had to take a series of overnight flights from LA to make it to the festival, but seemed happy they did.
This stage at Falconwood is a permanent structure and is really all they need for this portion of the park. The sound was fantastic, especially with this band. The young, fashionably hipster crowd happily bounced to the beat. Yeah, it was mostly women in the audience, but there were plenty of dudes, too. There also was a small army of people slinging SLR cameras taking photos everywhere – there must be a shit-ton of aspiring rock photographers in Omaha.
After a quick switch-out and some bumping DJ action, Nashville’s Annie DiRusso and her band were next. Their sound is more akin to modern indie rock, reminiscent of Blondshell and other artists who were clearly influenced by Liz Phair. She played most of the songs off her 2023 EP, God, I Hate This Place, as well as new songs from her upcoming debut full-length (which I think she said drops next month).
Their mix was much heavier and louder (in went my earplugs), which made things sound chunkier and less refined than her recordings. These folks apparently drove from Seattle to make this festival, which in itself was impressive.
In case you didn’t know, Charlie XCX’s new album, brat, has been deemed the album of summer 2024. DiRusso invented the term “NeBratska” in its honor, which she rolled out when introducing her band’s unique, rocked-out cover of “Apple” from that album – a highlight.
After DiRusso’s set, the fine folks at Falconwood gave me a quick tour of the entire facility (via golf cart), including where the upcoming Outlandia Festival will be held on the opposite side of the park. That concert space is immense, surrounded by old cabins that have been renovated for camping (or glamping). There is little doubt that Outlandia will be a completely different concert experience than Grrrl Camp (both are booked by 1% Productions) and more akin to the mammoth machine that was the Maha Music Festival.
The Outlandia Festival, by the way, is in just a few weeks – Aug. 9 and 10 – and will feature headliners The Flaming Lips, The Head and the Heart and The Revivalists, along with a fetching (and, in my opinion, more interesting) undercard that includes The Faint, Dinosaur Jr., Buffalo Tom (yes, that Buffalo Tom), Devotchka, Flipturn and more.
The story behind Falconwood is kind of inspiring and something I hope to pursue at a later date.
Hurray for the Riff Raff were on stage when we got back to the Grrrl Camp area. Their folk-tinged rock was the perfect compliment for a beautiful evening outdoors. No doubt the medical tent was kept busy doling out mosquito repellant (I certainly got my share).
We left before Indigo de Souza, whose music I love but who I’ve seen before. Because of our timing, getting out of Falconwood was simple, but like I said, I’m not so sure how it all works when you have a few thousand people leaving at once.
The moral of this rather long-winded review is to not be afraid of Falconwood Park. The facilities are awesome. The location – while nowhere near as convenient as Stinson Park – is easily accessible from Omaha (though the jury is still out regarding traffic during a big event), and holds far more potential than what Aksarben Village could provide.
Hopefully Grrrl Camp will return next year, building on the buzz generated this year. I was trepidatious about the name, but I get it now. As long as that name doesn’t hold back organizers from booking bands that don’t have at least one female member, I could see this festival growing to Maha proportions.
Ah, Maha, what has become of thee?
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
Grrrl Camp starts today at Falconwood Park in Bellevue. Here’s the deal: Over the past five years (or more), women artists have dominated indie music (actually not just indie, all pop music). So the idea of having a festival focused solely on female indie artists is, well, almost redundant in its very nature.
This is the third time I’ve made this point – Grrrl Camp is not a girls-only event. But it doesn’t matter how many times I say it, there’s going to be dudes who won’t attend because they think they’re not welcome. Tis a pity, because, as I said above, women artists have dominated Indie/pop/rock music for a long time, and this is the best indie-centric line-up I’ve seen at any local festival this year.
Both nights’ line-ups are solid. If I had to differentiate, tonight’s line-up is more punk and heavier than tomorrow’s more folk/singer/songwriter fare. Your mileage may vary.
I posted a description of every band back in April, which you can read right here. Bands I’m most looking forward to seeing most for the first time: Annie DiRusso, Hurray for the Riff Raff, and Mannequin Pussy. I can already vouch for the greatness of Shannon & the Clams, Rosali and Indigo De Souza, having seen them perform before.
Tonight’s schedule:
Saturday’s schedule
There are DJ sets and after-hours hi-jinx as well. See the full list of activities at grrrlcamp.com, where there’s also rules, directions, etc.
Let’s talk tickets. Weekend GA Passes are $85. Friday single-day passes are $45. Saturday single-day passes are $65. No VIP options. Camping options are available at the grrrlcamp.com website.
The website says there will be “100+ vendors,” though none are listed, but the FAQ states “We will be featuring some of the area’s most delicious eats, femme-owned and/or operated, too! Vegan/Vegetarian options will be available.” That includes a full bar.
Weather-wise, tonight should be OK but Saturday is looking wet. Keep your fingers crossed that the rain passes us by. Grrrl Camp is a rain or shine event, but organizers say there is a rain option (Falconwood Lodge) that can be used as a last resort if weather is severe.
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That’s really all I have for this weekend. If I missed your show, put it in the comments section. Have a great weekend!
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
The folks at Falconwood Park in Bellevue no doubt are gearing up for the season’s first music festival that features indie bands – GRRRL Camp July 19 and 20. Why mention this on Monday? Just to get the word out for those who haven’t been paying attention. This festival has the best indie line-up of any local festival, especially with Maha taking the year off. Headliners are Indigo de Souza and Mannequin Pussy, but the entire weekend line-up is solid.
When I talk about this festival with folks I continue to get quizzical looks by dudes who think it’s an Omaha Girls Rock event. OGR does, indeed, host a summer camp program. That ain’t what this is. Yes, men, you are invited along with everyone else. All the details are available at the event’s website – grrrlcamp.com.
I’ll be writing about the participating bands throughout the week.
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Speaking of shows, there’s another great Monday night offering at The Waiting Room tonight.
Etran de L’Aïr translates to “the Stars of the Aïr,” the mountainous region of Northern Niger. The band is based in the town of Agadez, an urban center renowned for the electric guitar and the Western named “desert blues.” In the Sahara, this electric guitar genre is intertwined with social function, and as such, these folks play a lot of weddings and other fun gatherings.
They remind me of a less guitar-heavy, more danceable version of indie darlings Mdou Moctor. Etran de L’Aïr, however, is still very much under the radar. The New Yorker picked their cellphone recorded debut, No. 1, as their album of the year in 2020.
Sez the New Yorker: “No. 1 was recorded live, outside of the band’s compound in the outskirts of Agadez, and it contains absolutely everything I have desperately missed about non-virtual concerts: heady, spontaneous grooves, the sound of people clapping, involuntarily loosed whoops. I put it on whenever I need to be reminded of what it feels like to be outside, among friends, happy, dissolving into sound.”
The band played an in-store at Grapefruit Records in the Old Market a year or so ago; I can’t imagine many folks around here know about them – they’d be hard-pressed to fill Reverb let alone The Waiting Room, especially on a Monday night.
That’s all the more reason to get yer ass to Benson tonight and see this show. Opening is local indie psych-rock newcomers Cowgirl Eastern. $25, 8 p.m.
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
Violin-playing singer-songwriting whistler Andrew Bird is headlining tonight at The Astro in La Vista. He’s one of those guys who has always flown under the radar for me, despite being a major force in indie music for well over a decade, starting out on Rykodisc and Grimsey Records before moving on to Mom+Pop, Fat Possum, and finally Loma Vista for the last few LPs. His most recent, Sunday Morning Put-On, is a collection of jazz covers. It’s interesting to see he’s playing at such a large venue, but I guess Bird graduated to the whole Fleet Foxes/Decemberist/Feist league of indie year’s ago.
This is a split-headliner show with country/bluegrass act Nickel Creek (Nonesuch). Singer/songwriter Haley Heynderickx opens at 6:30. Tickets range from $50 to $100.
That’s it for national touring indie-esque acts this weekend.
Tonight (Friday), Mitch Gettman opens for Charlie Ames’ band Cable Network at Slowdown Jr. Always interesting to see what Mitch has been up to, though I know he’s been working on a follow-up to last year’s Tilde. Omaha alt rockers Dear Neighbor opens at 8 p.m. $10.
Tomorrow is the second Saturday of the month which means Blackstone Second Saturday (It just doesn’t roll off the tongue like Benson First Friday). The day’s highlight is at Scriptown Brewing Company. They’re calling it “Summer Smash Vol. II,” and includes a punk rock flea market, tie-dye station and culminates in live performances by tractor-punk mavericks Wagon Blasters and C&W cowboys Lightning Stills. It’s free, and the music starts at 3 p.m. More info here.
Later Saturday night it’s back to Slowdown Jr. for another evening of up-and-coming locals that includes the arcane synth-and-drum noise-punk of Pagan Athletes. Indie stalwarts Bad Self Portraits headlines, while psych rock newcomers Cowgirl Eastern opens this show at 8 p.m. $10.
And that’s all I got. If I missed your show, put it in the comments section. Have a great weekend.
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
On this Throwback Thursday: This is a 30-year-old photo of Lincoln rock band Sideshow, taken after an interview conducted for a cover story for the defunct Lawrence, Kansas, music magazine The Note, which was published in November 1994. From left are Pawl Tisdale, Rich Higgins and Bernie McGinn. Their van smiles in the background. These days Tisdale plays drums for Domestica (the current incarnation of Mercy Rule), McGinn lives somewhere in San Francisco and I have no idea of the whereabouts of Rich Higgins. We all await their next reunion concert…
I found this photo digging through my files as I continue to work though research surrounding a book about the history of Nebraska music, circa 1990s to now. I’m looking for photos, folks, so I’ll be bothering many of you soon for pics from back in the day. Time creeps slowly until it’s passed you by…
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I don’t know a shit-ton about The Wallflowers other than frontman Jakob Dylan is Bob’s son, and that they had a mega-hit back in 1996 with “One Headlight.” This was an alt-rock era when bands like Counting Crows were holding court and a lot of the bands on FM radio sounded alike. Listening to The Wallflowers most recent album, Exit Wounds (2021, New West), their sound hasn’t evolved much over the past couple decades.
That’s something you’ll no doubt discover if you go see Wallflowers tonight at The Astro in La Vista. Opening is Omaha alt-indie band Virgin Mary Pistol Grip, in what will likely be one of the biggest audiences they’ve played in front of (though folks at Memorial Park waiting for Roger Daltrey take the stage a couple weeks ago were treated to seeing VMPG’s latest music video). 8 p.m., $45-$80.
I have still yet to step foot in The Astro, though I’ve purchased tickets for the upcoming Psych Furs/Jesus and Mary Chain concert and am a bit… concerned I may have f-ed up the tickets…
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
Cursive dropped a new video yesterday for the song “Botch Job,” a track off their upcoming album, Devourer, which comes out Sept. 13 on Run for Cover Records. Local boy Tony Bonacci was the cinematographer for the video, directed by Travis Stevens. Jim Johnson (of 1% and The Admiral Theater) and Django Greenblatt-Seay (of Love Drunk fame) also are listed in the video’s credits.
This song and the entire album is a return to old-school Cursive and I would love to see the band play the entire record in order during their upcoming shows at The Waiting Room Oct. 18 (w/Little Brazil) and 19 (w/Criteria). Gladie also opens both shows.
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Also thought I’d mention that Cursive’s former record label, Saddle Creek Records, just announced that it’s reissuing on vinyl Eric Bachmann’s solo album, To the Races, on Aug. 9. The album was originally released in August 2006 and was one of my faves that year. Bachmann mentioned the reissue at his recent Ming Toy Gallery concert, but said to keep it secret until the label announcement (I’m not sure why). Preorder here.
BTW, we’ve got another concert coming up at Ming Toy Gallery in September. More info on that one soon…
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Speaking of Saddle Creek reissues, our hometown label also announced it’s rereleasing on vinyl two classic albums by The Faint – 2008’s Fasciinatiion (originally released on the band’s blank.wav imprint) and 2014’s Doom Abuse (originally released by SQE Music). The drop date is Aug. 16. This brings all of The Faint’s releases back into the Saddle Creek fold. Order your copies here.
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com
The Baseball Project got me wondering: What are most rock songs about? Relationships, having fun, personal struggle, love and regret. Some are political anthems. Others are meaningless word salad combinations. Almost all are written from a singer/songwriter’s vantage point.
The Baseball Project’s songs are solely about baseball, the players, the history, the game itself. It’s the ultimate concept band that doesn’t sway from its subject matter, written by people who love and know the game and its history. With that in mind, The Baseball Project could be the first rock band to win a Pulitzer for its songwriting. Each song is a snapshot of America’s past time, reported – and sung – by the songwriter.
All of this was going through my head as I watched and listened – along with a couple hundred folks – to The Baseball Project at The Waiting Room last night. I mentioned yesterday that Steve Wynn sang most of the songs – that’s wrong. Each member of the band except Peter Buck sang leads on a song, with Wynn and Scott McCaughey handing the lion’s share. Mills sang leads on at least three songs, including standouts like “To the Veterans Committee” (consider Dale Murphy for the Baseball Hall of Fame) and “Stuff” (about illegal substances pitchers use to get more action on the ball).
Wynn and McCaughey have terrific complimentary voices and are commensurate storytellers. They introduced each song, explaining the history about what they were about to sing. Almost every song included a year or date for context and a lot of baseball players’ names that if you’re only a passing fan of the game, will likely be lost on you, except for heroes like Willie Mays and Hank Aaron, etc.
Take out the baseball subject matter and you’ve got some of the best jangle-power-pop rock that you’ll likely hear, and you would expect nothing less from this legendary line-up (with Buck, McCaughey and Wynn all playing guitars, Mills on bass and the remarkable Linda Pitmon on drums). You have to wonder if these songs could have been big hits if they weren’t solely about baseball – an idea I’m sure has been written about in past reviews. Because many of the melodies and compositions are as good as stuff by R.E.M. or Dream Syndicate.
But I guess for these folks, if it wasn’t about baseball, it wouldn’t be fun. There is almost nothing controversial or polarizing about the game. I guess you could argue about ‘the Steroids Era,’ or Pete Rose or your personal take on the Designated Hitter Rule, but it’s mostly just harmless fun, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2024 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.
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