Lee Meyerpeter and Josh Dunwoody at Take Cover Omaha, Vol. 2, at The Sydney, Jan. 18, 2013.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Nearly 300 people paid $5 to attend a Take Cover show this past weekend. Omaha drew the best crowd, with nearly 200 paid at The Sydney Friday night, and if you were there, you could feel it. Crush mob. I showed up about halfway through the evening’s line-up, just in time to catch the Lee Meyerpeter & Josh Dunwoody (of The Filter Kings) and Landon Hedges (of Little Brazil) do their one original/one cover. The Filter Kings’ dudes covered a Killigans’ tune, while Landon took on a Lullaby for the Working Class song. The crowd dug them both and so did I, but by the end of Landon’s song I was feeling pretty claustrophobic…

The final tally was nearly $2,000 raised for Hear Nebraska to help support their mission, which is pretty simple: To make the state a globally recognized cultural destination. Hear Nebraska’s only job is to support Nebraska music. That’s it. If you’re in a local band, or just love local music, get your ass behind the HN cause. If you didn’t get a chance to drop in at either showcase, you can still donate $5 (or more) by going to the Hear Nebraska donation page and making a donation. You can even do it using PayPal — just designate the payment to Hear Nebraska, Inc. How simple is that?

Or if you’d rather get a tchotchke in return for your donation, go to the Hear Nebraska store and buy one of their fancy new T-shirts or a koozy. Do it.

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The only thing else to report on this quiet MLK Day is that everyone’s favorite band of degenerates, Peace of Shit, has decided to change its name to something I guess they think is much less offensive: Dumb Beach.

Dumb Beach frontman Austin Ulmer confirmed that the name change is no joke. He said they may play a few remaining smaller shows under the old Peace of Shit moniker, but after that, look for Dumb Beach on the gig calendars. I’m trying to talk him into playing one final show as Peace of Shit — a heart-rending farewell performance that would rival The Last Waltz. Why not? It worked for Sun Settings…

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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 © 2013 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Oh my achin’ head… It’s going to be one of THOSE weekends — a show every night… and day.

Before we get to that, even without a bass player Peace of Shit lived up to its name last night in front of a pizza-farting crowd at O’Leaver’s. The free grub was both a play on words (Pizza Shit… get it!) and a donation from a band member who works at Godfathers. All night I watched the lettuce slowly wilt on a half-eaten taco pizza that sat with its grease melting in a half-open pizza box, the cardboard slowly turning brown to black like an old diaper. Pizza shit indeed. Next time bring some friggin’ Cinnamon Monkey Bread, pizza boy.

I missed opener Watching the Train Wreck as I was home watching the train wreck that is the U.S. Olympic diving team. Traveling band Oakland’s Bonnie & the BANG BANG (an ill fit on a bill of garage music) played a set of adult contemporary indie that would have been right at home at P.S. Collective rather than O’Leaver’s, where it went mostly unnoticed by a crowd that sat outside smoking in the beer garden waiting for them to get done. POS came on at around midnight as a trio without a bass player, which was missed but not a deal breaker as the rest of the band stepped up and nailed the landing with little or no splash (That’s a diving reference for you unpatriotic sports haters, btw). I like this band and stand by yesterday’s statement that they would have made a fine addition to the Maha Festival though that will never happen as their trashy looks resemble a group police mug shot featuring Randy Travis, Nick Nolte and Mr. Peabody. I spent the morning listening to their new cassette Business as Usual (Rainy Road, 2012) at work and getting the usual squinty, annoyed looks by people passing my veal fattening pen, a sure sign that you should seek out this tape and purchase it immediate and then play it as loudly as possible in your ’98 Trans Am (That’s a Randy Travis reference for all you unpatriotic sports haters, btw).

Tonight we do it all over again, but this time at The Barley Street Tavern where a cast of O’Leaver’s All Stars takes Barley’s hippie-fied stage. Headlining the sleazy brigade is Digital Leather who are about to embark on a mini tour of the Pacific Northwest. I don’t know if they’re the best band in Omaha but they’re my favorite. Not that it matters. Opening is New Lungs (DMax, straight from last night’s Little Brazil 400 Bar gig w/Desa) and The Fucking Party. Expect a higher-than-normal number of cop cars cruising the streets of Benson triggered by the influx of the degenerate O’Leaver’s crowd. $5, 9 p.m.

Also tonight, The Casualties play at The Sandbox with a handful of punk bands including the always dashing Cordial Spew. $15, 8 p.m., more details here.

Then comes Maha.

The full lineup and all the particulars about this 4th annual event are available at mahamusicfestival.com.

If you’re still looking to buy tickets, a friend of mine forwarded me this offer from Daily Mav that takes $10 off per ticket. It expires at midnight tonight. Keep your eyes peeled for other offers, or quit being a cheap-ass and just buy your tix at the Maha website (Tix will be $40 each at the gate, so better get them now).

So when you going to get there? Here’s the stage schedule:

12:10 — The Seen
12:45 — Conduits
1:30 — Eli Mardock
2:05 — Frontier Ruckus
2:55 — Universe Contest
3:30 — Josh Rouse
4:35 — UUVVWWZ
5:10 — Dum Dum Girls
6:15 — The Mynabirds
7:00 — Delta Spirit
8:10 — Icky Blossoms
9:10 — Garbage
10:40 — Desparecidos
Show ends at Midnight

Maha keeps boasting that there will be lots of parking, and I’m sure they’re right. Regardless, if you live within biking distance (as I do) I recommend pedaling it over there. Omaha Bikes is suppose to have a bike corral set up over by the Aspen Athletic Club. Check out the map at the Maha website. This should be a blast.

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Your weekend ends Sunday back at The Barley Street Tavern for Capgun Coup along with Candywhompus and the always entertaining Worried Mothers. $5, 9 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 © 2012 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

Peace of Shit at O'Leaver's, Jan. 14, 2011.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

How good is the new Peace of Shit cassette? Well, really good, actually, though it sounds (appropriately) like shit in my ’99 Tracker. The poor sound quality has as much to do with my standard-issue cassette player (which makes everything sound like shit) as it does the overblown, tin-can rattle recording. But no matter how dirty it sounds, you can’t keep a song as good as “Out of Our Heads” hidden beneath all the filth, nor can you ignore a line as good as, “I can only do one thing, and that’s drink, without you.” Sounds like frontman Austin Ulmer has had a little of his Digital Leather experience rub off, both in his vocal style and his song structure. Consider this the more punk, less New Wave version of DL (closer to the live DL sound). But amidst all the anger and angst and panic in the streets, there’s room for a ringing little pop song like “Slumber Party” that will have you doing a drunken twist with your chained-up gimp down in your personal basement torture room. Don’t have a cassette player? Doesn’t matter. You should still buy a cassette from the Rainy Road Records website, or from The Antiquarim if the band ever gets around to dropping some copies off down there. It comes with a download code so you can add the digital files to your portable listening device. Those files provide more pristine versions of these songs, but I still prefer the fuzzy, shitty versions coming from my Tracker’s 6 x 9s.

As you would expect, the live version of POS is a different animal than the cassette version. Frontman Ulmer had his paws wrapped around a couple microphones while he mmrrwwrrred the lyrics backed by a 5-piece punk band. Unlike, say, a Shanks show (I went to a fight and a rock show broke out) all the energy was focused directly on the music. Though they’ve only been around for a few months POS has somehow already floated to the top of the punk-rock toilet bowl as one of the best collections of local hard music talent in Omaha. It’s like they’re stars already, sort of. OK, maybe not stars, but a band that deserves more exposure. That is if their name doesn’t hold them back. It’s Ceelo Green all over again. Maybe they should change their name to the less offensive Peace of Poop.

Uh, maybe not…

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Tonight at The Waiting Room, Cursive performs their landmark album Cursive’s Domestica top-to-bottom, beginning-to-end, in honor of the 10-year anniversary of its release. No more needs to be said, except that they performed Domestica in Chicago on New Year’s Eve (review of that show here) and that tonight’s show has been sold out for quite a while now. Lightning Bug opens, show starts at 9 p.m.

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Lazy-i Best of 2010

This is it, the last day for entering the drawing for a copy of the Lazy-i Best of 2010 Sampler CD. Considering the number of entries received so far, your chances are pretty good this year of getting a copy. Just send an e-mail to tim@lazy-i.com with your name and mailing address. Tracks include songs by Arcade Fire, Jenny and Johnny, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, Belle and Sebastian, Titus Andronicus, The Mynabirds, A Weather, Zeus, The Black Keys, Pete Yorn and more. Full track listing is here. If you’re lucky enough to win, you’ll also get the new limited edition Lazy-i Sticker to stick on something. Deadline is TODAY. Do it.

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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 © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

How do you suppose the guys in the band Peace of Shit came up with the name?

“Hmm… Let’s see. How about Peace in our Time? No, no, they’ll think we’re a hippie band. We need something tougher, more punk. OK, maybe, maybe… Piece of Ass? What do you think? That’s awesome. Waitaminit, wait a minute. I got something even better. How about Peace of Shit. And we’ll spell it P E A C E. Yeah, fuckin’ A. That’s it!”

Head butts and high-fives all around. It is, in my humble opinion, one of the best new band names I’ve heard in years, though I won’t be able to wear their T-shirt to the UP gym. The band consists of members of a handful of the area’s most belligerent punk bands, including Digital Leather, Baby Tears, the Shanks, The Fucking Party, La Casa Bombas, The line-up: Johnny VD, guitar; Calvin Retzlaff, drums; Nicky Waggonner, guitar; Craig Fort, bass; Todd VonStup, bass, and chief peace officer Austen Ulmer. But according to Todd, every show has a different line-up. Who knows who’ll show up for tonight’s POS cassette-release party?

“This 10 song cassette was recorded by Ben Allen and Austen Ulmer,” Todd said, “with Austen on vocals, guitars, bass and drums.  Jeff Lambelt also plays drums on a few tracks.  It is being released by Rainy Road Records (Watching the Train Wreck, Brimstone Howl, the Shanks).”

You can download the songs here. But come on, who wants digital files?  Tapes are $5 and you’ll soon be able to order them right from the Rainy Road website. But your best bet is just coming to the show tonight at O’Leaver’s. You know I’ll be there. I even have a tapedeck in my Tracker so I can suck in these sweet tunes on the way home from the bar. Also on the bill are Watching the Train Wreck and Mosquito Bandito. $5, 9:30 p.m.

Kind of/sort of competing with this show is another punk show down at Slowdown Jr. featuring Bazooka Shootout, Dim Light, and Grandmother’s Milk. $5, 9 p.m.

Meanwhile, there’s a benefit for the National Humane Society taking place tonight Barley Street Tavern in the memory of Scout the Benson Bar Cat. Among the performers are All Young Girls Are Machine Guns, Platte River Rain and Alex Diimig. $5, 9 p.m.

John Wolf himself has confirmed that tomorrow night’s show (Saturday) at the Waiting Room will be the last time that you’ll ever get a chance to see Omaha legends Bad Luck Charm on any stage. It will be their final show. They’ll be going out in style with The Killigans and Cordial Spew, all for $7. Starts at 9. Come pay your respects to this maximum rock and roll band.

Also Saturday night, Fortnight will be celebrating the release of their new 6-song EP, Botany Camp, at Slowdown Jr. Fortnight is keyboardist Jenn Bernard, guitarists Mike Greene-Walsh and Tim Walker, bassist Matt Carlson, drummer Scott Micheels, and vocalist Corey Degner. Botany Camp was recorded on an analog board in a machine shed and a spare bedroom, then mixed at Enamel Studio and mastered by the master himself, Doug Van Sloun at Focus Mastering. Also on the bill are So-So Sailers, Landing on the Moon and Down with the Ship. $7, 9 p.m.

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Lazy-i Best of 2010

This is your last weekend to get in on the drawing for a copy of  the Lazy-i Best of 2010 CD sampler. Just send an e-mail to tim@lazy-i.com with your name and mailing address. Tracks include songs by Arcade Fire, Jenny and Johnny, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, Belle and Sebastian, Titus Andronicus, The Mynabirds, A Weather, Zeus, The Black Keys, Pete Yorn and more. Full track listing is here. If you’re lucky enough to win, you’ll also get the new limited edition Lazy-i Sticker to stick on something. Deadline is next Tuesday, Jan. 18. Do it.

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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 © 2011 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.