Poliça plays tonight at The Waiting Room.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Another late-in-the-day post. Hey whaddayagonnado?

Despite the late hour I’m tossing this one online to remind you that Poliça is playing at The Waiting Room tonight with Night Moves. Poliça is Channy Leaneagh and Ryan Olson, previously of the band Gayngs. Their debut album, Give You the Ghost (Totally Gross National Product) got a massive 7.6 on the Pitchfork meter (Check out four songs from the album from the SoundCloud link, below). It’s gorgeous, and seeing them on an Omaha stage is well worth your $14. Show starts at 9.

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/playlists/1878378″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]

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In other (old) news, Hear Nebraska today announced that it’s teaming up with Omaha Performing Arts and NET News to produce a “Austin City Limits-style” concert June 7 at the Holland Performing Arts Center’s 1200 Club. The performers: Saddle Creek Records’ Big Harp, Lincoln’s Kill County and the red hot Digital Leather. The show will be filmed by NET for four separate TV shows to air statewide (and possibly nationwide). It’s quite a coup for Hear Nebraska and helps galvanize it’s ever-growing rep as the state’s central music hub. Tix are $25 Adv/$30 DOS (info here).

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That greedy bastard Matt Whipkey has been riding my ass for two days to remind you that there’s only 24 hours left to get in on his Penny Park Kickstarter deal. Whipkey’s already blown way past his $4k goal (He was at $5,126 as of this writing). He says that initial $4k goal was only designed to cover half his vinyl costs. Vinyl’s expensive, folks. Especially gatefold double-vinyl. He says his Kickstarter is the best way for you to reserve your copy of his loving ode to one of his favorite teenage memories (Who else got loaded on cheap champagne at the Grove on New Year’s Eve? Ah, the memories)….

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Last but not least, tonight is the kick off the Big Al’s Free Music Festival 2013 — five nights of free music at The Hideout Lounge (320 So. 72nd St.). More info 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 © 2013 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Another “showless” weekend for me. And it looks like it’s going to be a showless week as well. I see nothing indie on any club schedule until Friday. Is it me or are rock shows — especially those featuring touring indie bands — becoming fewer and fewer these days?

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Speaking of rock shows, tickets to this year’s Maha Music Festival went on sale today. Get your early bird $30 GA tickets now and find out later what you’re in for. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

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Matt Whipkey’s Kickstarter campaign for his “Penny Park” double album exceeded its $4,000 goal over the weekend. Impressive. The campaign has nine days to go, so you can still get in on the deal.

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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

An update on yesterday’s post about Matt Whipkey’s Penny Park Omaha NE: Summer of 1989 project: This morning Whipkey launched a Kickstarter program to help fund production of the double-vinyl album. His goal is to raise $4,000 in 30 days. As of this writing, he’s already almost a quarter of the way there.

“My initial skepticism for crowd funding has recently turned into pure enthusiasm,” Whipkey says on the site. “This is an exciting time for independent music, like a live performance there is now no barrier between artist and listener. Through Kickstarter, we remove the proverbial middleman who always holds things up. You and I are working together on this one, in concert. Quite frankly the idea of a double-gatefold, 150-gram vinyl double concept album about a long gone Midwestern amusement park in 1989 would make many labels immediately stop communicating.”

I’m sure it would. Check out the Kickstarter site and make a pledge.

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Tonight at The Waiting Room it’s the return of Chicago-by-way-of-German industrial band KMFDM. Opening are Legion With and Chant. $25, 8 p.m.

By the way, I discovered from this review of KMFDM’s show in Milwaukee that the acronym stands for “Kein Mehrheit Für Die Mitleid,” a grammatically incorrect German phrase meaning roughly “No Pity for the Majority,” and not, as the band has jokingly claimed on occasion, “Kill Motherfucking Depeche Mode.”

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Tomorrow: Some very special news for fans of ’90s-era Omaha-based punk…

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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

Bad weather (or the threat of if) kept me away from the bars all weekend. What month is it, anyway? March? March used to be “kite-flying month.” Not anymore. Thank you global climate change.

Over the weekend, Matt Whipkey launched his Penny Park Omaha, NE Summer 1989 project. For those too young to remember, there was this urban amusement park located where the Hy-Vee currently stands at 79th and Cass St. I always thought the park itself was kind of shitty, but the lagoon, well, that was special.

Anyway, it was called Peony Park, not Penny Park. But there were some legal questions tied around using the Peony Park name. Whipkey points out that the record isn’t specifically about the park but about a girl named Penny Park.

“Penny Park is a person. Peony was an amusement park. The former spent a great deal of time at the later. This is a record about a girl,” says the mypennypark.com website.

As part of the recording project, Whipkey is asking people to send in their memories and photos of Peony Park. Those photos may be used in the album’s gatefold. We’re talking about a 21-song double vinyl album, folks. In fact, tomorrow, Whipkey will be launching a Kickstarter campaign to help fund its production.

For now, here are a couple recordings that will give you a flavor of the project:

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/84636455″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/84638002″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

Speaking of Kickstarter projects…

Outlaw Con Bandana is currently running a Kickstarter to help produce a new double-vinyl LP and writing collection.

“White Pariah is a micro publishing company started by four friends from Omaha, NE. The Ticks and Trips vinyl and writing collection will mark our first release. We’ve worked really hard to make sure this thing rules. The writing collection has a bunch of great prose, and poetry from Brendan as well as some old photos we had him dig up from the depths. The booklet also features lyrics to all 27 songs featured on the album, which we had fun making Brendan type up. We hope everyone loves sitting down and going through this thing.”

OCB is only trying to raise $1,000 and currently is at the $865 mark with four days to go. Go to his Kickstarter page and give him a hand.

About a month ago I told you about the Kickstarter campaign for Travelling Mercies’ Motel album. Well, according to that Kickstarter site, the band has met it’s $4,000 goal (though the pledges listed don’t add up to $4,000 — I’m not sure how that works. Regardless, congratulations are in order).

Kickstarter is quickly becoming a accepted way for artists to “pre-sale” their albums, effectively funding their production and taking away a lot of the risk involved. For better or worse, it’s become a primary business model for independent musicians.

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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.