The Bay Bridged Presents: A Benefit for World Access for the Blind

TheBayBridged.com is proud to present the latest in our series The Bay Bridged Presents concerts, an event bringing together three of the San Francisco Bay Area’s best bands and musicians in a special concert to support a fantastic cause.

For advance tickets, click here!

Honeycut’s debut album The Day I Turned to Glass has vaulted the group onto numerous year-end “Best ofâ€? lists. As Marisa Brown of AllMusic.com wrote, “Only occasionally do you find a group or album that manages to incorporate diverse influences into a unique sound and still remain absolutely accessible, be it to the casual radio listener or the diehard record collector… the band weaves its way through soul, funk, rock, bossa nova, and electronica without ever stopping firmly on one, instead creating something that’s very much their own…. giving Honeycut an almost unclassifiable vibe about them that makes them entertaining and danceable while retaining their musical integrity.â€? We recently had the pleasure of interviewing Honeycut, an episode which will be up in the week before the event.

The Ebb & Flow received much acclaim for their 2005 release Time to Echolocate, which the San Francisco Chronicle ranked as one of the top local releases of 2005. At the benefit, the band will play this album in its entirety for the first and likely last time ever. As the SF Weekly noted, “Part bad attitude soul singer, part sneaky, complicated beat, and part Frank Black gone gentleman, the work of The Ebb and Flow is justly adored. The trio could easily be sent to Sacramento, Santa Cruz, or New York City as SF emissaries, to show how we do it out here.â€? It’s not overstatement to say that The Ebb & Flow rank as one of The Bay Bridged’s favorite bands. Take a listen to our interview with them here.

Opening the show will be Michael Zapruder, a songwriter whose latest release, New Ways of Letting Go, Delusions of Adequacy described as “gorgeous, uplifting, well-wrought, and magical.â€? Said the Gramaphone raved: “I am excited and aesthetically satisfied. Every sound and word is thoughtfully placed, every dynamic shift is carried out with precision, every sentence (both verbal and musical) is phrased significantly. Michael Zapruder is working firmly embedded in the auteurial model of composition and arrangement, and he is a brilliant director.â€? One of Michael Zapruder’s songs was featured in our Monthly Local Mix for November, which you can listen to here.

On January 18th, these bands will join together for a night of music to benefit World Access for the Blind, a non-profit organization that employs unique teaching strategies to help blind and sighted people throughout the world improve their quality of life. Dedicated to the convictions that blind people can learn to see without sight and that sighted people can learn to see better, World Access for the Blind pursues its work through a mixture of educational training programs, public awareness campaigns, and advocacy work. More information about the organization can be found at their web site.

We’re very excited for this event, both for the music and for the cause. Tickets are available on a sliding scale, so whatever amount you can contribute, you’re guaranteed a great night of entertainment. Advance tickets can be purchased at Ticketweb here.

We’ll see you there!

Episode 44: Ten from 2006

 

 Episode 44: Ten from 2006 [41:10m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Welcome back,

As we look back on 2006, we’re astonished by the wealth of great bands we’ve been able to bring you in our features and monthly mixes. This week, we’re presenting a look back at some of our favorite bands that we interviewed this year. If you haven’t heard the episodes featuring any of these bands, we encourage you to check them out:

Starting off the set is a track from Moggs. Justin and Cara were very kind to invite us into their home in Petaluma, where we marveled at their fantastic studio and their awesome dogs. We are excited to be working with them again in the future, a collaboration which we will announce in the coming weeks. Their original episode can be found here.

Dan from Scrabbel was nice enough to not only be one of our first interviewees, but also to allow us to record him playing live in his home. You should definitely hear that track and more from the truly excellent 1909 in the episode here.

Pillows is another band we were fortunate to work with early on. Two Step is another of the year’s great releases and it was great to chat with Jessica and Julie about it. Bill Picture named this episode his “Download of the Week” a few months back. Check it out here.

Giant Haystacks is on the list of bands we drafted up the night we started the show as a “must-interview”. Their records are great but their live show is even better, a concentrated burst of energy and melody that will be hitting Annie’s Social Club on December 30th. You can find their original episode here.

Ex-Boyfriends were part of an experiment that should have been a disaster, a joint interview with Music for Animals and Deb from Playing in Fog. As it stands, it’s probably one of our favorite shows, and is certainly our longest interview to date. Check it out here for an hour of fun and great music.

Although it’s frustrating that The Lonelyhearts have a dual city existence that prevents them from performing together during the school year, it makes us eager for their return. We’re also exicted about their recent signing to Three Ring Records for an album to be released next year. Check out their interview here.

We first saw Finest Dearest play a great set at the Hemlock several months back with Elephone and Empty Rooms. By the time we interviewed them, they had a new 7″ out entitled Off Sides, which can now be purchased at Insound and on iTunes (leaving you no reason not to pick up it up). That interview can be found here.

Sholi is another of our favorite bands blending melody and complexity. The song we’ve included is from their excellent brand new 7″, just released on KDVS Recordings. We’re excited about the full length debut they’ve been working on and are looking forward to working with them again. For now, check out the original episode here.

Social Studies is another band we love both live and on their debut record This is the World’s Biggest Hammer. Every time we see them, their audience seems bigger and more energetic than before, a testament to this band’s ability to win new fans and still entertain the converted. As members of the latter group, you can be assured we’ll be at their next show, headlining this Thursday, December 21st at The Make-Out Room. To hear their interview, click here.

The Dont’s show aired to promote their record release party, which we can happily report was a ton of fun. Although Inner El Camino isn’t available yet in stores, you should pick up a copy from the band here. To hear more of their unique “Kelly Clarkson meets Can” sound (their words, not ours) and the interview that spawned that description, check out that episode here.

We’ve presented these song in the order to encourage you to check out some of our older episodes. This is a great opportunity to catch up because we’re taking our first week off since starting The Bay Bridged in February. Not to worry, though, we’ll be returning with a new episode on Tuesday, January 2nd.

We’d like to close with a big thank you to all of the bands, promoters, managers and fellow journalists we’ve had the pleasure of working with in 2006. Most importantly, though, we’d like to thank all of you for tuning in. We’re fourty-four episodes in and this still feels as fresh and exciting as when we started. We’ve got a number of great features lined up for 2007 and are going to be putting on some fantastic shows in the coming months.

Thanks again for listenting!

Episode 43: The Music Lovers

 

 Episode 43: The Music Lovers [25:52m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Hello,

This week we present the third in our series of “PiFcasts”, our ongoing series spotlighting bands performing in the excellent Playing in Fog Presents series of concerts curated by Deb Zeller from Playing in Fog.

This week, we were fortunate to interview The Music Lovers, whose sophisticated pop sound is wonderfully captured on The Music Lovers’ Guide for Young People, their latest full-length record which was released earlier this year on Le Grand Magistery.

We sat down with Ted and Ping from the band and discussed their progress on a new EP, their love for performing live, and their love for Margaret Cho. These guys are funny and smart and you can tell from the interview that they really enjoy making some truly excellent music. Plus, as a special bonus, we’ve included a newly-recorded song from their upcoming EP along with three tracks from the latest full-length.

More information about The Music Lovers can be found at their web site and MySpace page. You can pick up their records at Le Grand Magistery or on iTunes.

The Music Lovers are headlining the Playing in Fog Holiday Show this Wednesday:

Wednesday, December 13th
The Make-Out Room
9pm, with That Man Fantastic and The Bye Bye Blackbirds

We plan on being there and hope you will join us! Thanks for listening!

Episode 42: The Dont’s

 

 Standard Podcast [29:08m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Welcome!

The Dont’s have been friends of ours for a while now, and we’ve definitely been among the excited looking forward to their brand new CD Inner El Camino. To celebrate the release of the CD this week and the accompanying release show this weekend, we caught up with the guys at The Bay Bridged HQ and talked at length about the making of the CD. The new record is great, bringing to mind some classic pop and rock sounds but updating and integrating them in a unique way–poppy enough that you can dance to it, but with complexity to keep you listening.

We knew things were going to get wacky when we saw that Johnny brought his megaphone, and we think you’ll agree that they did not disappoint. In addition to the discussion, we’ve got four songs from the new CD, including a snippet of the early “improv” version of “BlahBlahBlah” as well as the full final version.

For more information about The Dont’s, head on over to their web site or their MySpace page, where you can hear two additional songs from their new CD. You can purchase Inner El Camino via PayPal by clicking here. You can pick up their last album, Misc Radio Leakage, on iTunes here.

The Dont’s CD release party is this Saturday night:

Saturday, December 9th
New Langton Arts (Folsom between 8th and 9th St)
9pm, $10

Every attendee will recieve a free copy of Inner El Camino at the door. We’ll be there and you should be too!

Thanks for listening!