The AV Club Reviews Secret Tapes N Tapes Show

(via the A.V. Club)

Download: Tapes N Tapes - "Hang Them All"
Download: Vampire Hands - "Wolf Skin Pose" (Live at the 7th Street Entry via Schedule Two)
Download: The Blind Shake - "Calling All Horses"


The fine folk over at the AV Club posted a review a few days ago of the secret Tapes N Tapes show at the Turf Club. Here's what writer Christopher Bahn had to say about the show:

the new Tapes songs are pretty clearly moving somewhat away from the quirky jangliness of The Loon toward a more intense, harder-rocking sound. I'm not sure if that's a good thing; I didn't hear anything that grabbed me with the immediacy of "Insistor" or "Cowbell" from The Loon. But there were still a lot of interesting angles in what I heard, and I'm guessing that hearing the disc itself will bring that out even further; Tapes have always been a better-in-the-studio band for me.

Additionally, Bahn had some kind words for Minneapolis bands VIP and Harems Vampire Hands and The Blind Shake, whom he called his "favorite Minneapolis bands"

Vampire Hands have a heavy psychedelic vibe, a little like Syd Barrett backed by the Stooges, with dual vocalists trading off between a spacey falsetto and a punky rasp, and a pair of drummers that both attack with relentless energy....The Blind Shake are a punk power trio fronted by two brothers, Jim and Mike Blaha. They made a terrific collaborative record with criminally unknown underground guitarist Michael Yonkers last year called Carbohydrates Hydrocarbons. On their own, they create a furious, squalling wall of noise.

Read the rest of the write-up here.

Tapes N Tapes MySpace Page
Vampire Hands MySpace Page
The Blind Shake MySpace Page

(Jonathan Graef)

Surprise! Tapes N' Tapes Tonight at the Turf Club

Download: Tapes N Tapes - "Hang Them All"
Download: Vampire Hands - "Opium Typhoon"
Download: The Blind Shake - "Midnight Scream"


Tapes N Tapes sent this email out to their newsletter subscribers fifteen minutes ago, literally. It's a surprise show at the Turf Club!

Here be the details:

that's right kids, we're playing a show tonight (thursday 2/21) @ the turf club in st. paul. we can't tell you how excited we are. it's true that we're always talking about how excited we are about things, but we're REALLY excited about this show. it's with two of our favorite MSP bands, vampire hands and blind shake. and it's gonna rule! we hope you can come on down. we're gonna be playing all of "walk it off" (minus one song), and just straight rock-rock-rawkin!
be there or be square,
tapes 'n tapes

show details:
where: turf club, st paul, mn
when: tonight, 9pm
who: 21+
with:vampire hands and blind shake
how much: $5

I would assume that tickets are first come, first serve, so get there ASAP! Opening are Vampire Hands and Blind Shake, both of whom put on a raucous live show. This should be an excellent rawk show.

Tapes N Tapes MySpace Page
Vampire Hands MySpace Page
The Blind Shake MySpace Page

The Blind Shake - Carmel

Download: The Blind Shake - "Midnight Scream"
Download: The Blind Shake - "Jolly Joes"

The Blind Shake
Carmel (Learning Curve Records, 2007)
Grade: B

It has to be awfully hard for musicians who play in a rawk-ously loud garage rock band to live in Minnesota, a state that has a catchphrase named after its renowned friendliness. After all, I don't think Ole and Edna would have approved of Dave Pirner yelling "fuck you" at Officer Friendly during the beginning of "Kids Don't Follow". But the members of The Blind Shake sure do make a convincing case for Minneapolis as a proto-punk town by unleashing a dirty-dozen number of fuzzed-out songs, all of which reside at the six-cornered intersection of Mudhoney, The Stooges and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

While TBS don't reach the transcendently sleazy heights of "Touch Me I'm Sick" or "Black Tongue", they, as a group, do a solid job of convincing the listener that Minneapolis is a scuzzier place than the Lutherans swimming in 10,000 lakes would have you believe. Tracks like "Been Young" and "Midnight Scream" explode with the kind of kinetic energy that can only come from a damp, crowded basement show or your parents' garage.

However, the songs on Carmel start to take on the same monolithic quality and listening to them all in a row becomes an slight exercise in monotony. The key word, though, is slight, because monotony is not that big of a problem when your average song length is two minutes long. Still, variety is the spice of life and while parts of Carmel are muy caliente, (especially the first few songs) toward the last few songs, the record becomes un poco frio. Doublestop bends and string scrapes are awesome for a while, but good things can become stale. However, at the end of 24 minutes of blistering, balls-out MPLS garage-rock, the listener may be simply too stunned to care. From now on, that state-of-mind could be referred to as having the blind shakes.

MySpace Page

(Jonathan Graef)

CD Release Party: The Blind Shake At The Turf Club

Download: The Blind Shake - "Jolly Joes"

The Blind Shake have their record release tonight at the Turf Club. Their album is called Caramel and you can read an review of it over at City Pages. Listen to a song at the top of the post. Show is 21+ and starts at 9 p.m.

MySpace Page

(Jonathan Graef)