WHY?
Serengeti, Doseone
Fri, September 14, 2012
Doors: 8:00 pm / Show: 8:30 pm
Union Transfer
Philadelphia, PA
$15.00
Tickets
This event is all ages
http://www.utphilly.com/event/137735/
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WHY?
WHY? is a trio of handsome Cincinnati-born men who fiddle with skins, strings, bells and microphones and present their findings to the listening public. Singer Yoni Wolf grew up the second son to an art book editor and a rabbi. He got his start recording bad poems and sloppy beats on the family synagogue's 4-track. In junior high he discovered hip-hop. At art school, he learned how to drop out. Yoni's brother Josiah played drums at Rabbi Wolf's worship service as a kid, became a band geek as a teen, and fell in love with Thelonious Monk on his way to study music at University of Cincinnati. Doug McDiarmid would eventually get expelled from that same school for carrying a stun gun, but first he was raised by two French teachers and taught piano while in kindergarten. He also went to high school with the Wolfs, where he played in Steve Miller cover bands.
In various permutations together and with other now-notables (i.e. Doseone, Odd Nosdam, Mr. Dibbs, Atmosphere's Slug), these three created and/or contributed to several freewheeling rap and lo-fi rock-related projects including Greenthink, Miss Ohio's Nameless, Reaching Quiet, and the seminal cLOUDDEAD outfit. Their wildest dreams were achieved when they relocated to Oakland to make pop-inflected psychedelic folk-hop.
For four years, two EPs and 2003's cult classic LP, Oaklandazulasylum, WHY? comprised Yoni Wolf alone. He honed his trademark delivery – a sickly sweet, half-rapped, singsong style – shined up his wry, picturesque poetry, and developed a clip-and-collage aesthetic using keyboards, toys, guitars, samplers and anything worth banging on. When Doug and Josiah moved west to join Yoni, they brought with them a hoard of instruments and the ability to wail on every last one. By chops and imagination, WHY? grew into a thing of flesh, bones and fully fledged songs, resulting in 2005's Elephant Eyelash album. Critics swooned; ladies lauded; WHY? neither resisted nor rested. They toured – with Silver Jews, Yo La Tengo, and Islands. They collaborated – with Danielson Family, Department Of Eagles, and Subtle (Yoni also recorded with Fog's Andrew Broder as "Hymie's Basement"). They put out yet more
music.
The brand new album Eskimo Snow is something of a companion piece to last year's celebrated Alopecia LP. In February of 2007, the WHY? trio temporarily relocated to Minneapolis and officially inducted Fog players Andrew Broder and Mark Erickson. Recording live as a five-piece, WHY? created two distinct albums from those sessions:
Alopecia, with its taut rhythms and biting wit, and Eskimo Snow, a shadowy and sprawling set that finds Yoni resigned to and ever-awed by those infinite erring bits of existence that make WHY? what it is.
In various permutations together and with other now-notables (i.e. Doseone, Odd Nosdam, Mr. Dibbs, Atmosphere's Slug), these three created and/or contributed to several freewheeling rap and lo-fi rock-related projects including Greenthink, Miss Ohio's Nameless, Reaching Quiet, and the seminal cLOUDDEAD outfit. Their wildest dreams were achieved when they relocated to Oakland to make pop-inflected psychedelic folk-hop.
For four years, two EPs and 2003's cult classic LP, Oaklandazulasylum, WHY? comprised Yoni Wolf alone. He honed his trademark delivery – a sickly sweet, half-rapped, singsong style – shined up his wry, picturesque poetry, and developed a clip-and-collage aesthetic using keyboards, toys, guitars, samplers and anything worth banging on. When Doug and Josiah moved west to join Yoni, they brought with them a hoard of instruments and the ability to wail on every last one. By chops and imagination, WHY? grew into a thing of flesh, bones and fully fledged songs, resulting in 2005's Elephant Eyelash album. Critics swooned; ladies lauded; WHY? neither resisted nor rested. They toured – with Silver Jews, Yo La Tengo, and Islands. They collaborated – with Danielson Family, Department Of Eagles, and Subtle (Yoni also recorded with Fog's Andrew Broder as "Hymie's Basement"). They put out yet more
music.
The brand new album Eskimo Snow is something of a companion piece to last year's celebrated Alopecia LP. In February of 2007, the WHY? trio temporarily relocated to Minneapolis and officially inducted Fog players Andrew Broder and Mark Erickson. Recording live as a five-piece, WHY? created two distinct albums from those sessions:
Alopecia, with its taut rhythms and biting wit, and Eskimo Snow, a shadowy and sprawling set that finds Yoni resigned to and ever-awed by those infinite erring bits of existence that make WHY? what it is.
Serengeti
If the voices on Serengeti's songs often sound like they don't belong to a rapper, that's the idea. More than any MC working, Serengeti (born David Cohn) writes story songs, in which he assumes the identities of the characters he creates. Sometimes these characters recur — like Kenny, the middle-aged sports enthusiast and rabid Brian Dennehy fan, whom Serengeti dreamed up on his 2006 album, Dennehy.
On the new Family & Friends, however, almost every song introduces a new character. Serengeti's voice doesn't vary as dramatically on this album as it did on Dennehy, save for the prissy affect of the self-reinventing fool who narrates "California." But his normal delivery has its own quirks: It can be discursive and mumbly or clear and quick, as in "The Whip," which chronicles the life of a mixed martial arts fighter.
Serengeti's "Family and Friends" juxtaposes a humble but idyllic vision of family with a haunting chorus.
Song Of The Day
Serengeti: On Fantasy And 'Family' Matters
Serengeti has more talent than success, as well as more than a dozen albums to his name. Several of these are quite obscure, and most are typical underground hip-hop — more complex and drawn-out than Family & Friends, which squeezes 11 songs into just 31 minutes. The new album's title is thematic: Just about every song here concerns intimate personal relationships. Half excavate ruined marriages, and the most troubling, "Long Ears," describes the return of an absentee dad.
There's an accrued melancholy about Family & Friends that reflects both the economic downturn and the long slog of a marginal artist who's just turned 35. It's poignant that way. But one reason it's poignant is that it also has its silly side. - NPR
On the new Family & Friends, however, almost every song introduces a new character. Serengeti's voice doesn't vary as dramatically on this album as it did on Dennehy, save for the prissy affect of the self-reinventing fool who narrates "California." But his normal delivery has its own quirks: It can be discursive and mumbly or clear and quick, as in "The Whip," which chronicles the life of a mixed martial arts fighter.
Serengeti's "Family and Friends" juxtaposes a humble but idyllic vision of family with a haunting chorus.
Song Of The Day
Serengeti: On Fantasy And 'Family' Matters
Serengeti has more talent than success, as well as more than a dozen albums to his name. Several of these are quite obscure, and most are typical underground hip-hop — more complex and drawn-out than Family & Friends, which squeezes 11 songs into just 31 minutes. The new album's title is thematic: Just about every song here concerns intimate personal relationships. Half excavate ruined marriages, and the most troubling, "Long Ears," describes the return of an absentee dad.
There's an accrued melancholy about Family & Friends that reflects both the economic downturn and the long slog of a marginal artist who's just turned 35. It's poignant that way. But one reason it's poignant is that it also has its silly side. - NPR
Doseone
Doseone (born Adam Drucker) is American rapper, producer, poet and artist. He is a co-founder of indie hip hop record label Anticon. He has also been a member of numerous groups including Deep Puddle Dynamics, Greenthink, Clouddead, Themselves, Subtle and 13 & God.
Venue Information:
Union Transfer
1024 Spring Garden St.
Philadelphia, PA, 19123
Union Transfer
1024 Spring Garden St.
Philadelphia, PA, 19123
