Halloween falls on a Friday this year, and while there’s always a lot to do in and around Buffalo for the holiday, if you’re looking for great music and someplace to dance, LiFT Nightclub has you covered. The club is throwing a party late Friday night called Nightmare on Franklin Street and will feature Switzerland-based DJ/Producer EDX.
Since August, the DJ has been everywhere from Ibiza, Spain to Mumbai, India, both coasts of the US, and everything in between. The world traveler has been making a name for himself to say the least. If you need proof, look no further than who he’s worked with, including names like Deadmas5, Armin Van Buuren, Axwell and Benny Benassi among many others. If you haven’t caught him on tour or at one of the many festivals he’s played, this is your chance. The Swiss DJ doesn’t come around often and his shows are only getting better.
LiFT’s first show last week was a great kick off and the club is definitely something to check out if you still haven’t been there. Opening the night will be local acts Jesse Aaron and Swagglerock. With things kicking off around 10pm and going through the night, I recommend you get there early and take part in what’s sure to be a solid Halloween in Buffalo. As always, the club recommends to “Dress to impress. Dress to dance,” so don’t worry about a costume if you don’t have one, but certainly wear one if you’d like.
Grab your tickets ahead of time here or at the door.
The leaves are changing, the temperatures are just starting to fall, and if the color of the foliage is any indicator, Halloween is upon us. As any music fan will tell you, the holiday seems to bring out the weird in bands as antics around the industry are aplenty. This year, Halloween in Buffalo is shaping up nicely with no snow (always a plus here) and two incredible bands coming to town to share a bill at Waiting Room downtown, Turkuaz and Jimkata.
Kicking the night off is none other than Turkuaz, the funk army who call New York City home. The nine-piece band was last in the area for Night Lights Music Festival back in September and they tore the place up with their catchy melodies and powerful sound. The band has a Buffalo tie-in as their drummer Michelangelo Carubba is a fellow graduate of St. Joe’s High School and grew up in the area. Turkuaz also just wrapped up recording a new album that is due out sometime next year which has fans excited for new material. I got a chance to catch up with the band at Night Lights for an interview and they hinted at what types of shenanigans they might be pulling for the show this week. Check out the video by our friends at Buffalo.fm
Co-headlining the night will be Ithaca’s Jimkata who bring an indie spin to electronic rock. The band is a favorite all over Upstate New York and should draw a solid crowd on Friday. The band was also at Night Lights and their headlining set there was one of the favorites from the weekend. Their latest album, Feel in Light, came out earlier this year and the band is currently touring throughout the fall season in support of it. Upon reaching out to Evan Friedell, the lead singer of the band, in regards to what to expect, the frontman didn’t tip his hand, but he did mention that they always plan surprises and try to make the Halloween show something special.
Between these two heavy hitters and all of the antics we’re sure to see, there’s only one thing you have to make sure you grab for an incredible Halloween night and it’s right here.
In the Northeast the festival scene has wound down. With the harvest festivals come and gone, concerts have moved indoors and pumpkin is in everything. However, a different breed of festival goer and live music freak is gearing up for one of the most anticipated Halloween festivals of the year, Hulaween!
This Halloween weekend marks the sophomore return of Hulaween. With headliner, The String Cheese Incident, playing three sets over the weekend they are joined by Big Gigantic, Thievery Corporation, EOTO, Beats Antique, the New Deal, Joe Russo’s Almost Dead, Conspirator and many more! There is even a Thursday night pre party with Electron and Particle!! See the schedule here.
Adjacent to the Black River, Spirit of the Suwanee music park in Live Oak, Florida hosts many festivals a year. A magical place it boasts a riverfront beach, canoe rentals, rope swing/cliff jumping, lots of places to put hammocks, as well as cabin rental upgrades. Though sometimes chilly at night in the northern Florida region this time of year, campfires are allowed in the primitive campsites so making lasting memories around the fire is common.
In addition to music, there is a psychedelic Burning Man inspired art installation curated by art director Andy Carroll planned on the festival grounds. Costumes are encouraged and will be judged in a contest for those inclined to dress up! Hulaween is sure to be quite the spectacle!
Béla Fleck and Abigail Washburn arent just virtuoso banjo players – they’re also husband and wife. Together, Fleck and Washburn employ the relatively rare 3-finger and clawhammer banjo duet to create an explosion of musical white heat. Add in Washburn’s voice and you have a night of musical magic waiting for you at Troy Savings Bank Music Hall on Friday, October 24.
These two banjoists have mastered the deceptively intricate art of the duet. Their performances embrace a diversity almost unthinkable – coming from just two banjos and one voice. Washburn’s beguiling composing, playing and singing blend with Fleck’s riveting and virtuosic musicianship to create music both unique yet familiar in texture.
Fleck is a 15-time Grammy winner who has collaborated with Chick Corea, Oumou Sangare, Zakir Hussain, Edgar Meyer, Dave Mathews, Earl Scruggs, and the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra for his Banjo Concert ‘The Impostor’. Washburn’s banjo has taken her far beyond the usual old-timey comfort zone, musically and geographically. An alumnus of Uncle Earl, the powerhouse all-female stringband, Abby’s adopted second homeland is China, and her music resounds with echoes of Appalachia and the tidal wave of emerging Chinese cultural influence.
Tickets for Béla Fleck and Abigail Washburn at Troy Savings Bank Music Hall are $25-42 and can be purchased at the box office or online.
Coming to BSP in Uptown Kingston, NY are three bands that have been turning heads all over the country and the world for one night only. White Fence released For the Recently Found Innocent this past July and have garnered nothing but raves reviews Tim Presley, who records under the name, has used a lo-fi and psychedelic sound throughout his career to weave in and out of the listeners ears. This latest record sees him re-team with Ty Segall to produce a beautiful set of elaborately crafted songs, harmony vocalizations and trippin’ guitar tones that conjure a fantasy about reality.
Joining White Fence will be Austrlia’s own King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard. These psychedelic garage rockers have also been receiving high praise from the music community and as of this month have released seven albums in three years. The prolific seven piece band were brought together through living in a share house and their mutual love for Pavement and Three Oh Sees. Each album the band has released has increased their psychedelic prowess and have given them an opportunity to reach more people. They have been dubbed a tour de force of reverberated rock ‘n’ roll and these guys and they deliver to a tee at their shows.
Opening the show is Juan Wauters who released his debut album N.A.P, North American Poetry and dreamed big throughout the album. He came to New York to live with his father and they worked in factories together to bring the rest of the family to New York. Juan’s lyrics have continuously looked to take dreams and turn them into reality. With a various cast of musicians and a great light show live, he should be a great start to the show.
The show starts 9 PM sharp and only costs $12 in advance and $15 at the door. Tickets can be bought now here. Don’t miss out on the psychedelic rock that is going to take over BSP this Thursday. It won’t be long until all three of these bands outgrow a venue as small as BSP.
If you have yet to hear the collective talent from the funkiest group in the world, you’re sadly missing out. Although they’ve been around now for damn near twenty years, Lettuce is that elusive band that once you hear, you don’t know how you’ve lived without. Everything from their extremely tight and infectious rhythms thrown down by drummer Adam Deitch and bassist Jesus Coomes, to the offset melodies that just reek of funky hooks is what makes this band so dope. No matter where you look, there’s a diverse mix of talent who all bring their own flavor to their otherwise flavorless name. Maybe that’s part of the thing that gets people. With a somewhat unsuspecting name, you’re instantly gripped by the music that just feels so right.
This Thursday, Lettuce is making their way to the area as they make a stop at Water Street Music Hall in Rochester. The band played Buffalo earlier this year in February, and for the sold out crowd that was present, there wasn’t a still body in the place. From wall to wall, the band seduced the audience through nothing but sound and their feel-good energy.
The band began their fall tour at the beginning of October and over the course of the last couple of weeks has excited their devoted fans as they’re feeding off of the energy and excitement of playing some new music. Their last record, Fly, was released back in 2012, and to say people are eager to hear something new from this group would be an understatement. Already, the band has played at least three new songs on this tour, so fans should expect something they’ve yet to hear. The band is locking in and the new material has provided fuel to this funky fire. If you’ve been following their live journal, you know the guys are feeling it with segments like the following:
Schmeeans (guitar): We came, we saw, we raged. And we had a great show, we played a brand new song for the very first time tonight, never ever done before, can’t ever be the first time again. Only one first time baby.
Neal (keyboard/organ): The coolest thing about tonight is if you’re in Baton Rouge tonight and you witness this show with Lettuce and Gramatik at The Varsity, we are dropping brand new music that’s never been heard, and I think people are gonna bug out cause we’re bugging out. We’re having such a great time and this is only day three. This is gonna be an incredible tour.
Deitch (drums): Tonight in Tuscaloosa was off the chain. We added a new song that we’re calling for now “The Big Anthem,” and it felt really big and powerful for the first time, we’re really excited to have added that. And then we played another song that Shmeeans and I wrote in Harlem entitled “Chief,” played that again and it was even better tonight. The new songs are infusing a lot of energy into our sets, and when we’re excited you know the crowd’s gonna be excited, so we feel like they got it tonight.
Want to know how fresh this material is? Check out Krasno’s log in the diary about a new song he heard a day prior to playing:
Krasno (guitar): It’s always fun to play new stuff super fresh, its way fresh for me because I didn’t play it till today pretty much.
Casual fan or dedicated one, there’s no reason why this tour specifically isn’t one of the most exciting the band has ever been on and luckily Rochester’s in their sights. Their Emo’s show in Austin, TX last week was streamed, and while it was choppy, the new music was somehow crisp and full of that typical Lettuce RAGE. If you don’t have your ticket yet, you’re going to want to grab one quickly here.
Capital Region, consider this your “Courtesy Call.” Get ready to throw up your “Rawkfist” Upstate N.Y. Thousand Foot Krutch is bringing their fall “Born This Way” tour to the Capital Region. The tour was named after the lead single off their brand new eighth studio album OXYGEN : INHALE. Supporting acts for the 19-date tour will be We As Human, Righteous Vendetta, and in select cities, Like A Storm.
TFK was formed in Canada in 1995. The band started seeing success in 2002 with the current lineup of Trevor McNaven, Joel Bruyere and Steve Augustine. Country megastar Carrie Underwood is a huge fan and performed the song “Let the Sparks Fly” live on stage with the boys at Winter Jam in Tulsa, Oklahoma. TFK has toured with many big names in rock music such as Breaking Benjamin, Skillet, Red and Chevelle.
The band’s sound is a fusion of Christian Rock meets Rap Metal, mixing melodic and high energy songs with slick verses and very catchy choruses and hooks.
TFK with Carrie Underwood
Ready to “Strike Back” and help support the tour is Memphis, Tennessee’s We As Human. The band has been touring relentlessly all year and it looks like they are not ready to stop yet. The band has recently toured with Black Stone Cherry and were part of Rock On The Range, K-Rockathon, Rocklahoma and were also on last years Carnival Of Madness.
Righteous Vendetta will bring “The Fire Inside” every venue on the tour. After Vendetta’s song “This Pain” was played on Sirius/XM Octane, the Wyoming natives have hit a lot of rock music fans radars and have also appeared on numerous tours. They’re an awesome up and coming rock band.
Clifton Park you better “Move” and get your tickets before everything “Falls Apart“. TFK will make their rare appearance in the area on Wednesday Oct. 22 at Upstate Concert Hall. Doors open at 7pm and show starts at 8pm. Advanced tickets are $17 and $20 day of show. You can purchase tickets at all Ticketmaster locations, the club box office 371-0012 and Northern Lights Smoke Shop.
Rochester will also see the tour on Tuesday Oct. 21 at The California Brew Haus. Tickets for this show can be purchased through ticketfly for $20. The event is 18 and older.
Every rocker/ninja’s favorite band, Kung Fu, kicks off its fall tour this weekend and Upstate New York gets two of the first three shows.
The Fu will provide musical therapy to Baltimore, whose Orioles just fell a step short of the World Series, on Thursday night. Friday, Kung Fu brings their high-octane funk fusion to Syracuse’s Westcott Theater before wrapping up the weekend at The Hollow in Albany on Saturday.
Like every great funk outfit, the band has a bassist, Chris DeAngelis, who will send vibrations through your bones and shake up your soul. Each show gets more than slightly Stoop-ed as Todd Stoops handles the keys and Robert Somerville will be center stage crushing the tenor sax. Adrian Tramontano is absurdly relentless on the drums and Tim Palmieri, who just added a newborn ninja to his family last week, rounds out the band on guitar.
If you’re not following Kung Fu on Facebook yet, you’re missing out. Earlier this week, the band offered free tickets and 10% commission to volunteers for manning its merch booth all weekend. Wednesday, Stoops took to the social media site to give away free tickets to anyone who asked — no contest or duties involved.
For more information or to check out Kung Fu’s new album, Tsar Bomba, visit the band’s website.
Tickets to Syracuse’s show can be purchased here. Click here to purchase Albany tickets.
And in case you can’t catch them this weekend in Syracuse or Albany, the band is heading to Western New York later in the tour for a stop in Buffalo on Nov. 13. Click here for tickets to their show at The Waiting Room.
Southern rockers Drive By Truckers will perform at The Egg Performing Arts Center on Sunday, October 19th at 7:30 PM as part of the American Roots & Branches concert series.
Drive by Truckers boast a mix of Southern pride, history, folklore, politics, and character studies and have quickly risen to become one of today foremost alternative country-rock bands. This will be their debut performance at The Egg in support of their new, critically acclaimed recording English Oceans. Read a review of Drive by Truckers’ latest album English Oceans by Garrett K. Woodward.
Tickets are $29.50 and are available at The Egg Box Office at the Empire State Plaza, by telephone – 518-473-1845 – or online.
Drive by Truckers start things off in NYC at the famous Beacon Theater on Friday, then head to the Electric Factory in Philadelphia this Saturday before making their way north to the Capital Region. For the full tour schedule, check out the bands website.
Pink Talking Fish, a hybrid of jamband members performing music from Pink Floyd, Talking Heads and Phish, will debut a new concept show in New York City on Saturday, October 18 at The Cutting Room. The band will perform the classic Pink Floyd album Dark Side Of The Moon in its entirety, while intertwining songs from Phish and The Talking Heads throughout the album tracks.
In addition to a a Dark Side of the Moon set, an extended encore of classic Pink Talking Fish combinations will be performed amid a light show and special guest appearances. Commemorative poster art by Stephen Gunn will be available, with 50 of the limited edition of 100 available to those who purchase advance tickets. Show starts at 10:30 pm, 21+ and tickets are $12 in advance, $15 day of show.
We will be giving away Two Tickets to this Pink Talking Fish show – all you have to do is share this link on Facebook or Twitter, or comment below with a combination of Talking Heads, Pink Floyd, Phish songs that you would love to see performed by Pink Talking Fish! Pink Talking Fish on Twitter | Facebook | Instagram