In the world of classic rock, there’s a lot of love for the Young Dubliners. One reason perhaps is Keith Roberts, who co-founded the band with a fellow Irishman in the early ’90s, grew up watching Top of the Pops, and decided that home country bands like Big Country and Boomtown Rats were more interesting to him than traditional Celtic reels.
The biggest factor, though, is the number of rock stars who love them.
After Bernie Taupin watched the Young Dubs (what most fans call them) light up L.A.’s House of Blues in the late 1990s, he gifted them with the lyrics to “Red.” It became the title track of a 2000 album, one of their best. However, a certain Sir Elton almost kept that from happening.
Roberts wrote the music quickly, and Taupin loved it, Roberts recalled by phone recently. “Then right as it was recorded and ready to go, Elton suddenly tells Bernie, ‘I’m working on something for that song.’ Bernie said, ‘no you’re not, Elton. I’ve given it to the boys.’ I always joke about how I’ve never met Elton John, but I’ve [screwed] with him.”
Red was helped by a tour opening for Jethro Tull, during which Tull’s front man found ways to make every press avail about the Young Dubliners. “That album blew up massively because of Ian Anderson talking about it, and everything he did. Every interview, he would make me come in and do all the media stuff.”
They’ve toured with a bevy of bands over the years.
“We just became friends with these people,” Roberts said. “Following an appearance at the Deadwood Jam in the Black Mountain Hills of South Dakota, Ed Roland of Collective Soul recruited him for a night of partying, along with Spin Doctors lead singer Chris Barron.
“Ed said to me in his southern drawl, ‘I hear you like to drink whiskey.’ I said, ‘I’ve been known to,’ and he’s like, ‘Well, why don’t we go do that?’” They headed into the Deadwood Saloon. “The girl just kept putting bottles of Jameson on the table, and we just kept going.”
The next night, Collective Soul’s road manager asked Roberts, “‘Would it be OK if I didn’t take Ed out again?,’ because he was hurting pretty bad. I’m like, oh, crap, really? Then I’m doing it again.”
In August, they will join On the Blue, a cruise hosted by the Moody Blues’ Justin Hayward, with acts like Alan Parsons, Dave Mason, Starship with Mickey Thomas and more. This year’s cruise originates in Boston; because of the city’s Irish heritage, the Young Dubliners will play the ship away from the dock and off to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.
So, more than six decades down the road, this affinity for the Young Dubs’ anthem-y Celtic rock endures. This may seem at odds with their name. However, they didn’t choose it; it chose them. Roberts moved to Southern California with hopes of becoming a rock journalist, but ended up opening a pub and starting a band instead.
“Me and Paul O’Toole, who started the band, he was from Dublin and I was from Dublin, and people would say, oh, the young lads from Dublin are playing,” Roberts recalled. “They started making backdrops from sheets that they just spray-painted Young Dubliners on.”
They never dreamed of getting a record deal, but when it happened they had to agree on the fan-bestowed moniker, which needed to be cleared by Ronnie Drew, leader of The Dubliners in Ireland and a family friend. “I had to call him and ask him, was it all right, because the label wouldn’t let me change the … name.”
They received his blessings — “Keep the faith,” he said — and later got an even more satisfying validation.
“When my dad passed away, at the funeral, they took a picture of me and my brother and Ronnie Drew,” he said,. It was printed in the local paper. “It said, ‘Old Dubliner and Young Dubliner say goodbye to Charlie.’ It was the biggest gift you could give me, because that made the Irish accept the name.”
Young Dubliners When: Sunday, March 30, 7 p.m. Where: Tupelo Music Hall, 10 A St., Derry Tickets: $35 and up at tupelohall.com
A woman’s beautiful family life falls apart when her husband is disappeared by the Brazilian government in I’m Still Here, the Oscar-winning adaptation of the true story of Rubens and Eunice Paiva in 1970s Brazil.
Rubens (Selton Mello) was once a congressman but is now an engineer living with his wife, Eunice (Fernanda Torres), and their five children in Rio de Janeiro in a lovely house by a lovely beach. Like, it is all so lovely and sunny and early 1970s beautiful — from the cars to the clothes to the luminous Torres. Her happy children run around like kids on vacation — teen daughters Vera (Valentina Herszage), Eliana (Luiza Kosovski) and Nalu (Barbara Luz) are all about music and records, younger kids Marcelo (Guilherme Silveira) and Babiu (Cora Mora) are all about a small shaggy dog they find on the beach and make the family pet, naming him after Vera’s shaggy-haired boyfriend. But like storm clouds on the horizon of a perfect beach day, the heavy-handed presence of the dictatorship government is everywhere along the edges of their lives. The news is full of talk of abducted ambassadors, military trucks full of troops roll down city streets and Vera and her friends are stopped on the way home from a movie by a checkpoint looking for “terrorists,” a label which seems to indicate anyone with disagreements with the government. We see Rubens accept and hand off envelopes and talk with his friends who seem to be politically aligned with his anti-dictatorship views but the only people in this circle who seem worried are a bookshop-owning family who have decided to move to London and offer to take Vera with them, which Rubens and Eunice agree to.
Rubens and Eunice are just enjoying an afternoon together — playing backgammon, smoking cigarettes in a way that makes even a non-smoker want a drag — when armed men show up. There are no warrants, no papers, no uniforms, just guys with guns saying Rubens has to come with them to give some kind of testimony. He tells Eunice not to worry, that he will be back before dinner, and gets into his car with one of the men. Several of the men stay at their house, searching Rubens’ office and just generally being menacing. Eunice tries to keep things normal for the younger children and sends one of the kids off to spend the night with her friend. But she can’t entirely hide her fear from 15-year-old Eliana, especially when after about a day, the men say Eunice and Eliana need to come with them.
Eunice spends a harrowing 12 days in a jail, seemingly run by the military, being asked about random friends and acquaintences, terrified for her daughter and her husband. Torres does an excellent job of making the Euince who returns home after being released a completely different person than the one who left — her easy smile is gone, the light in her face is replaced by tenseness. It’s a magnificent performance — would I place it above Demi Moore’s The Substance performance, one of the performances nominated along with Torres’ for Lead Actress at the recent Oscars? Maybe not, but I do think I’d rank it higher than winner Mikey Madison. (I’m Still Here did take home an Oscar for Best International Feature Film.)
It’s hard not to weigh the movie against the other Best Picture nominees — it would definitely be in my top three of those 10 films. The movie does an excellent job of juxtaposing the normalness of life — even in a dictatorship kids still adopt stray dogs, families still eat ice cream, the beach is still a mini vacation — with the psychological destruction of Rubens’ absence. It’s not just that he’s arrested, he is thoroughly disappeared, removed from existence by the blank wall of an unaccountable government. They won’t even admit that he was arrested or what happened to him. Eunice initially can’t access any of his/their money because he doesn’t exist even on a death certificate that would make her a widow. The movie shows how a country doesn’t literally need to be at war for existence to become terrifying. A Available for rent or purchase.
Black Bag (R)
Married British spies get tangled up in the sale of state secrets in Black Bag, a well-paced mystery from director Steven Soderbergh.
George Woodhouse (Michael Fasbender) is tasked with finding the fellow spy who sold a thing to the Russians (the thing is a device that causes a meltdown of a nuclear plant). The suspects are friends and colleagues — and his wife, who is also a spy, Kathryn St. Jean (Cate Blanchett). He invites the other suspects to dinner: friend/co-worker Freddie (Tom Burke); Freddie’s too-young girlfriend/fellow agent Clarissa (Marisa Abela); James (Regé-Jean Page), who George recently promoted above Freddie, and Zoe (Naomie Harris), James’ girlfriend and a staff therapist who professionally treats/oversees all the suspects. At George’s dinner, a dish dosed to lower inhibitions results in fights all around but doesn’t leave George with a clear answer. As he watches the repercussions of the dinner’s conversations play out, the clues start to point to Kathryn’s involvement. George is such a straight shooter that he once brought down his own father, but what will he do if Kathryn is the one who is in trouble?
Black Bag is solidly acted, coolly funny and wonderfully brisk. For me, there is a sparkle that this talented cast suggested but that the movie didn’t fully deliver on. But this doesn’t make this any less a solid, quietly fun adult thriller. B In theaters.
Snow White (PG)
Disney tries to make a plucky modern hero out of the OG “Some Day My Prince Will Come” Princess in Snow White, a weird mess of an unnecessary live action adaptation of the 1937 animated movie.
First, let’s jump back to the 1937 source material, which I definitely saw years ago but only vaguely remembered as a tale where the heroine’s inciting event is that she’s discovered to be too pretty and her special skill is tidying up. I rewatched it after seeing this new Snow White and it is not quite what I remembered. Animated Snow White, who reads as sort of Clara Bow plus Shirley Temple, and her Prince Charming (we call him that but he doesn’t actually have a name) and the Evil Queen are wafer thin characters presented in a high melodrama. Snow White and the prince meet while singing and decide they are in True Love, a fact that then doesn’t really matter for the story again until the movie’s final moments. Snow White is nearly killed by the Huntsman, who was ordered by the queen to cut out her heart because the queen was jealous of Snow’s beauty, but he tells her to flee instead, and then she runs off into the forest in a panic. You can see in this story the scaffolding on which 2007’s Enchanted built its fairy tale riff — and actually that movie serves as a pretty good live action take on the Snow White story.
But back in 1937, all of this romance-and-jealousy stuff is just setup for what serves as the true heart of the animated movie, which is Looney Tunes-esque woodland animal hijinks and Three Stooges/Oliver & Hardy-ish wackiness of the seven short miners that Snow White encounters when she invites herself into their cottage in the woods. Their vibe is very much “grizzled prospector” and/or less-malevolent Elmer Fudd. Bigger chunks of the movie than I expected are about them Stooge-ily trying to sneak in the house to figure out who is inside or goofing at an outdoor wash bin, doing silly bits with bubbles.
The Snow White of it all — with the red hair band and the weird dress and the getting squirrels to help her do chores — has stuck around through the decades because she’s the central image of the movie and because she’s the most merch-able element (little princess-phase girls still dress up as her) but she’s rather incidental to most of the fun stuff in that movie. The 1937 movie’s whole vibe is very of its time — it’s a fascinating watch for the visuals and the style of comedy but I don’t see why anyone would really want to remake it (other than whole IP machine, of course).
Back to the new live-action movie: here, we get a whole backstory about Snow White (Rachel Zegler), the princess born during a blizzard, hence the name, and beloved child of two benevolent rulers of a happy kingdom. But then, in the grand Disney tradition, good Queen Snow White’s Mom (Lorena Andrea) dies and King Snow White’s Dad (Hadley Fraser) is enchanted with the beautiful, minor-magic-having lady Evil Queen (Gal Gadot). They marry, she convinces him to go fight the Southern Kingdom and then the Evil Queen becomes a dictator who rules by fear and makes bakers and farmers serve as soldiers. Snow White is forced to be her servant for no particular reason, and is also afraid (of the Queen? I think?) and just sort of mopes around feeling bad about the situation.
No handsome prince here, instead she meets a floppy-haired cute guy, Jonathan (Andrew Burnap), stealing potatoes to help feed his merry band of Robin-Hood-esque thieves — but like half-hearted thieves. Did the movie say they were once a theater troupe? Because I was getting real “pop-up production of Midsummer Night’s Dream” vibes off of them.
Once again, the Magic Mirror (voice of Patrick Page) tells the Evil Queen that she is the fairest of them all — which, how is a magical object who can only do that one thing (as the movie specifies) useful? He is basically a yes-man who only gives her the positive poll numbers, until one day he tells her that Snow White is fairer. But in this movie “fair” can mean both “kind and just” and “beautiful” and it seems like Snow White is defined as the first and the Evil Queen is only concerned with the second and what even is the conflict here? But anyway, off to the woods and the woodland creatures and, eventually, the seven dwarfs who are here the most oddly rendered CGI approximations of the animated characters. The slapstick is very secondary to the central story of Snow White, learning to stand in her power or whatever and rescue her kingdom from the tyranny of the Evil Queen who doesn’t seem to have much of a plan beyond “wear pointy jewels and try to be a sassy bad-ass.”
Gal Gadot can’t quite make her villainy fun or interesting. She is no Cate Blanchett, who was such a delicious evil stepmother in the live-action Cinderella, all Bette Davis snarls to accompany her on-point lewks. Gadot’s performance is only wardrobe, and while the wardrobe is nice it’s not enough to carry her through.
Zegler brings something more to Snow White, even if her conflict isn’t well-defined and her character’s motivations and abilities are sort of hazy. Having the seven dwarfs be otherworldly animated beings prevents them from having real personalities or from one really being the strong, comic-relief supporting character this movie probably needed.
Probably because the Snow White story was so thinly drawn in the first movie, this movie brings a lot of ideas to what’s going on and who these people are. But I feel like they’re mostly half-formed ideas. There is a lot of “to what end?” to all of the Evil Queen’s motivations that make her a mess of a character on top of Gadot’s nothing performance. Clearly “make her plucky” was the goal with Snow White but the movie never bothers to give her reasons for her pluckiness. It all feels so overworked, so “let’s please everyone!” that the result is just an unfun slog that probably pleases no one, giving us forgettable copy-of-a-copy songs and no real sense of why we’re watching these people. C- The 2025 live-action Snow White is in theaters. The 1937 animated movie is streaming on Disney+.
Emmett Soldati is very thoughtful about chai lattes.
“It’s spiced, flaky, typically pretty strong and then with some kind of either foamed or steamed milk if it’s hot or milk if it’s over ice, and sometimes a little sweet,” said Soldati, owner of Totally Tea + Coffee in Concord and Dover.
“We have a tagline at the cafe that says ‘Everyone’s a Little Chai-Curious,’” he said. “We sell several different chai blends. But, for our cafe bar, we have a specific blend we make with black tea, cinnamon, clove, cardamom, star anise and black pepper; we use that to make a concentrated tea base. And then with that base we can make hot or iced chais, which allows us to control pretty much every aspect of it. We can control how sweet it is. We usually put a pump or two of brown sugar syrup in it. We can control what milk goes in it, whether it’s a non-dairy oat milk or just a regular cow’s milk. And that allows us to control the flavor and make sure that it’s a nice strong sort of deep amber brown chai latte.”
The color of Soldati’s chai lattes is important to him.
“There’s only a handful of chai companies that sell packaged chai to restaurants and cafes and they tend to be fairly diluted and sugary so by the time you add in milk it basically just looks like tinted milk. To me it’s really important that it’s a nice deep amber and then of course you get a dusting of cinnamon on top,” he said.
According to Soldati, one reason Totally Tea+Coffee’s chai lattes are distinctive is that they came to the development process almost backward.
“We’re basically a tea and coffee company,” he said, “but I think a lot of coffee houses and cafes lead with coffee and then their tea and chai becomes like a secondary afterthought. We started from the other way. We started as a tea company and then expanded our espresso drinks so that we can do like a dirty chai [a chai latte with a shot of espresso], but people know us because of our specific house chai blend.”
Tiana Sargent is the manager of Flight Coffee Co. in Bedford. She is proud that Flight brews its own chai concentrate.
“We [make] a really strong brew using a masala chai from Mem Tea,” Sargent said. “They’re out of Cambridge, Mass. Awesome tea company. But yeah, we make a really strong brew using that, we lightly sweeten it with sugar, and cut it with milk and serve it. You can steam it to serve it hot or you can mix it in a cup.”
“I am very proud of our chai,” Sargent said. “It’s a great balance of sweet and spicy. We don’t overly sweeten it and we go heavier on the chai so you really get the flavor, the spices, the tea. A lot of places will use a really small amount and so it gets really diluted in the milk. And a lot of places will sweeten it too much as well. So you end up with a sweet drink that’s lacking depth. So we try to not put it there. We really want the tea to be tea-forward, spice-forward, and have just the right amount of sweetness [so] that it’s great on its own but if you’re somebody who likes the flavor of chai you can add a syrup and it won’t overdo the sweetness.”
Danielle Beaudette is the owner of The Cozy Tea Cart (104A Rte 13, Brookline, 249-9111, thecozyteacart.com) and a Specialty Tea Institute, (STI) Certified Tea Specialist. She said that chai and chai lattes have been popular in India for decades, but vary from one region to another, depending on the variety of teas and spices grown in a given area.
“The South grows different ones than the North,” she explained. “So depending on where you are, you’re going to get different spices in your chai latte. Some use ginger, some do not. There’s all different spices Some use peppercorns.”
She said that the quality of a chai latte depends on the quality of the tea used.
“We are very proud of the teas that we bring into the country here,” she said. “We only use loose leaf tea, so we never want to hide the flavor of the tea. It would complement the flavor. So it really depends on the place that’s blending it, on how they blend it. If they’re using tea bag tea, [the quality of the tea] probably doesn’t matter to them,” she said.
Brit McCullouch, the Supervisor for Waterworks Cafe in Manchester, said chai lattes have become a fixture on her menu.
“They’ve become very popular,” she said. “We’ve put a twist on the one that we have. We carry an organic and gluten-free honey vanilla chai latte, and we serve that either iced or hot, but we also put a spin on it [to make] a specialty drink. We add flavors to it. So last season we did pistachio and now with spring coming we add coconut syrup to it. It’s fine on its own, but I think always putting a spin on something grabs people’s attention. It’s just a nice alternative to having coffee. It’s a black tea concentrate with the honey and spices, and you pick your milk, and it goes so well with non-dairy milks, dairy, it really is just a very versatile product.”
Roo Hasty at William & Sons Coffee Co. in Concord and Manchester pointed out that the type of milk a chai latte is made with is an important and underappreciated aspect of the enterprise.
“A lot of people who are in their 20s like it with oat milk,” she said, “because it’s creamier. Whenever I have oat milk, it just tastes way creamier. We have oat milk, we have regular [dairy milk], we have coconut milk, we have almond milk. We’ve got all the milks.”
The search for Symphony New Hampshire’s next Music Director, reported in a March 6 Hippo cover story, has led to the selection of five finalists, each of whom will present their vision for the state’s premier orchestra over the course of next season.
Over the 2025-26 season, each finalist will curate and conduct a concert. In addition, finalists will engage with the public at meet-and-greet events across the state. Audience members will provide feedback through post-concert surveys.
The search was driven by a desire to select a Music Director who was already a New Englander, and all of the candidates live at least a reasonable drive from the New Hampshire border. One, Filippo Ciabatti, is a resident of the Upper Valley.
“We believe having an artistic leader embedded in New Hampshire’s cultural fabric will shape our programming and community engagement,” SNH Executive Director said in a recent press release announcing the candidates.
Here’s a look at the conductors vying for the job of Symphony New Hampshire’s Music Director.
Adam Kerry Boyles holds three current positions: Assistant Conductor of the Hartford Symphony, Director of Orchestras at MIT, and the Brookline Symphony Orchestra’s Music Director Emeritus. Last year, he stepped in for Keith Lockhart at the Boston Pops, after several years as cover conductor.
Boyles has worked with other artists across multiple genres, including James Taylor and Doc Severinsen, as well as groups like Cirque de la Symphonie and Aardvark Jazz Ensemble. He’s also a singer who’s performed in operas and had leading roles in musical theater productions like Little Shop of Horrors.
Taiwanese-American conductor Tiffany Chang’s credits include nine years as Music Director of Boston’s NEMPAC Opera Project. She’s been engaged as a conductor by the Washington National Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Portland Opera, and Minnesota Opera.
Chang is the author of Conductor as CEO, a blog aimed at facilitating growth for conductors, arts leaders and musicians. “My mission,” she writes, “is to help musicians feel more valued, seen, and fulfilled.” Since 2013 she’s served as an Associate Professor at Berklee College of Music.
Filippo Ciabatti currently leads the Dartmouth Symphony Orchestra. The Florence, Italy, native was named Assistant Conductor of Boston Baroque in 2023, the first such appointment in their 50-year history. He also founded Upper Valley Baroque, a professional orchestral and choral ensemble.
The well-rounded Ciabatti is also the Music Director of the Opera Company of Middlebury, where he debuted in June 2023, leading a production of Fidelio. He’s also conducted productions with Opera North in Lebanon, and the Lyric Theatre at Illinois.
Jotaro Nakano conducts the Longwood Symphony Orchestra in Boston, which serves the city’s health care and medical communities. As part of his association with Longwood, he also leads the Healing Art of Music Program, which assists with fundraising for local nonprofit organizations.
Nakano, a Japanese-American, has shared the stage with musicians in Mexico — he’s Musical Director of the SA’Oaxaca Strings International Music Festival Orchestra, a tuition-free chamber string music festival. He’s also toured in the Czech Republic, in Romania and all across the United States.
Tianhui Ng has been called “one of the most sought-after interpreters of new music in the United States.” As Music Director of the Massachusetts International Festival of the Arts’ Victory Players, Ng has led performances on public radio and television and toured in Puerto Rico and Illinois.
Ng is Music Director of White Snake Projects, when’s he’s led more than 50 premieres, including Jacobs and Sosa’s Alice in the Pandemic, a production selected by the Library of Congress for their special collection of the most significant works of art during the pandemic.
SNH’s Executive Director Hoying expressed her approval of the selection committee, led by search professional (and former SNH Operations Director) Nick Adams. It began with 30 applications that were narrowed to 20 semi-finalists; 10 advanced to the interview stage.
“Each of these conductors brings remarkable expertise and vision,” Hoying said of the five in the March 19 press release. “Now, it’s about how they engage with our musicians, audience, and the broader community.”
On the first day of February, a packed gathering of the goth-clad, pierced and tattooed felt the rumblings of a revolution. To the untrained eye, it was a modest milieu, a back room of a Manchester American Legion Post lined with rows of booths, each offering everything from taxidermy to tarot card readings, art and apparel.
For Janelle Havens, however, the Queen City Black Market was a dream come to life.
The New Hampshire native had experienced similar events below the border in Massachusetts and at tattoo conventions. Along the way she was inspired to open a platform shoe store in Manchester, Lustshroom, Etc. She wondered why there weren’t similar efforts in her home state, and decided to launch one of her own.
Hoping for the best, Havens had scheduled an afterparty at the nearby Shaskeen Pub. The market’s success made the three-band show, organized by Aaron Shelton, that much more momentous. Shelton’s Kinetic City Events books regularly at the Shaskeen, helping to boost bands like Cytokine, who headlined the afterparty.
A slashing heavy metal band, Cytokine’s lineup includes guitarist Rob Kulingoski, another thread of the many moving this community forward. Along with Shelton, who spent a lot of time in punk and metal bands before focusing on being a promoter in the early 2010s, Kulingoski kept the fire burning after many venues closed mid-decade.
With nowhere else to go, Kulingoski repurposed the basement of his home in Litchfield for shows, and lived the metaphor for five years until the town shut him down.
“I’ve been a part of the underground hardcore and metal scene probably since I was 16, and I’m 39 now,” he said recently.
Kulingoski and many others are buoyant these days. The New Hampshire alternative scene is by all accounts thriving. Along with Kinetic City at the Shaskeen, BAD BRGR in Manchester has been open over a year and is, Kulingoski said, “a breath of fresh air for us” as it showcases original music. Over on Canal Street, Jewel Music Venue continues to host EDM, punk and other fringe events.
To illustrate the interwoven nature of the scene, Havens will be at Jewel’s Goth & Industrial Night in May, she and Shelton are at work on new projects, and Kulingoski’s Five/Nine Printcore makes T-shirts for bands and businesses like Fishtoes, a new vintage clothing store in Manchester where many scenesters shop.
Terminus Underground. Photo by Eleanor Luna.
“Underground” may not be the best word for this bustling community. “It’s almost misleading … it makes it sound secretive,” Aaron Shelton said by phone recently. “It’s just a broad term for things that aren’t quite in the mainstream. I mean, a band that claims to be underground could be mainstream the next day, if they get signed to a record label.”
Once upon a time, Metallica was underground. Now their logo is on premium whiskey bottles.
Shelton does allow, “it’s a term that people are comfortable with that adds a sense of belonging; this is ours, it’s not the mainstream. This doesn’t belong to Spotify, or MTV, or major record labels, this is our scene, we control it. It’s our community. We decide the successful bands, not the radio.”
It’s also not synonymous with an oath of poverty. This philosophy drives a Nashua-based organization that works with creative independents looking to make a career of their art. Clients include musicians, like Whole Loaf and 6 Minds Combined, along with graphic artist Keegan Fitzgerald’sMyArtbyKF and author Ellie Beach.
New Hampshire Underground is a micro entertainment complex that serves as a comprehensive resource for artists, musicians and writers. Founded by music business maven Eleanor Luna, it offers business guidance to creative professionals to assist with branding, marketing and financial management.
How to turn art into enterprise can get lost in the act of creation, Luna explained in a recent phone interview.
“When you’re really talented and focused on your particular passion, you might not know how to get yourself out there like a business would,” she said. “That’s what I do. I guide people.”
It’s modeled after a fitness center; Luna has also worked in that world. She acts as personal business trainer for her customers. Services are membership-based; VIP “Rockstar” level members have weekly meetings to go over topics like how to optimize an online presence and effectively reach out to industry insiders.
“These are the paths that you can go down,” she tells them. “This is the avenue that I recommend, these are the people that I would talk to. This is what I would do for your social media or your personal brand presence on the Internet.”
Like a lot of efforts to boost the independent creative scene, Luna’s started when the world started to emerge from the pandemic. Everyone was still unsure what that meant for the music business, and she saw a chance to finally use her Berklee MBA and multiple decades in marketing to make a difference.
“I sat on it for a number of years kind of wanting to do something like this, but not really knowing if there was a market,” she said. “But then I started to see lots of people asking questions. How do I copyright? How do I sign up for MusicPro? How do I navigate social media? How do I become a brand? I’m thinking, I know the answers … I literally could start a business.”
Luna picked a price point reasonable enough for the scrappy artists she hoped to mentor.
“I wanted to make it accessible to people but still be able to give them good value, and I knew a membership model would work better than an a la carte or hourly rate,” she said. “It’s more comfortable for people to say, ‘I’m going to have a commitment, and this person will provide what I can’t get on my own on the art side of it.’”
There’s also an entry-level Community Member tier that offers access to the Musician and Artist Lounge, a networking hub best described as Panera Bread for cooler people. It has a wi-fi-equipped co-working space, along with couches and other amenities. The lounge is open Tuesday through Thursday from 7 to 11 p.m. and access can also be booked for an hourly rate.
Other on-premise perks include a podcast studio, a backline-equipped community jam space, and an art gallery. Finally, there’s Terminus Underground, a performance space that serves as NHU’s public hub. It hosts regular events — the next is Night of the Fools, with Sunset Electric, Dog 8 Dog, and Questing Beast.
Queen City Black Market. Courtesy photo.
The NHU complex is on the second floor of a suburban warehouse in Nashua. For several years it has served as a rehearsal space for Dead Harrison, the doom rock band Luna manages that’s led by her partner Andre Dumont. It grew into its present configuration when more room opened up and Dumont, experienced in construction, built out an expansion.
Its efforts to foster the underground scene extend to the Nashua arts community. NHU collaborates closely with the city, including participating in last year’s Fourth of July River Fest. They provided live music at the event and helped raise enough funds to feed 40 veterans, while drawing a crowd of 150 attendees.
Luna also serves on the Nashua Arts Commission, which meets monthly to facilitate, advocate, coordinate and educate on behalf of the city’s arts and cultural assets.
“A voice for underground or alternative music wasn’t there previously,” she said. “Now we’re bringing it to light, which is really exciting.”
All this supports NHU’s role as a one-stop shop for music professionals, Luna continued.
“People get advice on how to run their band as a business, how to do their taxes, how to market themselves, strategies for selling their products and merch branding. Anything you can think of that you can use to create a regular business, the same strategies can be used to create your music business.”
When asked to define “underground,” Eleanor Luna’s answer was as much about what it wasn’t. “Unsigned bands, independent artists, indie music, writers, anything independently driven … any genre really,” align with the term, she said. Ultimately, though, “Underground to me means anything that’s not of the mainstream.”
For the live music scene, mainstream was exemplified by venues who primarily book “cover artists that could make your club money,” she said. “Not that we’re not trying to make money … but it’s not the priority now. The priority really is to support the musicians. It’s almost like a labor of love.”
To that end, the majority of NHU shows are held at Terminus Underground, although they do promote some events below the border. The next one happens April 11, a Beats & Bridges hip-hop concert starring 6 Minds Combined at Koto Underground in Lowell.
Film from the underground
Johna Jo Toomey is a videographer, and her youtube.com/@johnajomedia archive is a treasure trove of punk and metal music, including full sets from many local shows. Toomey’s story reflects the scene’s tight knit community and the support it provides to its own.
“I got into punk rock as a teenager. I was drawn to the subversive lyrics, chaotic energy, and working-class ethos. It was also this mystical thing that I never got to experience in person because I grew up in a small farm town with no shows nearby. After high school, I moved to NorCal and earned my B.A. in photojournalism and cultural anthropology, so documenting (sub)cultures for posterity is really ingrained in me. It’s so important to have these archives to look back on, on both individual and collective levels. While living in San Francisco, I covered shows for local print media, and got to shoot some of my early favorites such as Social Distortion and Dropkick Murphys. Eventually I moved back to New England, and in 2017 I started photographing metal and hardcore shows near Boston. As a woman in a male-dominated space, I felt proud to be an active contributor instead of a passive observer (not that there’s anything wrong with that). When I started to focus more on hardcore instead of metal, I made the switch to videography, because everybody wanted to see the mosh pit, but nobody wanted to stand near it. Then in 2019 while filming a basement show in Lowell, Mass., I got punched by a crowdkiller and broke my nose and eye socket. What happened next was eye-opening (no pun intended). New England hardcore friends showed me love and support, and took care of me when I needed four surgeries in 13 months. Meanwhile, my other friends and family victim-blamed me and said, “you shouldn’t have been there, you should find better friends.” So then I doubled down and started a YouTube channel … I’ve been filming hardcore shows around the country ever since. My style is always evolving, but I’ve always been heavily inspired by gonzo journalism.
For Aaron Shelton, his business is a way to support the community he loves, not the other way around. When he began doing the emo-centric Live Free or Cry nights at Shaskeen Pub, his primary objective was to provide a gathering place for people who missed a bygone time the same way he did.
“I grew up in that community, I was in metal bands and post-hardcore bands and emo bands, so that’s where it comes from,” he said. “It’s not a cash grab for me, it is a revitalization of one of my most informative eras…. I think that for so many people, it is that same thing.”
In Shelton’s case, his evening of bands playing Get Up Kids, Taking Back Sunday and My Chemical Romance songs would turn Luna’s mainstream analogy upside down.
“A lot of these bands that play cover sets are original bands,” he said. “I’ve had bands tell me, ‘This has given us the opportunity to make extra money to pay for our recordings or meet bands that we’re playing original gigs with now.’ It still gives to the underground scene, and I think that’s one of the best parts about it.”
It’s also created a ripple effect. Down the street, smashburger restaurant BAD BRGR is offering live original music on multiple nights. Rob Kulingoski called the venue “the new saving grace for extreme music in New Hampshire.”
BAD BRGR owner Ian Tufts moved to Manchester a few years after opening in Hampton Beach just as Covid-19 upended everyone’s life. A musician himself, he held an all-ages hip-hop show in mid-2020 that ran afoul of social distancing requirements and nearly shut down his business.
His vision for the new location always included live original music.
“From the onset, we’ve totally been about embracing artistry,” he said by phone recently. “There’s such an energy that comes from original music, art, creativity. Harnessing that and allowing that to thrive, it’s so powerful.”
Tufts found help from a few area musician/promoters with shows there. Joe Chubbuck, who plays in both Ratblood and Bleach Temple, has been instrumental with booking. “He’s the most significant metal and hardcore promoter,” Tufts said, noting that he has help from his partner, photographer Ashley Seiferheld.
“I love the direction the scene is going in and love everything that Ian and BAD BRGR is doing,” Seiferheld said in a recent text exchange. She also co-hosts a podcast with Death’s Hand guitarist Ed Hamaty called Angry Advocate. “It’s about local artists and musicians, anything to bring more awareness to our scene.”
Others helping to fill the BAD BRGR calendar are Irongate lead singer Jeff Higgins, who’s booked some metal shows. On the indie/alternative side, Cade Earick, a prolific recording artist who’s also a producer and audio engineer, is doing promotion.
For many if not most, the underground scene goes beyond music and art; it’s a tool for survival.
Videographer Johna Jo Toomey, who frequently films Shaskeen shows, said that after a mosh pit injury in 2019, “New England hardcore friends showed me love and support, and took care of me. Meanwhile, my other friends and family victim-blamed me.”
Kulingoski credits the scene for helping his mental health. During his days running basement shows, he organized awareness days to support others in need.
“We would all come together and just talk about our problems and how much the scene has helped us, how much of a positive impact it’s had,” he said. “It’s so much more than just music. It’s art, it’s friendship, it’s small businesses. It really is a welcoming community that I think some people don’t know about, but it’s not hard to find out about.”
Upcoming events from the up-and-coming
New Hampshire Underground Terminus Underground, 134 Haines St., Nashua. Tickets: newhampshireunderground.org/shows. All shows 21+, BYOB, $15 general admission, $20 VIPizza tickets
• Night of the Fools, Sunday, March 30, 6 p.m. – Sunset Electric (punk-flavored alt rock), Dog 8 Dog (dual female fronted indie/alt rock) and Questing Beast (concept-driven metal) • Punk Rock Masquerade Ball , Saturday, April 12, 8 p.m. – Ragz to Stitchez (NH), Vallory Falls (Vermont), Marianne Toilet and the Runs (Mass.) and Lobotomobile (NH) • Requiem for the Apocalypse: A Death/Doom Metal Explosion, Friday, April 25, 7 p.m. – Dead Harrison, Oxblood Forge, A World Worth Burning and Swarm of Eye • Lily Angelique Desrochers (LAD) art exhibit, Saturday, April 26, 6 p.m. free • Music Industry Networking Night, Wednesday, May 7, 7 p.m. free
Kinetic City at Shaskeen Pub 909 Elm St., Manchester, facebook.com/KineticCityEvents
• Saturday, April 12, 9 p.m. — Gina Fritz w/ Anaria, Proelium and Arcantica, $10 at the door • Thursday, April 17, 8 p.m. — Showcase 603 w/ Black Hatch, 2000s, Cellar Door and Dead Time, $5 at the door • Friday, April 18, 9 p.m. — Candy Striper Death Orgy, Psycho and Summoning Hate, $10 at the door • Saturday, April 19, 8 p.m. — The Doldrums, Still Sleeping, Regals and Birds, In Theory, $10 at the door • Saturday, April 26, 9 p.m. — Live Free or Cry Emo Night w/ Heely & the Moon Shoes and A Blockbuster Summer, $10 at the door
BAD BRGR 1015 Elm St., Manchester; schedule at instagram.com/bad_brgr
• Friday, March 28, 9 p.m. — Street Trash, Wrought Iron Hex, Joe Grizzly and Abel Blood, $15 at the door • Saturday, March 29, 9 p.m. — Donaher w/ Better Sense and New Norde, $10 at the door • Friday, April 11, 9 p.m. — Guns of Brighton (punk), Sotah and Glue, $10 at the door • Friday, May 16, 9 p.m. — The Whole Loaf w/ Alana Corvette and Vale’s End . $10/door
Jewel Music Venue Canal Street, Manchester; find them on Facebook
• Saturday, March 29, 7:30 p.m. — A Night of Black & Death Metal with Angel Morgue (NH), Shitangel (Vermont), Infernal Occult (RI), Commuted (Maine) and Respiratory Secretion (Mass./NH), 18+, $15 at dice.fm • Wednesday, April 23, 7 p.m. — The Planet Smashers, PWRUP, Threat Level Burgundy, $20.77 at dice.fm
The Greater Manchester Chamber is holding a Taco Tour Manchester proposal contest for someone willing to propose at the Thursday, May 8, Taco Tour, which runs from 4 to 8 p.m. in downtown Manchester. The winner will receive an engagement ring from Day’s Jewelers (valued at $7,000) and professional photography to document the moment at the tour, the release said. Enter the contest at tacotourmanchester.com/proposal by April 30.
Egg!
The peregrine falcons at Brady Sullivan Tower in downtown Manchester welcomed their first egg of the season on the morning of March 22, according to the daily log. You can watch the couple and their progress at the Peregrine cam at nhaudubon.org/education/birds-and-birding/peregrine-cam, where the New Hampshire Audubon offers three live views of the nest with support of Peregrine Networks and Brady Sullivan Properties, the website said. The log also has a link to a document with basic information about the nest and a look back at previous seasons of peregrine falcons who have occupied it and the chicks that hatched there.
RIP to a K-9
The New Hampshire State Police Canine Unit announced the death of K-9 Wyatt, a Plott Hound who worked with the state police since 2015, according to a press release. Wyatt and handler Trooper First Class Kevin Devlin specialized in search and rescue as well as detection of human remains, the release said. “Wyatt passed away … after being diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer that had spread throughout his chest and lungs,” the release said. “K-9 Wyatt was a cherished member of the New Hampshire State Police family, an essential part of the Canine Unit,” said Colonel Mark B. Hall in the release. “Today we mourn his passing and remember his years of exemplary service. Trooper First Class Devlin and K-9 Wyatt were instrumental in bringing closure to families throughout New Hampshire and beyond.”
Gardening & climate
The Atkinson Garden Club will host a presentation by UNH Master Gardeners Betsy Coes and Mike Koutelis on “Gardening in a Changing Climate” on Wednesday, April 2, at 6 p.m. at Kimball Library, 5 Academy Ave. in Atkinson, according to a club email. The event is free.
Sustainability
The Boys & Girls Club of Souhegan Valley (56 Mont Vernon St. in Milford) will hold the 2025 Souhegan Sustainability Fair on Saturday, April 5, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Bring a non-perishable food item to donate to the local food pantry SHARE, according to a press release. The fair will feature live music, food, a guided hike, a story walk, kids crafts, 34 exhibits, presentations and more, according to the release. Admission is free.
The Bach’s Lunch on Thursday, April 3, 12:10 to 12:50, at the Concord Community Music School, 23 Wall St. in Concord, will feature a lecture on “Raga Music Composition.” “Hari Maya Adhikari and David Nugent will present a lecture on traditional Indian string instruments and their use in the creation and performance of Raga music,” according to a press release. The event is free; see ccmusicschool.org.
Keep those St. Patrick’s Day celebrations going: Manchester St. Patrick’s Parade steps off at noon on Sunday, March 30, running down Elm Street from Salmon to Central. Join in the fun by running in the Shamrock Shuffle at 11 a.m. (a kids’ fun run starts at 10:30 a.m.). See millenniumrunning.com/shamrock for details on the 2-mile run/walk and visit saintpatsnh.com for more on the parade.
The Southern NH Skating Club will hold its “All the Best” 60th annual ice revue on Saturday, March 29, at 1 and 7 p.m. at JFK Coliseum (303 Beech St. in Manchester). Tickets cost $10 for adults, $6 for children and seniors. See snhsc.com.
The Nashua Garden Club will hold a workshop on figs on Wednesday, April 2, at 7 p.m. at the First Baptist Church, 121 Manchester St. in Nashua, with Jay Guarneri, who will discuss growing figs in cold climates, the different flavor classes of figs and more, according to a club email. Admission is free; see nashuanhgardenclub.org.
