Category: Nightlife

Bands, booking and community building

For many musicians, having space in life to create and stages to play on is the measure of success. While stream counts and ticket sales are fine for rock ’n’ roll fantasy, a Friday night in front of a supportive group of fans and friends is a dream that might actually come true — but it won’t happen alone.

That’s the idea driving Always Forward, a promotion effort led by Sam Beachard, who’s also a singer for Manchester nu-metal band House Lights. Beachard has been part of the local music scene since Rocko’s Bar & Grill regularly presented shows in the early aughts, along with the Sad Café in Plaistow. Between those and spots like Milly’s (now Stark Brewing), he and his college friend Mathew Laramie’s band Horns Become Haloes always had a place to play.

Sad Café and Rocko’s have been gone for nearly a decade and getting from the basement to the big stage is a bigger challenge. Beachard aims to change that.

“I want to build a community within the music scene of New England,” Beachard said by phone recently, adding that indie bands face an uphill battle. “A lot of times they don’t bring the crowd, but even ones that do, a lot of promoters and venues won’t work with them because they don’t have name recognition. They’re not willing to give them a chance.”

Incorporated in late 2022, Always Forward has done five shows already, with four more planned in the coming months. A typical bill is composed of an out-of-town act surrounded by a few local performers. On July 29 at The Strand in Dover, rambunctious Albany, New York, punk rockers The Snorts appear, along with Oziem, a Manchester band equally inspired by Social Distortion and the Misfits. Rounding out the undercard is Lovewell, described by Beachard as “emo alt rock indie that’s good for fans of Death Cab.”

The Jerritones, a Newmarket duo that’s fond of fuzzy guitars and oddball costumes, will headline. “I liken them to early Weezer with elements of the Hives … irreverent silly lyrics, with fuzzy guitars and catchy melodies,” Beachard said. “I tell people it’s something you probably weren’t expecting, but it will put a smile on your face and have you reevaluating a bit of your musical taste.”

The following weekend in Concord’s at Penuche’s Ale House, New Jersey’s Bobby Mahoney & the Seventh Son appear. Beachard calls them “an Americana punk band … very much like John Mellencamp or Bruce Springsteen’s style.” Local support will come from Wired for Sound and Sauce on the Side.

Soon, Beachard’s own band will appear, in support of a new album that’s been a long time coming.

House Lights, which also includes Adam Soucy on drums and bassist Bobby Spence, rose from the ashes of Horns Become Haloes. In 2014, the group made a “Seven Stages of Grief”-themed EP, then scattered. “It was more a getting-back-on-the-horse moment,” Beachard said of making the record. “For us to kind of prove … we can work together, we’ve done a little bit of growing up here, we can be mature about this. But we all kind of had our own thing.”

Laramie and Beachard pivoted to career and family, Spence had a myriad of projects, and Soucy left to study at Berklee. One day in the depths of the pandemic, Laramie reached out to his college friend and former bandmate to share the material he’d built up in the intervening years. “He and I have always worked well together, our styles just blend very well,” Beachard said. “I love the music he writes; it resonates with me emotionally. So it’s easy for me to write lyrics to it that I can fully get behind and I’m proud of.”

What It Means to Feel is set for release Sept. 1, followed by a series of live shows. The first single, “Love and Understanding,” came out July 21. A Beachard lyric could be read as a mission statement for his promotion effort. “You’re not alone in this battle you’re fighting,” he sings. “I’m beside you, still fighting.”

Regarding Always Forward, Beachard stresses that the community he aims to foster needs support from everyone, not just musicians.

“Find one or two bands,” he said, “and make it a point to get out to their shows regularly. That’s what keeps us doing what we do; that’s what makes it worth it, even if it’s not financially. Musicians are stubborn as hell and don’t know when to quit. We’re going to do it, but we need mental support too.”

The Jerritones, Oziem, The Snorts & Lovewell
When: Saturday, July 29, 7 p.m.
Where: The Strand, 20 Third St., Dover
Tickets: $12 at eventbrite.com

Wired for Sound, Bobby Mahoney & the Seventh Son, Sauce on the Side
When: Friday, Aug. 4, 9 p.m.
Where: Penuche’s Ale House, 16 Bicentennial Square, Concord
Tickets: $5 at the door

Featured photo: The Jerritones. Courtesy photo.

Young Dubliners perform in Concord

It’s been 35 years since the Young Dubliners debuted. With rocked-up songs that owed as much to Thin Lizzy as any trad band with a fiddle and bodhran, they were the West Coast counterparts to New York City’s Black 47.

“At the time, the term ‘Celtic rock’ didn’t exist,” band founder Keith Roberts said in a recent phone interview. “It was just … blending Irish music with other forms of music.”

Roberts, the last original member, seems bemused by his band’s longevity.

“The name tells you right away I didn’t plan it,” he said. “There’s no way when I was 22 that I thought, ‘Oh, yeah, Young Dubliners. That’s really gonna work when I’m 58.’ But it is what it is; I’m stuck with it. So, I have to pretend to be the Peter Pan of Celtic rock.”

The singer, songwriter and guitarist originally moved from Ireland to L.A. to chase a career in journalism. He buttressed an interesting but low-paying job doing research for NPR with odd jobs like driving an airport shuttle, which led to sound work on movie sets. One day, he bought an Irish bar in Santa Monica, mainly so the band he’d started could escape the pay-to-play gigs then dominating SoCal.

“I’d never intended on going on the road, I just wanted to own the pub and be the band on Saturday night,” he said. Weekend shows consisted of a headliner, the Young Dubliners and a band that later became Flogging Molly. “We got signed first and a year later they got signed, then Gaelic Storm…. It’s an interesting, fluky chain of events.”

They’ve solidified into a standard-bearer for the genre, playing all over the world, topping the bill on cruises, and every 18 months or so heading back to Ireland with over 100 Americans in tow. When Roberts was first approached with the idea of touring with a group of fans, “I couldn’t think of anything worse,” he recalled. “I eventually said, ‘Look, if I do this, I want it to be a normal tour.’”

So a plan was hatched that offers a balance of sightseeing and shows like an unplugged hotel lobby gig and a concert in a castle, with a sleepover.

“The Americans will have two days to just enjoy it like they are in Downton Abbey or something,” Roberts said, laughing. “Nobody wants to go to Ireland and see us play every single night…. This isn’t the Bruce Springsteen farewell tour. They’ve already seen us in America; they want to come and see Ireland with us.”

The Young Dubliners have made nine records and are close to finishing their 10th. The new album doesn’t have a title, but it’s shaping into an introspective effort. “Drive” was inspired by Roberts’ worry that he might not perform again, a thought shared by many musicians as the pandemic stretched on.

“My lyrics are all over the place and they definitely represent a lot of what happened,” he said. “We all sort of reinvented ourselves with skills we never knew we had during Covid, building furniture, making bread; I turned an old band trailer into a camper. The song is sort of uplifting about what would happen [and it] resonates now playing it to an audience.”

Another new song, “Look to the Stars,” pays homage to one of Roberts’ primary influences. “It’s absolutely got the Big Country riffs at the beginning, and I love them. They were probably the biggest — them and the Waterboys’ Fisherman’s Blues were probably what really pushed me out of just being a straight rock band and embracing the Irish stuff.”

Their current concert is a mix of old and new that begins with “a historical musical journey of the Young Dubs and how we wrote all our own stuff along the way,” Roberts said, followed by a portion “dedicated to the Irish Sessions album, where we did all the covers.” That trad-rich album included the bracing “Rocky Road to Dublin” and a lilting take of the Pogues’ “Pair of Brown Eyes.”

From there the music moves emphatically forward, Roberts continued. “If you only stay for the first half of the show, you’re going to miss out on a whole other part of our life,” he said. “I was joking about it the other day, saying if I was doing a farewell tour, this would probably be a pretty close set to what we would do.”

Young Dubliners w/ Rebel Collective
When: Sunday, July 23, 8 p.m.
Where: Bank of NH Stage, 44 S. Main St., Concord
Tickets: $35.75 at ccanh.com

Featured photo: Young Dubliners. Courtesy photo.

LaBelle Winery welcomes comic Juston McKinney

Ever a relatable comedian, Juston McKinney tries to find the local angle wherever he performs. His latest YouTube special, On the Bright Side, was filmed in Concord. It begins with a story about a The Price Is Right contestant from Massachusetts winning a trip to the Capitol City.

The prize came with a round-trip flight — between Los Angeles and Manchester. “She’s gotta go all the way out and come all the way back,” McKinney joked. “She didn’t win a vacation; she won the longest tax-free liquor run in history!”

For a July 13 show at Labelle Winery, some anecdotes will come from closer to home. “My grandfather ran McKinney Dairy in Derry, and that’s where he met my grandmother,” the comic said in a recent phone interview. The punch line: “So she ended up marrying the milkman!”

McKinney primarily performs in New England, which keeps him nearer to his family; he lives in Newmarket. This makes for a lot of repeat business, forcing him to keep his act fresh. “I try to tell people that if you give me a year and I come back, I’ll have an 80 percent different show.”

It can be a double-edged sword for fans with a favorite bit; the memory bank can only be so full before it overflows. Consider a recent comment on Facebook. “It said, ‘I saw you 20 years ago, and I’m still laughing at your Old Navy button fly joke.’ I have no freaking idea what the Old Navy button fly joke is,” McKinney recalled. “I gotta message the guy … because if it’s really good, I’m gonna do it again.”

Another side effect of keeping to the region is making the rest of the country feel slighted. “People are getting mad that I’m not leaving,” he said. “They’re literally like, ‘Oh, you’ve got something against South Dakota?’ So I’m trying to get out a little bit, just to give something to these fans. I just did Ohio, and now I’ll do Detroit. I usually try to do Vegas every couple of years.”

To enjoy family time with his wife and two teenage sons, McKinney maintains a light summer schedule.

“I have a house with a water view … yeah, we put an above ground pool in the backyard,” he joked. “My whole trick has been balancing being a dad with being a comedian. Not looking back when these years have passed and going, ‘Oh, my kids are going to college [and] I’ve been on the road 40 weeks a year.”

Unsurprisingly, McKinney mines his home life for laughs — to a point. “Sometimes my wife will cut it right in the bud and go, ‘You’re not doing a joke about that,’” he said. “I get in this argument about how I’m gonna frame the joke, and finally I’ll say, ‘Alright, I’ll make it about my friend.”

On the other hand, McKinney’s boys can be a bit more agreeable about inspiring his standup.

“I’ll say something funny, and they’ll say, ‘You should do a joke about that.’ As long as it’s not at their expense, and they’re not the butt of the joke. My kid the other day WTF’d me in a text because I was late. I go, ‘You don’t WTF your parents!’ He goes, ‘Dad, I didn’t spell it out, it’s just the abbreviation.’ I’m like, ‘So is FU; don’t you put it in a text to me.’ He’s like, are you going to do a joke about that?’ I go, ‘I don’t know, but you’re gonna get in trouble if you do it again.’”

He tends to avoid flashpoint topics like politics, but in McKinney’s hands, even the war in Ukraine can provide a chuckle. In On the Bright Side, he observes that their draft age tops out at 60. “That’s kind of pushing it; I mean, I go to bed at nine thirty. I got a CPAP machine; I’m gonna need an outlet,” he said. “Is that a problem?”

This idea would never work in the United States, McKinney added. “We can’t get 18- to 60-year-olds to go to work, let alone go to war,” he said. “We should draft people into jobs.”

Juston McKinney
When: Thursday, July 13, 7:30 p.m.
Where: LaBelle Winery, 14 Route 111, Derry
Tickets: $40 at labellewinery.com

Featured photo: Juston McKinney. Courtesy photo.

The Gravel Project provides DMB lead-in

For fans of original local music, the show always starts early at Bank of New Hampshire Pavilion, on the venue’s Hazy Little Stage. Situated just beyond the Gilford amphitheater’s entrance, the second stage hosts some of the region’s finest local talent, with each act chosen to complement the headlining performer.

Upcoming are the countrified Not Leaving Sober ahead of Sam Hunt on July 7, and blood harmony band Town Meeting prior to Counting Crows’ July 14 show. In August, singer-songwriter April Cushman precedes Jelly Roll, with jam band stalwarts Supernothing playing prior to a Slightly Stoopid and Sublime with Rome double bill.

In a perfect pairing, the concert season closes out on Sept. 30 with ’90s acolytes Donaher teeing off for the Goo Goo Dolls. The Hazy Little Stage’s full schedule can be found on the venue’s website.

Providing the prelude to Dave Matthews Band’s July 11 show is The Gravel Project, a Boston band offering a vintage rock and soul sound that pairs with the bill-toppers like a salted pretzel and a cold IPA. On guitar and vocals, Andrew Gravel leads a novel configuration of his brother Jordan on keys, drummer Dave Fox and Eguie Castrillo playing percussion.

Gravel has been the band’s one constant since it began in 2013, though for the past six years he, his brother and Fox have formed its nucleus.

“The fact that we call it a project means we’ve got other people who come and play with us from time to time,” Gravel said by phone recently. “It kind of describes the whole nature of it.”

Playing without a bassist is uncommon but wasn’t always the case. The choice came out of necessity; a few years back, when their then-bass player didn’t make it to a couple of gigs, Jordan crafted a low end on his keyboards.

“We were like, ‘that was actually really good,’” Gravel recalled; they kept at it after that. “It was an organic direction for us at the time … then it brought a level of consistency to the lineup that we hadn’t felt prior.”

Live at Wellspring, released in February, is the first album to include a female voice in a prominent role. Having another vocalist “was something I always wanted to explore,” Gravel said. “A lot of these songs [are] meant for more than one singer.”

Though the vocalist who appeared on Wellspring is gone, with a rotating roster now accompanying the band (American Idol alum Erika Van Pelt joins them in Gilford), the added element on the live LP made Gravel realize that a woman on stage made a big difference. “It opened the band up for us, and there’s definitely a commitment to keep that role filled.”

The Gravel Project has played Meadowbrook’s side stage before; last year they opened for Tedeschi Trucks Band. Like DMB, that slot reflected Gravel’s influences as a performer “Nineties rock was the soundtrack to my childhood, but even before that, in the eighties, when I was younger, my parents were always just playing tons of Beatles in the house,” he said. “A lot of Allman Brothers, Led Zeppelin … that stuff kind was from the very beginning real close to my heart.”

Early on, Gravel played a Fender Stratocaster. These days he toggles between two Gibson guitars — the iconic Les Paul, and a hollow body ES-335.

“That’s a big part of my sound, the vintage Gibson thing,” he said. “I’m also a sponsored artist by Two-Rock, which are these amazing amplifiers made out of California. They capture the spirit of the Sixties Blackface Fender sound [and] take it a little bit further.”

To extend the theme, Jordan plays both Hammond B3 and Fender Rhodes organs. “He loves, just like I do, the vintage gear,” Gravel said. “I mean, you just can’t beat it.”

Gravel is pleased to be opening DMB’s two-night stand. “It’s certainly an honor to be involved,” he said. “It’s such a loyal fan base that loves good music, and we’re excited to bring something that’s different [but] closely enough related. I think all his fans are certainly into great songs, and they’re also into extended jams and improvisation.”

The Gravel Project
When: Tuesday, July 11, 5:30 p.m.
Where: Bank of New Hampshire Pavilion, 72 Meadowbrook Lane, Gilford
More: thegravelproject.com
Ticket for Dave Matthews Band required – $74 and up at livenation.com

Featured photo: The Gravel Project. Courtesy photo.

Rising band Feverslip plays Manchester

If having headliner acts checking out their sets is a harbinger of greater things, Feverslip is a band on the rise. At last year’s Great American Ribfest, Great White’s then-lead singer Andrew Freeman not only watched them perform; he also hopped on stage and helped them finish a song.

A few months later, ex-Saving Abel front man Scotty Austin was so impressed seeing them open for him at Wally’s Pub in Hampton Beach that he connected them with his producer, Malcolm Springer. Soon after that night, Feverslip was in Nashville, working with Springer.

The first fruits of the project arrived in April, when they released the rollicking single “Aces.” Another track from the album in progress will drop in early July. The new song is representative of the band’s no-nonsense rock ’n’ roll, which evokes Aerosmith, AC/DC and classic acts like the Yardbirds and Rolling Stones.

It’s music that’s punchy, powerful, and especially good when played live.

They went to Music City looking to translate that energy to the studio. “Where we’re most at home is just playing on stage, and that’s something that was cool about the recording process,” lead singer Sam Vlasich said in a recent phone interview. “I really hope that people can take away that vibe from the new material.”

Feverslip is a regional supergroup that includes Maine guitarists Liv Lorusso and Jordon Brilliant, who met at a Portland open mic and have performed for several years as a duo, Liv ‘n Brilliant. The two found Vlasich after his band Red Sky Mary split. Vlasich knew drummer Harrison Foti and bass player Brad Hartwick from sharing the bill with their previous band Victim of Circumstance.

The quintet began the new project with heavy preparation, a novel move for them.

“We did three weeks or so of the pre-recording process,” Vlasich said. “It was cool because I’ve never really had an experience where we got to just focus on writing songs and getting them tight, so when we go into the studio we can make them sound good with some live takes.”

Working with Springer was “just amazing,” Vlasich continued. “He totally got what the band was about, and what we want to do. He allowed us to dig our feet in and say, ‘OK, we’re just going to do it; we wanna be a badass rock band.’”

Songwriting is a collaborative process involving all band members.

“We’ll try everything, no matter where it takes us,” Vlasich said. “The best songs always seem to come about when somebody has some sort of riff, whether it’s Jordan or Liv or Brad, some sort of lick idea. Then we just kind of go, ‘OK, that sounds good.’ … Once we have a verse and chorus down, then I’m kind of able to scream on top of it until I find a melody that suits it.”

As a vocalist, Vlasich is inspired by Bon Scott, Brian Johnson and Robert Plant. “That’s just the stuff I was raised on,” he said. “As a kid singing in my hairbrush, peeking out the window making sure nobody rolled up to catch me making noise upstairs in my room alone, that’s kind of the stuff I was singing.”

The rest of the group has similar roots, he said.

“Liv loves Aerosmith and Jordan is Guns N’ Roses, and Brad loves The Who and Iron Maiden. Who I also love — the older ’80s metal stuff is great. We share similar influences but in different regards; they mesh well together.”

A June 30 appearance at Shaskeen Pub will be Feverslip’s third at the Manchester venue, though Vlasich noted that he did a lot of shows with his former band there. They have several bookings in the area over the summer months, including a return to Ribfest on July 23, and Manchester’s Strange Brew Tavern on July 28. They’ll play Portsmouth’s Press Room in early August.

Vlasich has his sights on wider horizons.

“I would love to get on the road [and] hit a lot more places than Red Sky Mary, playing these songs. Because I think they’re just good rock songs, and they need an audience to sing along to the choruses. And if AC/DC or Aerosmith needs an opening band, that would also make my life…. Getting to watch your favorite band play every night after opening up for them, that’s the dream right there.”

Feverslip
When: Friday, June 30, 9 p.m.
Where: Shaskeen Pub, 909 Elm St., Manchester
More: feverslip.com

Featured photo: Feverslip. Courtesy photo.

Brian Regan finds the funny

Along with eschewing profanity, Brian Regan assiduously avoids politics in his act. He does, however, have a one woke joke. Growing up, his parents would make Regan and his siblings vote on playtime activities. The family had four boys and two girls, so it was an inherently undemocratic exercise.

“I didn’t like that, so I voted for dolls,” Regan quipped.

He hasn’t checked on whether this bit set the social media world atwitter. “I’m just gonna keep trying to do what I think is funny,” Regan said in a recent phone interview. “If it bumps somebody, I apologize. Well, I take that back. Maybe I don’t apologize.”

His latest Netflix special On the Rocks finds Regan’s broad appeal on display. He addresses being diagnosed with OCD (“How come when you want things in order, they call it a disorder?”), the absurdity of bagpipes, and his newly gray hair, leading off with the latter. “Let’s get [it] out of the way, ’cause if I don’t you won’t listen to a word I say for an hour.”

Regan went prematurely gray in his thirties, so he started coloring his hair. “I’m like, hey, I’m trying to get booked as a twentysomething, I can’t have gray hair,” he said. He stopped during lockdown and didn’t start again. “When the world opened up a crack and people were like, hey, we’ll do a show with eight audience members, I said, ‘Alright, I’ll perform,’ but I decided … I’m just gonna go out, and this is what I look like now. It’s kind of freeing.”

On the Rocks was filmed at the Tuacahn Amphitheater in Utah, but Regan was quick to point out that the open-air venue was chosen before the pandemic. “It was just a fluke, I wanted to do an outdoor show,” he explained. “I might have been one of the only people to be able to do a special with an audience during Covid, but it worked out OK.”

The special was the final one of a Netflix deal that included 2017’s Nunchucks and Flamethrowers and the two-part series Standup and Away! a year later. He’s talking with “various platforms” about a follow-up. “I’m anticipating being able to do something soon,” he said, adding, “I never know how to talk about what I do because the topics themselves always sound incredibly boring.”
To illustrate, he recalled an article from a few years back. “It said, ‘Brian … talks about food, traveling and shopping.’ I wondered if couples or families were sitting around reading the paper going, ‘Oh, my God, we have to go check this guy out — he’s exploring our favorite topics for humor!’”

Regan worked against type in Loudermilk, a Peter Farrelly-created series that ran for three seasons. “That opportunity was tremendous, because audiences know me for a certain kind of comedy … and Loudermilk is far from clean,” he said. “It’s on the rough side of the tracks … gritty and dirty, but I still loved doing it because it was real. There’s a lot of love in it.”

The comedy drama starring Ron Livingston as a recovering alcoholic faced a few challenges. The network it ran on ceased operations just as Season 3 was about to air; the show was later rescued by Amazon Prime. That said, more episodes could happen. “It’s not a definite that it’s over,” Regan said. “Peter Farrelly has said that he hasn’t given up on it; I mean, the last season was shot before the world shut down.”

For now, Regan is glad to be working again in relative normalcy.

“I don’t want to say it’s completely gone; there might still be people out there who have health concerns and don’t want to get out,” he said. “But for the most part it feels like crowds are back and it’s a lot of fun performing in front of places that are full.”

He’s also looking forward to his upcoming show at Manchester’s Palace Theatre.

“I love the whole New England area,” he said. “I mean, every part of the country is different, but New Hampshire is wonderful, it has its own personality, and I love performing for the people there.”

Brian Regan
When: Thursday, June 22, 7:30 p.m.
Where: Palace Theatre, 80 Hanover St., Manchester
Tickets: $39 to $59 at palacetheatre.org

Featured photo: Brian Regan. Courtesy photo.