Studio-A-Rama 2024: Cheekface & Shadow Show
WRUW, aka my old radio station, hosted Studio-A-Rama for the first time since 2019. I didn't feel the need to spend all day at a concert, but the headliner was Cheekface and multiple people from WRUW have been geeking about them for the last year. In particular, my friend Brandt has been raving about them a ridiculous amount. Since Brandt got me to see The Beths and Alvvays long before anyone else cared about them, not to mention Allo' Darlin, through the sheer force of his enthusiasm, so this was a very strong recommendation. Throw in that a great many of my friends were going to be at the show and that it was free, and attending the end of the day was a no brainer.
I made it for the regional headliner, an all woman rock & roll trio from Detroit who were clad solely in black & white and called themselves Shadow Show. At the start of their set I was not particularly impressed, but the set slowly picked up speed and the final two songs were killer. If their whole set had been that good they would have really had something. Of course, maybe I just wasn't in the mood at the start of the set, or I was distracted, or maybe they weren't good. It's hard to say, but by the end they had won me over.
After them Cheekface came on. They are are a four piece (vocalist/guitarist, bassist, keyboards, drummer) from Los Angeles and their set was all killer no filler. I loved every minute of it, and in all the many, many years of Studio-A-Rama that I have attended the only band I'm absolutely certain was better than them was Mission of Burma in 2009, which was one of the best shows I've seen ever. There's been plenty of other good Studio-A bands (Infinite Number of Sounds, The Sadies and Matt Pond PA immediately come to mind off the top of my head), but Cheekface is right up there among the best of them.
I had listened to relatively little Cheekface, mostly via Brandt's show, and almost none of it in a consistent fashion so I was going in more or less blind (deaf?). I was pleased to discover that the lyrics were clever and easy to pick up and more importantly, worth listening to. This is a very literate band. The music wasn't quite a strong, but for some reason I got very strong "Stop Making Sense" era David Byrne vibes from the lead singer and the whole aura coming off the band. Needless to say, that's a good thing.
After the show I happily dropped some cash to buy their two most recent CDs and support the cause. Count this as another win for Brandt's taste.
For 2024 to date, I have now been to 8 concerts featuring 11 bands, and purchased a total of 3 CDs at the merch tables. I have tickets for three more shows this year, and one for 2025.
I made it for the regional headliner, an all woman rock & roll trio from Detroit who were clad solely in black & white and called themselves Shadow Show. At the start of their set I was not particularly impressed, but the set slowly picked up speed and the final two songs were killer. If their whole set had been that good they would have really had something. Of course, maybe I just wasn't in the mood at the start of the set, or I was distracted, or maybe they weren't good. It's hard to say, but by the end they had won me over.
After them Cheekface came on. They are are a four piece (vocalist/guitarist, bassist, keyboards, drummer) from Los Angeles and their set was all killer no filler. I loved every minute of it, and in all the many, many years of Studio-A-Rama that I have attended the only band I'm absolutely certain was better than them was Mission of Burma in 2009, which was one of the best shows I've seen ever. There's been plenty of other good Studio-A bands (Infinite Number of Sounds, The Sadies and Matt Pond PA immediately come to mind off the top of my head), but Cheekface is right up there among the best of them.
I had listened to relatively little Cheekface, mostly via Brandt's show, and almost none of it in a consistent fashion so I was going in more or less blind (deaf?). I was pleased to discover that the lyrics were clever and easy to pick up and more importantly, worth listening to. This is a very literate band. The music wasn't quite a strong, but for some reason I got very strong "Stop Making Sense" era David Byrne vibes from the lead singer and the whole aura coming off the band. Needless to say, that's a good thing.
After the show I happily dropped some cash to buy their two most recent CDs and support the cause. Count this as another win for Brandt's taste.
For 2024 to date, I have now been to 8 concerts featuring 11 bands, and purchased a total of 3 CDs at the merch tables. I have tickets for three more shows this year, and one for 2025.