Music & More

Photo: Courtesy of the artist Dido played Philadelphia's Union Transfer Saturday night, June 22nd and offered her usual masterful performance. Although she played the much larger Tower Theater the last time through, Dido reportedly opted for smaller venues this tour. Perhaps because it had been fifteen years since she last toured here, she wanted the intimacy of smaller houses. When the show was first announced last winter, it sold out immediately. The upshot of all this was that the fans secured their tickets early, and I did likewise when the show was announced back in January. And so, the multi-generational crowd was missing the component that you usually get at a weekend show, the folks that just want to go out on a Saturday night. That's the sort of crowd that talks continuously through the show; venues generally deal with that by running the sound at a bludgeoningly loud level. The sound mix was superb. Every instrument was well defined, even when loud, yet there...

Photo: Courtesy of The Japanese House The Japanese House played The Foundry reportedly for the fourth time, on Sunday night, May 26th. The Foundry is located inside the Fillmore in the Fishtown section of Philadelphia. The Japanese House is essentially Amber Bain, a musician, singer, and songwriter from England. Judging by the reception she got from the sold out Foundry, the crowd reaction sounded much louder than the venue's capacity of 450. The crowd sang along throughout the set, and not just when asked. I was imagining that this must be what her performances might be like at home; at least we made her feel welcome here in Philadelphia. Home (away from home) is the place, incidentally, that was the source of the name. As the story goes, when Bain was young, her family went on holiday and stayed in Kate Winslet's house, which was called The Japanese House. The Japanese House first caught my ear when I heard a single included in one of Lee Bennett's excellent playl...