krisis

Krisis has been creating Crushing Krisis since 2000, writing songs since 1996, and reading comics since 1991. He is a Customer Success and Digital Brand Strategy executive, serial organizer, parent, and feminist, among other things. Based in Philly through 2017, he now resides in Wellington, NZ.

Recommended: Sharon Van Etten – Epic

January 6, 2011 by krisis

Krisis’s Recommended Releases of 2010:
Sharon Van Etten – Epic

Key Tracks: “Don’t Do It,” “Peace Signs,” “One Day”

Sharon Van Etten’s Epic is a slight, seven-song album that doesn’t have to rely on hip production or endless hooks to make an impact.

Sharon Van Etten - Epic. Released 10/11/2010

Why? Because Van Etten is a substantial songwriter, and her seven songs are damned good. She’s also a sure singer. Her voice is both weathered and pretty, a kissing cousin to Florence and the Machine (especially on closer “Love More”).

Van Etten has the gift of writing compact songs with distinct melodies and the imagination to be a singer-songwriter without always sounding the same. Opener “A Crime” is plain and acoustic, but “Peace Signs” is straight up indie-rock, recalling Emma Pollock. “Save Yourself” veers country with accents of slide guitar. “DsharpG” is dirge-like, vocals ebbing and flowing across humming organ. “One Day” starts Liz Phair plaintive, but accelerates to modern folk similar to the Watson Twins with its constant sigh of underneath harmony.

The best song in the strong septet may be “Don’t Do It.” It slithers around genres, a throbbing bass transforming an acoustic strummer into an anthem of songwriter-stadium-rock.

Epic might not feature the length or scope suggested by its title, but in a year filled with that sort of monolithic album Sharon Van Etten’s LP of finely-crafted songs is a welcome entry.

Crushing On: Butter Crunch Peanuts

January 6, 2011 by krisis

Some crushes are a little less cerebral than others.

Before you get too excited, I feel that it's necessary to tell you that you cannot order these online.

E brings home amazing butter crunch peanuts, cashews, and almonds from Iovine Brothers at Reading Terminal Market. They come in pint-size plastic containers, are festooned with tiny morsels of buttery crunch, and rarely last past two sittings with me.

When I saw this fairly hefty tub of (surprisingly good) Target house brand Archer Farms Butter Crunch peanuts over the weekend I felt like I had found the mother-ship, and oh how they lived up to that promise and MORE.

First, this thing is massive. I attacked it again and again over the weekend and hardly made a dent. The peanuts are covered entirely with a buttery, caramel-esque shell that renders them the totally perfect sweet:salt ratio. PLUS they are nuts, so they’re a suitable between meals snack to keep from getting ravenous (even if they aren’t exactly health nuts).

Finally, while I cannot comment on this theory from firsthand experience because the risk of having ice cream in the house is far too great, it seems like the litter of broken crunch shells from the bottom of the container would be the best ice cream topping in the history of civilization.

Let’s just say I’m obsessed and leave it at that. And if you have some horrible truth to disclose about their nutrition information, or that they’re harvested by killing defenseless baby narwhals, or whatever, just keep it to yourself, mmkay?

Recommended: Far – At Night We Live

January 5, 2011 by krisis

Krisis’s Recommended Releases of 2010:
Far – At Night We Live

Key Tracks: “Give Me a Reason,” “If You Care Enough,” “Are You Sure”

Far - At Night We Live. Released 5/25/2010

Far’s At Night We Live is an album that wears its rock on its sleeve, but an abundance of riffs and metal bombast are merely ornamenting an LP full of mercilessly catchy power-pop songs.

At the surface level, Far has a bracing sound slightly on the harder side of radio modern rockers – near neighbors seem to be Foo Fighters or 30 Seconds to Mars, and to a lesser extent more pop-oriented acts like All-American Rejects. But Far is differentiated from those bands not only by smart, layered arrangements, but by the handsome, tuneful baritone vocals from lead singer Jonah Matranga.

The titular melody on “Give Me a Reason” is almost too pretty to be a rock song, and even proto-typical screamery on “Fight Song #16,233,241” (biting hard on Eagles of Death Metal) turns into something shimmering on the chorus.

In that way, Far is like Eagles or a harder, less jocular OK Go – because both bands consistently display seductive, playful-but-mature vocals. Far even recalls, god help us, a less smarmy Rivers Cuomo, finally living up to the supposed love of hair metal that got him into music to begin with (check out “Are You Sure” and the super-Weezer “Burns,” each like a sticky wet dream of what post-Pinkerton Weezer could/should/would have been).

If the parade of hyper-popular comparisons sounds like a turnoff then this LP might not be for you. Almost every song has the immediacy of the best cuts on alternative radio in 2010, which marry metal influences with carefully crafted melodic work.

Again and again At Night We Live floats up and away from standard riffing to stadium-filling rock. On the whole it’s a strong, confident re-entry into the rock scene from a long-absent band.

Crushing On: Table for 2 and a Half

January 5, 2011 by krisis

Get ready, I’m about to crush on a blog you’d think I’d never be caught dead reading:

A new Philly foodie mommy blog called Table for 2 and a Half.

Mel, the foodie and mommy behind Tablefor2andaHalf.com

I know what you’re thinking. Is this some sort of quid pro quo? Am I name-checking this blogger in turn for her recommendation of me as her local singer-songwriter of choice to the many foodie moms around the region?

Nope. Well, I mean, I hope I’m her local singer-songwriter of choice, but I just love her darn blog.

Before regular status updates were de rigueur, getting someone to blog was the best way to hear the voice inside of their head and to keep up with their adventures. I’d cajole my favorite friends and co-workers, mostly to no avail – I don’t know many people bit with the blogging bug quite so hard as I am.

In a Facebook and Twitter era, my convincing is less essential. Now have people have other, more easily accessible means to express their inner thoughts in conveniently bite-sized fragments, and I’m happy to consume them that way.

That doesn’t mean my refrain of “you should have a blog” has gone the way of the dinosaur. Nay. I save it for special cases when I truly need to acquire as many words as possible from a particular person.

For the past two years my number one target has been my co-worker Mel, a formidable former journalist, certified sommelier, and dedicated foodie mom full of never-ending perk and snark. She’s also the 9-to-5 voice of sanity in my life.

(Seriously, if only we kept a list of the ridiculous ideas she has talked me out of. It could be a blog unto itself.)

When Mel prepared for her maternity leave I badgered her constantly about blogging. “Are you really going to leave me here without you and expect EMAILS to suffice? I need DAILY BABY UPDATES!” My request fell on deaf ears, which grew even more disappointing when we learned that Mel’s son is just about the cutest possible baby of all babies.

However, when she returned she quietly ramped up to writing for Haute Living and being the wine-girl for Drink Philly, plus tweeting, and so the volume of my “rah rah blog!” mantra increased.

Lo and behold, it finally happened! Table for 2 and Half follows the misadventures a foodie whose wee one is finally old enough to dine both in and out. Will his toddler palate warm to her gourmet cooking? Do her favorite restaurants even own a high chair?

The blog is still fledgling, so it’s not packed with posts, but I love every word of it so far. Mel writes exactly how she speaks. She is fretful and funny in her home escapades and descriptive and pointed in her reviews of family-friendly, fully-adult restaurants. While I love her writing on Haute Living and Drink Philly, 2-and-a-Half finds her free to be herself. I’m looking forward to it getting even more madcap as her adventures continue and her son reaches the terrible twos.

Now if I could just get her to write a novel…

You Sound Like a Vulture (an Arcati Crisis adventure)

January 5, 2011 by krisis

For the past few months Gina and I have been rehearsing with Zina, who is also the drummer in E’s band Filmstar.

It started as a speculative exercise – what would Arcati Crisis sound like with drums? We got our answer pretty quickly, as Zina is a ridiculously fast study. We’re already eight songs into drumming up our repertoire, and last night Zina polished off “Bucket Seat” after only a second rehearsal of it.

“Bucket Seat” has been one of my favorite songs from the moment I finished writing it in 2003. When Gina and I made Arcati Crisis formal in 2007 it was the second new song I brought to her to add to the repertoire, and in minutes she found the off-kilter chords that tangle with my staccato diminished stabs. Now the song sounds nude if I play it solo.

Zina was proving to be equally as intuitive on it. After our first run with Zina we fine-tuned a few spots and ran it twice more. It was solid, and we were playing it at the right tempo, but I felt like it was over too quickly.

I turned to Gina. “I think you need to play a guitar solo out of the fast part after the key change.”

One of my favorite aspects of the drumming process is that rather than constrict arrangements around our guitar playing, drums have opened up more space. Zina’s rhythm takes the burden of the two of us. These are songs we’ve played literal hundreds of times, but we keep finding new spaces inside them.

That said, nothing’s structure has really changed yet. The songs are all the same shapes they’ve always been. We haven’t added any funky breakdowns. Or guitar solos.

“A solo?” Gina asked, a little tentatively.

“Sure. You know, like what you play in the intro. Try it.”

We tried it. Gina stopped after four notes, two of which were pretty cool. “It doesn’t quite fit.”

“Yeah, but if you keep the two that worked, and descend…” I started imitating her guitar with my voice, wailing a solo. “raw wah, whear wheh wah, rah weh wah,” I paused for a breath between phrases, “and then a lower ascending line.” I climbed back up the scale, “until it resolves!” I shouted, wheezing and wailing until I reached a bent note at the top.

I finished my performance and looked at Gina expectantly.

“You sounded like a vulture,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“You want me to play it like that?”

“Well, you know. That’s the general shape of it.”

She regarded me skeptically while Zina looked on from behind the kit, bemused.

“I could draw it for you,” I offered, “like David Bowie did for Mick Ronson on ‘Moonage Daydream.’ I could go get crayons.”

“Oh, sure,” Gina mimed with her hands what I assumed to be an elaborate David Bowie crayon drawing, “that might work. Or we could just try to play it a few times.”

And that was how “Bucket Seat” acquired a guitar solo.

You can stream or download our full-length Live @ Rehearsal, Vol. 4 LP for free. Hear “Bucket Seat” and other rocked up Arcati Crisis songs at Dorian’s Parlor Neo-Victorian ball on Saturday March 12. There will be steampunk costumes. We’re also working on a ninja weeknight gig for February. Stay tuned.