Portland Calling
J. Graves plays the faves at Deep Cuts on Tuesday, 2 April 2024.
Babers completes the Rose City doublet as Sailor Down and Indoor Friends sandwich the four-stack bill.
Deep Cuts is on the Mystic River. The proposed site for Robert Kraft’s new soccer stadium is on the Mystic River. How would the potential development impact life at the music & brew & food joint?
Not much. The proposed site is on the water in Everett, the next town over. Sounds like the stadium could hold up to 25,000 people. Though there are only a projected 75 on-site parking spots.
Enough for the VIPs, and the rest of you can get the fuck out!
But if the MBTA can pump up its public transportation options, why not? Still seems like a big disconnect, though, 25,000 versus 75. If you want to hit Deep Cuts for a show after an afternoon soccer game, you’re looking at a 30-45 minute bus trip. You’ll probably just end up taking a rideshare.
Ready for the Revs? The team’s fortunes could rise with a more centrally-located urban home, sized to fit the crowd. Foxborough is not it. As long as the local government isn’t handing out subsidies from the public coffers to seal the deal, it’s got the Hump Day News stamp of approval.
Which is a real stamp. We custom-ordered it online.
Sailor Down
For the longest time (or, like, two times) we wrote up Sailor Down as if they were out of western Mass. Nah, North Shore.
Not that it matters where a band is from, but it’s nice to have the basic facts nailed down. Just keep in mind that this is a fact that’s constantly in flux. People move, and what does the “out of” factoid really mean when half the time different band members are from different towns?
Sailor Down performed as a four-piece, serving up jangly, spangly indie rock with more than a few cuts off 2023’s Lookout Park. Sounds like there is a new EP in the works, with recording to start in a week or so.
Shout out to the shout out of fronter Chloe Deeley’s guitar student. Waddup, Vivian – how you living?
Babers
Babers was the first Portland act of the night. Portland via Los Angeles. The band performed as a two-piece, though it sounds like there’s a fuller band version for hometown gigs. As a two-piece, the pair traded between instruments, sticking to a tight orbit around guitars, vocals, and percussion. It was an opportunity to workshop new material. So said one guitarist of the stripped-down versions: “If they don’t work like this, they don’t work.”
The guitarist in Babers was pulling double duty as the bassist in J. Graves – all that was required was a quick costume (and instrument) change, and then she was good to go.
J. Graves
The de rigueur uniform of the second band of the night out of Stumptown, out of Rip City, out of Little Beirut, out of Bridge City, out of PDX, out of Beervana, was a black plumber’s onesie with the ‘J. Graves’ insignia artfully emblazoned over the heart. All the better to rock you with.
There was some sort of stage bantered scheme involving an invitation to text and a homemade “choose your own adventure” project related to their 2022 album Fortress of Fun. Who knows?
What translated loud & clear, though, was the music. Fronter Jessa Graves is an intense watch, intense listen, delivering precise post punk with a wild-eyed glee and a singer-songwriter’s focus. There’s a love of old time rock n roll in J. Graves’ tunes, along with a refusal to fall into any tired sonic cliches. Sounds like a new album might be in the works.
Indoor Friends
The Indoor Friends strike again! We recently caught the band in the opener slot at The Rockwell, playing a diverse bill with a ska capper. Tonight they were closing out the evening as a five-piece.
The dual fronter vocal harmonies are the axis on which the band pivots, playing around with the pop/rock lexicon while the rhythm section keeps the boat afloat. Fun factoid: the drummer is from Portland, Maine. Which is one of those no-brainer stage banter nuggets to drop on a night with a pair of bands visiting from the namesake city of Oregon.
All hail Portland, Maine, home of the Maine Red Claws. Yeah, you can get out of here with the Maine Celtics nonsense.
Gimme da Clawwwwww!
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