Since 2008, Rockstar Energy Drink has brought metal fans with the most high energy shows of the summer. The Mayhem Festival has, in the past, included main stage acts such as Marilyn Manson, Slayer, Disturbed, and Slipknot, as well as side stage acts like Underoath, Job for a Cowboy, and Whitechapel. The Mayhem Festival has two side stages and one mainstage. This year, the side stage bands were Norma Jean, Winds of Plague, Shadows Fall, Chimaira, Hatebreed, 3 Inches of Blood, In This Moment, and Atreyu. This year’s main stage, started off with Five Finger Death Punch – who in the pervious year were on the side stage, Lamb of God, Rob Zombie, and headlined by Korn.

The night was filled with true metal fans and tons of mayhem. The side stages brought high energy and high hopes for the rest of the night. Despite the heat and humidity of an August day in Washington, DC, that did not stop fans from coming out to see the opening bands. As the day went on and the side stage acts had ended, Five Finger Death Punch brought an amazing performance, that had proven why they had been asked to join the main stage this year. Virginians, Lamb of God made the locals proud, playing hits such as “Redneck”, “Laid to Rest”, and “Hit the Wall”. Rob Zombie, which all the fans would say was probably the best of the night, came out from a robot and with flames and theatrics brought the crowd to it’s feet. Finally, ending the night was Korn, who covered a Metallica song and played their hit, “Twisted Transistor.” In my opinion, the band was not up to par with what many fans came to expect from Korn. Despite a bit of a letdown, Mayhem Festival brought the ruckus and uproar to Washington, DC, just like it has in past years.

Hail The Sun may not be one of the most distinguished acts in it’s genre, but with their recent release of  POW! Right in the Kisser!, the Chico based foursome isn’t going to go unnoticed for much longer.

The album’s name might make you think twice before giving it a serious listen, but the sound this band has created is anything but a joke. Falling into both the progressive rock and post-hardcore genres, Hail The Sun’s debut is a blend of rough vocals almost identical to those of Anthony Green and intricate musical parts that resemble those of Coheed and Cambria and Boys Night Out’s Trainwreck.

The album opens up with Ready Or Not, There I Go, which has a much more rough, almost live, sound to it than the rest of the songs. It appears slightly out of place next to the other tracks, but definitely deserving of a spot on the record. Dinosaur, God Hates It When We Think sets out with a strong bass line and smoothly runs through the first verse into one of the catchiest choruses on the album. It shows the depth of their musical abilities and is one of the highlight songs on the release; however, the rest of the CD offers just as much. Railmaster switches tempos with ease and is one of the few songs with a light, cheery sound to it. It presents a variety of sounds that manage to tie together without sounding sloppy.  The album continues with five more tracks and ends with Crying Is Only Manly If Splinters Come Out, one of the strongest on POW!. If it was titled only “Crying”, it could have easily slid onto Trainwreck and posed as a BNO song. The songs overall are very well written, balanced and catchy. Although it is a first release by the band, the only amateur aspect is the recording, which is to be expected and doesn’t take anything away from the record.  My only complaint about  P!RITK! is that most of the songs seem almost drowned out by the drums, at certain points the drumming overpowers the vocals. With that said, POW! Right in The Kisser! offers a refreshing and original sound that somehow fits into today’s “scene” without hiding behind breakdowns and pointless lyrics. The record by far one of my favorites of the year, and is worth looking into.

The album can be streamed free here and here

Review by Kristin Allen

Goo Goo Dolls on Tour!

 With a new album coming out at the end of the month, the Goo Goo Dolls embarked on the Something for the Rest of Us Tour, with support from Switchfoot and The Spill Canvas.

The Goo Goo Dolls, who have been together for 24 years, have been on this tour since April and in November will go on the UK leg of this tour. On August 3rd, the Goo Goo Dolls graced Pier Six Pavilion in Baltimore, MD for a large crowd and they did not disappoint. Even if you only know the Goo Goo Dolls from their hits such as, “Iris”, “Slide” “Broadway” or “Before It’s Too Late”, they are still a band that is worth seeing.
The show began with The Spill Canvas, who set the easy-going tone for the show. But it was Switchfoot that brought the energy early on, with lead singer Jonathan Foreman performing the first two songs in the middle of the crowd. Switchfoot played songs such as “Meant to Live”, “Mess of Me”, and “The Sound”. Finally after much anticipation, the sights and sounds of the Goo Goo Dolls brought the crowd to a joyous embrace of singing along and dancing. Goo Goo Dolls ended their set with “Iris”, their latest single, “Home”, and finally, “Broadway”, bringing the conclusion of their concert with an amazing high.
As the Goo Goo Dolls come to their 25th anniversary, there is no doubt that these boys are not a band to write off. The Goo Goo Dolls are still as energized as ever and will continue to rock on with many years to come.

Photos and Review by Sandra Sanchez

July 8, 2010 – Scream It Like You Mean It Tour in Sayreville, NJ

New Jersey brought out one hell of a crowd to kick off the Scream It Like You Mean It Tour! Starland Ballroom was completely packed; way more than usual. To match the amped up crowd, every band brought their A-game.  With special guest The Devil Wears Prada, the line-up for this tour couldn’t have been put together any better. An intense balance of screams, keys, breakdowns, and lyrics of understanding – these bands had what this generation of alternative/heavy music-lovers feed on. Specifically Dance Gavin Dance and We Came As Romans had the best performances of the night. Both had very high energy and constantly gave the crowd something to keep not only their ears, but eyes entertained. Definitely bands to add to your bucket-list of live performances to see in the future (multiple times at that).

June 20, 2010 & June 26, 2010 – Bamboozle Roadshow in Philadelphia & Long Island

With the lineups changing for every stop on the tour, it was pretty cool seeing the bands at different times in the day. Although most of the bands played the same set every night, Third Eye Blind changed it up which was awesome. Speaking of TEB, the lineup for this year’s Roadshow was a fun mix to listen to and enjoy. It brought out a wider range of ages and sent everyone back to those grade school days when Simple Plan’s “I’m Addicted” was on repeat and Good Charlotte’s album “The Chronicles of Life and Death” set sail. The best part about this lineup is the bands got the chance to play and make friends with bands that inspired themselves growing up. Based on tweets from Jack and Alex from All Time Low, this tour is something they will never forget.

That said, the general feel of the Bamboozle Roadshow was very upbeat and exciting but not to the intensity of the Bamboozle Right/Left or Warped Tour where you’re running to catch a band every 20-30 minutes. There are two stages, but once the side stage is finished, the main stage sets off. However, just like those bigger festivals, there’s a designated spot for merch, crazy lines for signings, overpriced water and food, and of course the amazing array of people. Everything just adds up to a sick tour to blog about for sure.

Before the second show of their tour supporting Polar Bear Club, Greg Dunn, vocalist and guitarist of Purchase, New York-based band Moving Mountains, took time to talk to Preach Electric.

This is the second night of the Polar Bear Club tour. How has it been so far?

It’s been fun. It’s been our first tour since November, so it’s a little daunting but it’s been cool. It’s exciting for us to be on tour with Polar Bear Club ‘cause we’ve been trying to set that up for months now. It’s cool, all the bands are cool, it’s kind of like a diverse group of bands that should be fun.

You’ve said that you’re pulling out more songs from Pneuma for this tour, so how do you go about deciding which songs to play?

Uhm, well we tried, we kind of did it. We just kind of asked everyone. This is probably the last tour that we’ll do where we’ll play songs off that record just because we’ll have a new record and we’ll play that. But we sort of just asked people and then figured out which songs we could really play. We’re not really a good band.

You’ve had the opportunity to tour more of the US recently. Is there anywhere that you haven’t hit that you’d most like to play?

Yeah, I want to play in Nashville, which we wanted to play on this tour but it didn’t work out. That’s a tough question, but I think Nashville’s the first place that comes to mind. Florida would be cool, just because it’s Florida and it would be nice to hang out there. But it terms of like, music history, I think I’d want to play in Nashville.

Being a student, how have you balanced school and touring?

Uh, I don’t, really. I’m enrolled in college. I go for music, for recording. I don’t really go to class much. It depends. For me it’s not that hard because the school isn’t that demanding. But it’s sometimes stressful. Once in a while I have to take a gen. ed., like this year I had to take a class about personal and social relationships and how to be a good boyfriend, so that kind of sucks. But no, it’s easy. If I was going to school for history or literature, it would be tough. Like our guitar player goes for literature and I don’t know how he does it. But yeah, it’s easy; it’s not that hard. It’s been weird living a double life, but… If I had my way, I wouldn’t be going to school, but you sort of have to.

What are your plans for after this tour when it ends at the end of this month?

We come home, we have a week off, then we start recording a new record immediately. We really want to get that finished, so that’s our immediate plan.

How far along is the album?

It’s like ninety percent written, like a skeleton of the songs is about ninety percent written but for us the songs really flesh out when we record them. It’s pretty much there. It’s done, almost completely; we just have to record it.

I read in another interview that the new songs are less post-rock and a little more post-hardcore than your previous releases so where do the two influences come from?

We listen to a lot of that. Well when we first started the band we listened to a lot of that post-rock stuff, like we were really into Appleseed Cast, Explosions in the Sky, Mogwai, Hammock. That’s sort of where our initial following came from, those instrumental rock bands. We also listen to, I don’t know, Poison the Well and, you know, Thrice, and bands that are much heavier. The new record still sounds very much like something we would do. It’s not crazy different. It still sounds like a Moving Mountains record.

Like on Pneuma and Foreword, are there going to be trombone parts, and more alternate instrumentation like that?

Definitely. That was like one of the things that we always try to do in our music is sort of incorporate instrumentation that isn’t always heard in mainstream hardcore bands or music, whatever you want to say. We’re actually having, which I’m really excited about, actual players on this record. On the older stuff it was sort of me programming fake instruments and stuff but this time around we have like, a real cellist.

As a band, you’re fairly active in communicating with listeners through social networking and at shows. Which social networking site do you think is most useful in staying in touch?

Most effective? Probably Facebook, just because I don’t know, maybe there isn’t another site to take over it, like when Facebook destroyed MySpace. Facebook is definitely the most powerful. It’s like real people as opposed to comedians and porn stars on MySpace, or you get spam all the time and you’re like, “I don’t know who this person is.” Facebook is cool because I’m not friends with fans through the Moving Mountains Facebook.   Like Gregory Dunn, my personal Facebook is friends with our actual fans and I can actually talk to people, which I think is so cool.

What would you say has been the most gratifying experience you’ve had with a listener?

With a listener? Wow, that’s hard. I mean, we get e-mails all the time from people saying how music has sort of changed their lives and it’s sort of a thing that you can’t completely take in. You hear it, you understand that your music has affected someone, but it doesn’t really sink in. It’s hard to really grasp. I find the craziest feeling’s when a lot of people in the Armed Forces, I feel like I’ve met a lot of those dudes, who are like, “your music is so impactful.” That always affects me the most, for some reason.

When you’re not recording and finishing up the album, do you have any touring plans for the rest of the year?

Uhm, no… It’s hard, like, we’ve gotten the offers to do tours, and there’s certainly the idea of tours, but our main priority is just to go home, write a record, and if it takes us four months to record then we would need four months. Obviously we hope that doesn’t happen. Once we’re done with the record then we’re gonna start figuring out touring stuff. Ideally, in a perfect world, we would do the record in July and August and just be on the road the rest of the year.

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Although Dunn had remarked earlier, looking at the line winding around the venue, that it didn’t appear as if there were any “post-rock kids” in attendance, there were at least a few Moving Mountains fans scattered throughout the audience.  As promised, Moving Mountains’ set was fairly heavy on material off of their first release, including “Cover the Roots/Lower the Stems,” “Aphelion,” and “8105.”  The latter song in particular incited excitement amongst the Moving Mountains fans in the crowd, it being what one could consider to be a signature MovMou song, yet one that the band has rarely performed.  Off of their 2008-released EP Foreword “With One’s Heart in One’s Mouth” and “Light & Shapes” were played.  The band also played a yet to be titled new song that they debuted during their Bamboozle set last month.  Its more fast-paced and “harder” qualities have led to it being compared to the previously mentioned “Lights & Shapes.”  The song certainly causes one to anticipate the release of Moving Mountains’ upcoming album, for which no official details have been released.

Interview conducted by Jenna Korus
Photograph by Kaitlin Higgins

Resulting from the overwhelming success of their debut LP, Oracular Spectacular, MGMT’s newest follow up two years later graced “Most Anticipated Albums of 2010” lists across the internet. In this case, however, “anticipated” was defined as both extraordinarily excited, and, well, biting your nails in a nervous manner to see if the duo could top past infectious hits such as the greatly-known “Electric Feel” or “Kids”.

On March 9, 2010, the first single, “Flash Delirium”, off the upcoming Congratulations was released for free download. The turn-out, unfortunately, was not as warm as any one had hoped. The single disappointed MGMT fans and was dismissed almost immediately, leaving listeners praying for the album release to rekindle their faith in the band.
When April 13, 2010 rolled around, people everywhere got their hands on Congratulations, and while the album was still wish-washy to the ears of previous fans, MGMT placed #2 on the billboard charts, selling 66,000 copies in their first week, while Oracular Spectacular hardly sold 17,000 in it’s debut. Carved in stone at #1 was still the flippy-haired fairy Justin Bieber, who would take a blessing from God to beat out, so the success could be considered nearly monumental.
Congratulations is considered the making or breaking point in MGMT’s career – a risky stylistic departure from the drug-induced tunes produced two years earlier. MGMT’s sophomore creation is the love-child of something one might find in their grandparent’s vintage record collection, and the synthesizers straight from a rave in the heart of New York City. The album follows a more psychedelic, 50’s theme with tracks such as “Someone’s Missing,” in which Vanwyngarden starts slow and quietly, his vocals echoing in an almost spooky matter when finally the song breaks into a funky, toe-tapping outro. “It’s Working” opens Congratulations with a post-modern bass line and fluffy mood.
While there are certainly no Electric Feels or Time To Pretends on the new album, Congratulations hasn’t been a complete flop. It has raised MGMT to a new level of success, including headlining the two-day mega festival Bamboozle in East Rutherford, NJ on May 2, 2010.
At approximately 8:15 PM on May 2, the members of MGMT trickled onto the main stage before a sea of people. The quirky pair, Ben Goldwasser and Andrew Vanwyngarden, accompanied by their stage band, warmed up their instruments anxiously, and one could even go as far as to sense the feeling of a little boy on the first night of Hanukkah. While their musical styles may have changed, Vanwyngarden still sported a quaintly clashing fashion, clad in a mix of red-striped skinny pants and a light blue t-shirt.
Their most recent single, “Flash Delirium”, kicked off the night to a calm yet playful start as bodies moved in sync with the pit-pattering of the snare drum beats. The skill of MGMT’s live performance is almost too good to be true. The precision of Vanwyngarden’s vocals through out the night is baffling – almost identical to the studio vocals and a true breath of fresh-air after the auto-tune fest that occurred on the very same stage earlier that day.
The night pulled on, keeping up the theme of perfection with “Time to Pretend”, the mod-rock “Song For Dan Treacy”, “It’s Working”, and so on. The highlight of the set, of course, was when the catchy flute intro of “Electric Feel” blasting through the stadium, and every set of feet was suddenly floating from the pavement.
The show closed with a power-house performance of “Kids” that got everyone off their feet and dancing away the end Bamboozle 2010.
MGMT, with out a doubt, left everyone revved and ready for their upcoming tour, where you can catch them this summer.

Article by Emily Bevington

Photos by Ali Carcache

Punk band Against Me! headlined Toad’s Place in New Haven, Connecticut on Monday, April 26^th.  Supporting the band were Moneybrother and Dead to Me. 

Moneybrother, the project of Swedish pop artist Anders Wendin, performed first.  Wendin being the former frontman of the punk band Monster, Moneybrother played with a punk edge that one would not necessarily expect from a solo venture.  The catchy pop supporting Wendin’s raspy vocals were reminiscent of Bruce Springsteen, making them compatible with Against Me!’s music.  While the venue was near-empty as Moneybrother performed, a few dozen more people filed in towards the end of the set, and those that were in attendance listened appreciatively.

Dead to Me, from San Francisco, played soon after, playing a brief but powerful set of their brand of straight-up punk.  The group was a bit preachy, opting to discuss politics between songs.  The audience was not very responsive, but the talk of world peace and Dead to Me’s bouncy punk songs were endearing.  As their set went on and more people lined the front of the stage, the crowd got a bit more into the band, although it was clear Against Me! was almost everyone’s reason for attendance.

Against Me! took the stage with the lights dimmed, to a muffled recording of Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots Were Made for Walking.”  The crowd rushed the stage as the band opened with “High Pressure Low,” a song off their upcoming album White Crosses.  From then on they played an approximate hour and a half of almost straight music.  Against Me! is not a band for stage banter, the only times vocalist and guitarist Tom Gabel spoke were to thank the previous bands as well as their fans, and to urge the crowd to take care of one another when things got a bit rough.  The band played a fairly varied mix of songs from their discography, including a few off of the new album, including the previously mentioned “High Pressure Low” as well as the title track “White Crosses” and the recent single “I Was a Teenage Anarchist.”  The crowd, who was in movement almost the entirety of the set, slowed down considerably during the new songs, despite their catchiness.  Against Me! is undoubtedly a sing-along live band, making new songs that the audience is not necessarily familiar with hard to take, although certainly not received poorly.  Also from newer material, off of 2007’s New Wave the band played “Thrash Unreal” and “Borne on the FM Waves of the Heart,” their two most commercially successful singles to date.  The fans in attendance that night undeniably enjoyed the older songs, those off of their first three full-lengths.  A pit opened up during “Sink, Florida, Sink,” from 2003’s As the Eternal Cowboy, and re-opened several times throughout the remainder of the night.  After an already substantially lengthy set, Against Me! played a several song encore, closing their performance with the fan favorite “Baby, I’m An Anarchist” off their first studio album, Reinventing Axl Rose.  The four members left the stage to a content and cheering crowd, with a few words of thanks and appreciative smiles.

Against Me!’s fifth studio album, White Crosses, will be released June 8^th on Sire Records.

Article by Jenna Korus

Photo courtesy of Ryan Russell

April 7, 2010 – A Day To Remember, August Burns Red, Silverstein, Enter Shikari in Philadelphia

Toursick North America 2010′s Philadelphia stop was sold out, and you could definitely tell the crowd throughly enjoyed it. From the opening band to the headliner, the fans were going nuts and sweating since they walked through the doors. Enter Shikari got the crowd pretty hyped up and brought about an energetic vibe. Next Silverstein brought their usual screamo set leaving the crowd stoked for the last two bands. August Burns Red was simply incredible. Every member was clearly very talented in their own ways and put together, they created insanity. Finally, A Day To Remember’s set was outstanding; very visually appealing and their set was well though out switching up between new/old albums, playing “If It Means A Lot To You” second to last, and ending the set with bursts of smoke, confetti, and streamers everywhere.

On April 23rd, the booming voices of teenage boys and girls alike chanting “We want Chris!” pervaded through the TLA on South Street. As the lights dimmed over a stage clad in peace signs, shrill screams broke through the ballroom and a spotlight dropped on 19 year old Christofer Drew, better known as NeverShoutNever, from Joplin, Missouri. Drew opens the introduction of “Love is Our Weapon”, the first track on his debut full-length album What Is Love?, crooning a message of peace and unity to the sold-out venue.
However, behind all of the love, peace, and unity being preached lies the story of a regular teenager from Missouri, struggling to find himself and the love he sings about. At the early age of only 16, Drew dropped out of high school to pursue his talents in the music business. For Christofer Drew, doing what he loved meant breaking the hearts of his parents and brother, and growing through his final teen years on the road.

It all started with a Mac, a guitar, and a much needed release in Drew’s life. Soon he was pumping out music left and right, and finally released his first EP, Demo-schmemo, on February 9, 2008. His first fifteen minutes of fame didn’t come until five months later with the release of his first single “BigCityDreams” and a performance on TRL on July twenty-ninth. Girls across the country went crazy for the young song-writer, and not long after he was booking tours with artists such as Danger Radio, Hellogoodbye, and Ace Enders, but as black goes with white, hate grew strongly in opposition of the love for Christofer. From the very start Drew has made feel-good, happy-go-lucky music none the less pleasing to teenage girls of all ages. People have asked, however, where does all of the positivity bubble from despite all of the harsh judgment he is exposed to?
“Since I was about thirteen, I have always been a very heart broken person,” Drew admits in a Myspace blog post earlier this month. “I mostly only listened to melancholy or depressing tunage, although, as I started to get a couple more years on me, I started to develop a love for feel good music. I think in a sense it fills the void. I just want to create music that makes people feel. It doesn’t always have to be happy, but I always want there to be emotion behind the music.” Christofer Drew holds true to his claims even now on What is Love? with a variety of emotions conveyed from nostalgia (“The Past”), the beauty of having a crush (“Can’t Stand It”, “I Love You 5”) , to the darkness of a divorce (“What Is Love?”), however, never displaying any messages of hate even when the emotion he is provoking in some people is antipathy.
The young singer-song writer has heard it all from accusations of being gay, to being a “poser” of the hippie-like vibes he puts out to his fanbase. As of late the internet is populated with Youtube videos, facebook groups, and livejournal threads dedicated to the bashing of Drew and his music. A wide range of defamation plasters web pages with statements such as “When I log on to NeverShoutNever’s Myspace and see hundreds of fan girls post messages about how much they would love Christofer Drew’s dick in their mouth, the word poser just doesn’t cut it,” to much harsher claims accusing Drew of sleeping with underage girls. (“Christofer Drew is a fake who gets his jollies sittin’ around writing up laughable songs to entice 13 year old scene girls into his tight pants.”) Cruel teens have even gone as far as to say he is talentless, a phony, a “faggot.” (“I didn’t know 3 chord songs with stereotypical and recycled lyrics required a significant amount of talent. Go figure!”)
A more reasonable source of hate comes from Youtube channels where kids have posted videos titled “I Hate Chris Drew” and “Chris Drew is a Faggot”, as one would notice are usually videos of kids talking in circles about their empty hate for Drew, and are, ironically enough, usually dressed quite similar to the musician himself.
Christofer Drew, however, addresses the crude remarks in a fashion that is nothing less than mature and cool-headed. When asked up-front about rumors of his sexuality later on in the same Q&A blog, Drew responded casually stating “I am 100% straight. I have been called gay ever since I started playing music. I guess I do come off that way (high voice, tight clothes, girl hair). I assure you though that I love me some lady.” Christofer brushes the hate off and keeps his goal of spreading the love strong, addressing the haters as having a “thirst for the limelight”.

The harder negativity to cope with came from his family, however, when he first set out on his journey. “I got kicked out of my house for a little bit,” Drew has confessed online. In songs such as The Past (And I saw the look in my brother’s eyes/ When I told him I was leaving/He couldn’t help but despise me/He’s wanted out his whole life) and Damn Dog (Cause’ Dad, I called you my friend/My best friend at that/And I know that I’m a loud man/But give me another chance) he references his family’s distaste for his decisions. Most would agree with his mother’s pain, considering when he set out, Drew was a mere sixteen years old, playing to a fan base that were his peers. The independence has always been taken well, despite acquiring a chain smoking habit and a love of bare feet.

Avid supporters defend Christofer relentlessly, accusing each and every hater of either being sparked from jealousy or cynicism. When it boils down to it, though, there is always going to be hate to challenge the love, war to smother peace, and darkness to put out the light. Drew can be seen as somewhat of a hero to our music scene, tackling mountains of negative energy to spread love through even the toughest of storms – a public figure using his popularity to put the idea of total peace and unity into the youth of today’s head’s. Christofer Drew is determined, dammit, and won’t let anything stand in his way.
“I dropped out of high school. I’ve been a fuck-up to my parents for the last two years. If one thing that I’ve learned it’s that you have to live with selflessness instead of selfishness, because our society trains us to be so fucking selfish, guys. It’s not about you. It’s not about me. It’s about we. It’s about we together as one. We can do this, guys. Just live with love. Live in a harmony with everyone else. I love you guys so much, and I respect you guys so much.” Drew declares to the crowd after an emotional, tearful encore performance of “The Past” before walking off stage and concluding the night.

Despite the inner and surrounding struggle, Christofer Drew managed to come out on top, standing strong through a war of hate and negative messages, and his success proves the boy won’t be going anywhere for a long time. Expect more from Chris and check him out all summer at Warped Tour Twenty Ten!

Article by Emily Bevington

Photos by Ali Carcache