Besides being an excellent name for a roller derby team, Toronto’s Lipstick Junkies exist solely to blend the yesteryear sound of funk with modern indie rock, all the while soaking it that neon-district downtown vibe. The rhythms are an appealing combination of bouncy, smooth and grooving. As evident in tracks such as Desire and Lighthouse, the melodies are infectious, and the sexual spirit of funk is effectively captured and expressed through the music and lyrics. In an age where traditional genres are becoming more manufactured, The Lipstick Junkies have retained the essence of funk-rock, and have achieved their own genuine sound. In a nutshell, The Lipstick Junkies are a band perfectly suited to the small-club-in-a- big-city environment. If you feel like getting your groove on, you can satisfy those urges by taking in The Lipstick Junkies @ The Cavern Bar on July 30th. - Chris PJ D

The popular San Francisco based beach rock band, The She's have announced the dates for their summer west coast tour. The string of shows does, of course include a local San Francisco gig at The Chapel on August 14th. If you're new to town or have just never had the chance to check out a live performance from The She's, we whole-heartedly recommend that you take the chance to see their upcoming show!

If you've got friends from out of town or are enjoying a vacation somewhere on the coast, you'll have the chance to see a great Bay Area band right in your vacation destination!

 
7.28 - Redwood Bar, Downtown LA, CA $
7.29 - Burger Records Hump Night, Grand Air, Fullerton, CA @
7.30 - Pappy and Harriet's, Pioneertown, CA
7.31 - Duffy's, Chico, CA %
8.01 - Corner Haus (House), Portland, OR **
8.02 - The Future (House), Seattle, WA $$
8.03 - The Hindenburg, Vancouver, BC Canada ##
8.05 - The National Hotel, Nevada City, CA ***
8.14 - The Chapel, San Francisco, CA *&

* w/ Pyromids, Emotional
^ w/ The Memories, The Lentils, & Grape Room
# w/ Growwing Pains
$ w/ Dripmen, Ugly Kids, deadpanzies
@ w/ June Holiday, Grand Air
% w/ The She Things + TBA
** w/ Ladywolf, Makeout
$$ w/ Mope Grooves + TBA
## w/ Jody Glenham + TBA
*** w/ Dazeys
*& w/ Swiftumz, Smiles, Air Surgeon

The San Francisco based singer/songwriter, indie pop musician Luke Sweeney will be completing his residency with Miller Carr at the Make Out Room in San Francisco on Sunday, July 26th.

For the final event, Tim Cohen of Magic Trick and The Fresh & Onlys will be performing a solo set. The Chico, California based soul singer/songwriter Pat Hull will be playing the line up with musician Nicholas Campbell. This is going to be a very intimate event, showcasing some of the Bay Area's best male vocalists and guitar players.

In this rocky time in the San Francisco's arts and music scene, we should certainly pull together and support our hard working local musicians! Artists like Luke Sweeney and Tim Cohen have had staying power in the Bay Area over the years, surviving venues getting shut down, neighborhoods morphing and the depletion of resources for independent local musicians.

The best we can do for our community is show up, have fun, encourage our local artists and buy drinks and merch!

Last month, I had the pleasure of reviewing The Foresters' latest single, "Machines." This month, I have the greater pleasure of premiering their album, Sun Songs. The record, released through Dord Music Group, reveals a wide array of 90s rock influences - Built to Spill being the strongest comparison that comes to mind. Energetic guitar riffs run rampant through these tracks, my favorite being those on "How the World." The lone opening riff immediately caught my attention, before hitting a feedback swell and launching into raucous guitar revelry. Summer is the perfect time to open up your windows and blow out your speakers, and Sun Songs is the perfect soundtrack to help you achieve maximum aural satisfaction. 

In addition to the record release this week, Mother Brother Studios will be posting a Salon Sessions video of The Foresters this Friday, July 24. For more info about the band, check out their Facebook page.

-Dan McMahon (@dmcmhn) 
 

Goddamnit kids, there's just somethin' about truly earnest music that hits a chord deep within' yer chesty bits where the soul feels like it lives, and you just can't fake that shit no matter how hard you try. Twee and cutesy pop were like scientifically condensed versions of cute, yeah, but they really never got away from the saccharine nature that comes with something so deliberately boiled down. It might be cute, but it's like callin' one of those whipped cream injected whippersnapper cupcakes at Hey Cupcake! sweet: yeah we all get it, but it's not the kinda complicated and sticking sweetness-based revelations that, say, your mom's apricot cake baked in her small town home's old-ass oven will ever get ya.

All that's a very complex way to explain somethin' pretty damn simple, which is that Les Zombies makes music that is just real goddamn cute and entirely earnest-feelin', and that newest track "Unravel" is without question the most authentically un-heavy and adorable American love song we've heard in a damn long time. It's like a soundtrack for a kind of indie romance film set in the beige-and-green-washed suburbs with a lot of 80s clothes and cars that just doesn't exist anymore, and which would probably feel real put-on if it was made these days. Somehow this band keeps nailing this sound and sentiment in a pitch-perfect way that makes it feel like you can just go live in that kinda smaller, simpler, cuter world for a while. That ain't a bad thing in these angry, immediate days, in my opinion. Listen below, and let's give the past and the idea of love a bit of time to play around in our heads again as a less public, cuter, more personal thing that's still confusing but maybe more for the simple human parts and less for the whole mess of new problems that a social media, contemporary bae-infused narrative life has put onto shit. It's cute music that sounds great y'all, get up on it and let it get you feelin' some good, possibly bygone way.