Bushwick School for Music Benefit Show with Rubblebucket, Zula, Celestial Shore

RUBBLEBUCKET: A BIOGRAPHICAL SOMETHING
Rub-ble-buck-et
[ru-b
ul
-
buck
-
it
]
Noun

1.
A vessel in which workers collect waste materials on a construction site;
We
need a rubblebucket for all this rubble.

2.
A wild art?pop band from Brooklyn, NY;
I'm
jonesing for the

new Rubblebucket album 'Survival Sounds'.

3
. The condition of having
hard nipples, or riding a mean yes wave;
He has great Rubblebucket.

Verb
4.
The act of
uncrossing one's arms and letting loose, while strange, new feelings and sounds flood
mind and body, leading to uncontrollable dancing, possible injury and definite sweat;
Man, we really put the rubble in the bucket last night.
My experience with Rubblebucket goes way back – to the summer of 1987, when I was
born and first met lead singer and baritone saxist Kalmia Traver, then four. Kalmia was
already well on her way to being a multi-instrument prodigy (penny whistle, recorder,
alphabet burping), and I was already drowning in the ginormous shadow that she cast just
by breathing. When she put our brother in a dress, blonde wig and heels, let me put on his
lipstick, then forced his elastic micro-limbs into a diva pose, I knew she was a natural
performer.
Kalmia met Alex Toth (band leader, trumpeter, guy, brother-from-another-mother, Jersey)
in a latin jazz combo in Burlington, VT. I'm assuming she also dressed him in drag,
because he liked her and they became friends, painting the town with their loud horn
playing. In 2006, they moved to Boston, where they did respectable things for money.
Kalmia nude modeled for art classes, and Alex was hustling marching band gigs at $50 a
pop, for which he was required to wear a black shirt
and march around for six hours at a
time OR NO PAY NO WATER NO DINNER. It was like that scene in
Oliver Twist
.
Naturally, out of this hot, tarry, magical, broke-ass time, Rubblebucket emerged like a
huge, slippery, post-afrobeat baby. Alex had met trombonist Adam Dotson at one of these
marching gigs, and the three began composing and playing the first songs in
Rubblebucket's repertoire. Soon, they were joined by three more friends – guitarist Ian
Hersey, drummer Dave Cole, and 15-seater van Puppy – and started taking the
Rubblebucket show on the road.
The first time I heard Rubblebucket perform live, two things happened: I realized this
was the coolest thing on earth, like the lovechild of a unicorn and the Tom Tom Club, and
I asked them if I could sell their merchandise at shows. You know what they say – those
who can't do, sell merch. Night after night, standing behind that table of CDs, thongs and
beer cozies, while Rubblebucket transformed the crowd from a skeptical wall of people
into one big, happy, silly, jiving, open-hearted mass was an unforgettable experience.
Their music does that – it just does. You can't know it until you see it. And everyone who
sees it, knows it. Like
Paste
, who said it best: "
music that will make anyone with a pulse
dance." (I'll annotate this by extending it to you pulse-less readers.
You, zombie. I know
you're out there.) The Rubblebucket condition has spread, melting cares in its way. It
barges in like an escaped rhino and triggers everyone, everywhere, to let loose and feel.
Arm-crossing be damned!
I've been to many Rubblebucket shows. But it wasn't until I was mid-crowd in NYC's
Bowery Ballroom and heard a guy in front of me say to his friend "the singer looks so hot tonight" (but? Gross? That's my sister?) that I knew Rubblebucket had made it. The
experts will tell you that, actually, this was when they released their 2011 album
Omega
La La
, with its headlining tracks "Came Out of Lady" and "Silly Fathers," and reached a
whole new, larger audience.
Or, when they flew out to LA to play on Jimmy Kimmel
Live, and got free pizza and Alex almost puked backstage. Or, when their song "Came
out of a Lady" appeared in the movie
Drinking Buddies
, and I was suddenly one giant
leap closer to meeting Anna Kendrick (that's when I knew
I
had made it). Or, when their
green rooms started stocking guacamole. Or, when their 2012 and 2013 EPs
Oversaturated
and
Save Charlie
introduced fans to the next and the next evolution of
Rubblebucket, and more and more people fell in love. Now, much to my drool and dire
impatience, the band is hovering on the knife's edge of their next highly anticipated
album release,
Survival Sounds
(Communion Records, Aug. 2014). Prepare yourself,
universe.
Rubblebucket is many things and nothing at all; it's a mindset, a legend, a feeling, a
mystery; a mischievous, playful, boundary-smashing blast of sound that you can sit still
and wonder at, or turn off your mind and move wildly to. Or both at the same time. As
Kalmia said, when she handed me one of her now-famous peanut butter, cheddar cheese,
cabbage, honey tacos, "This is the weirdest, most delicious thing you will ever taste."
And if you won't take it on my authority, take it on the authority of a small, but reputable
publication called
Rolling Stone
, reporting from Bonnaroo: "
Rubblebucket revved up like
an indie-rock Miami Sound Machine, dancers, horns and all." And if you won't take it on
Rolling Stone's
authority, cleave to the words of guitarist Ian: "Our music is like being at
a raging party, but in the center of it, there's this beautiful painting that you're staring at,
trying to wrap your mind around." Or the words of our dad, Tim Traver: "Kids these
days."
- Mollie Traver


"Twin Loss" is a tense yet tempered psych pop song by Brooklyn's Zula, a band fronted by cousins Henry and Nate Terepka. It deals with a rather dark and emotionally draining theme: twin loss, the feeling of incompleteness and grief someone experiences when their twin dies at birth. The song's narrator is "longing to transcend life and merge with one's true counterpart," the band says. "Twin Loss" will appear on Zula's first full-length album, out in October via Inflated Records. In the mean time, the band have released three-track Twin Loss EP, which you can stream in its entirety below. - Stereogum
Zula is currently working on a debut LP, set to be released this summer.


The whispers about Celestial Shore's debut full-length, 10x, began with the release of the balmy I'm-so-done-with-you song "Valerie" on Stereogum earlier this year. Sound traveled: the Brooklyn trio joined Hometapes and 10x will be released September 3rd in partnership with Local Singles (the new label begun by Brad Oberhofer). In nine songs, Celestial Shore deconstructs city life, the history of pop music, and their own jazz educations into something both heartbreakingly raw and mystically timeless. In between the lines, the band exalts the vibrant scene they call home: the album was mixed by Deerhoof's Greg Saunier, includes Empress Of's Lorely Rodriguez on vocals, and features cover art by Prince Rama.