Two Door Cinema Club’s Big Night Out

Alex Timble

“I’ve never seen you so happy in my life,” said a young woman to her friend as they exited Marathon Music Works on Monday night after the Two Door Cinema Club show. That night the warehouse was packed with millennials who cut class to get there early and had clearly been excited about this show for a long time. Fans above kept the fans below cool as they scrambled to the stage front.

Albums That Don’t Suck As Much As I Once Thought

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While on a music-deletion rampage sometime last week, I realized that a lot of the albums I downloaded legally purchased ages ago only had roughly 2 or 3 songs on them that I recognized/ever listened to.  I gave some of these albums that I originally didn’t like more of a chance to woo me, and on most accounts I was pleasantly surprised.  

Pilgrimage Music Festival

Cake at Pilgrimage Festival (source: Mickey Bernal Photography)
Cake at Pilgrimage Festival (source: Mickey Bernal Photography)

Pilgrimage is a Franklin music festival that seems to be themed around largely AC/DC rip off bands. That said, for a music festival in its second year, they attracted some big names: Violent Femmes, Cake, and Beck, to name a few.

Whitney Brings Energy, Tears, & Flowers to Exit/In

Julien Ehrlich at Exit/In
Julien Ehrlich of Whitney at Exit/In, Oct. 3rd.

Everyone’s new favorite band, Whitney, has captured the hearts of many an ironic-flower-crown American millennial with just half an hour (exactly half an hour) of recorded music. At Exit/In Monday night, they recaptured those same hearts during the first show of their fall tour.

Finding your Fall Favorites

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Photo credit: Vanderbilt’s Peabody website

After what felt like an eternally hot summer, fall is finally here. The temperatures have finally dropped out of the nineties, classes are starting to pick up, and the pumpkin spice latte is now back at Starbucks. In light of all of these other changes you may feel tempted to hold on to your old playlists full of summer pop in the hopes that you can somehow will back the days of road trips and beach days. However, like all things in life, your music too must change. Here are some recommendations for how to shift your old summer songs into a collection of new fall favorites:

WRVU Unplugged: Swag Swag Like Caillou

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Kristen sits on a backless bench in the hallway of a classroom building. It’s dark outside and the hallway is barely lit. All you can hear are the handfuls people loudly roaming through the building, filing into classrooms for meetings.  She looks completing unfazed by the conversations around us, and looks confidently prepared to discuss her show, Swag Swag Like Caillou.

Indie Folk Band vs Beyonce: A Comparison

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Photo credit: Jeff Lombardo

Last night I had the honor of being graced by the presence of Queen Bey herself. Hitting Nashville as part of her Formation World Tour, the show was nothing short of spectacular; there were fireworks, pools of water, and instantaneous costume changes throughout the course of the performance.

St. Lucia Kicks Off Their Fall Tour In Nashville

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Last Friday, I got the opportunity to see my favorite band, St. Lucia, perform for the third time. When I say favorite band, I mean more along the lines of obsession, so this concert was something that I had been waiting for since the last time that I saw them in November 2014. I saw them open for Foster the People in 2013, and something about their tropical, 80’s-like vibes just got to me, and I fell in love with their colorful, vibrant music.

Roosevelt’s Big Debut

(source: Pitchfork)
(source: Pitchfork)

Roosevelt is a one man project by producer/DJ Marius Lauber of Cologne, Germany. He’s been making music for over 3 years, and recently French powerhouse label Greco Roman, picked him up. His debut album, Roosevelt, was released this August.

Preoccupations’ Classic Post-Punk Lives On

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It’s been written to death now, the story of Preoccupations (fka Viet Cong) and their name change. In short – amid a storm of cancelled shows and controversy, Viet Cong had to change their name, so they landed on Preoccupations. What’s clear, though, is that the controversy did nothing to knock them off their course of making fantastic, classically post-punk records.

WRVU Unplugged: Heena Koona

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Two nights ago I’m sitting at my desk, dead eyed, and I open innumerable Chrome tabs in avoidance of my paper that’s due the next day. I decide to refresh my Vanderbilt gmail inbox for the sixth time, something that traditionally needs to be done after I scroll through my entire Facebook feed. It turns out that neither of the two WRVU DJs I’ve reached out to earlier in the day is able to meet up this week for an interview. I get it. It’s a busy week and I only gave them a few days to clear their schedules for me.

So I think in my head, “What if I interview myself?”

WRVU: A Blast from the Past

1984: Joe Strummer with WRVU DJs.

Over this past weekend a couple of us on the e-staff got together to clean out WRVU’s office. Full of dust, old CDs, and old promotional t-shirts, this needed to be done. So on Sunday morning we banded together with a roll of paper towels, some all-purpose cleaner, and a truly impressive number of trash bags. WRVU is over forty years old at this point, and with time inevitably comes a series of knick-knacks and souvenirs that someone just can’t bear to get rid of. That’s where we came in. Over the course of several hours, we excavated the desks and shelves of WRVU’s office, unearthing a startling collection of items in the process.

The Mainstream Alternative

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We all have that friend who talks incessantly about how they relate to Twenty One Pilots on a spiritual level, then ask you if you’ve heard “that new one from Suicide Squad.” They appear to listen to “Chocolate” by The 1975 on a loop on Spotify, with a brief intermission of Foster The People’s “Pumped Up Kicks.” They drone on about how they are literally obsessed with Imagine Dragons and can’t wait for fall just so they can play “Sweater Weather” on their new record player as they down their third Pumpkin Spice Latte (PSL if you’re edgy).

Miike Snow’s Second Coming

Miike Snow lights up the stage at Marathon Music Works
Miike Snow lights up the stage at Marathon Music Works

I was justifiably skeptical in my approach Marathon Music Works for Miike Snow’s return to Nashville after their three year hiatus to pursue personal projects. My sentiment was further warped upon waiting in line to receive my ticket and photo pass, when I was eavesdropping on a woman behind me that was ‘desperately in need of a sitter.’ It was in that instant that I was struck with the realization that I was utterly companionless, afloat in a sea of financial-independence. The late-twenty to late-thirty-year old crowd filled up all the space around me and I buckled in to receive whatever was coming my way.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Well, it’s here at last. The trees have donned their leafy green uniforms, the ENO hammocks have found their places amongst the summery shade, and every student is slowly dying a crippling death by means of final exams. This only means one thing for us here at Vanderbilt, and that thing is summer. Before we are set free to our respective internships and summer vacations, we must make it past the hurdles that stand between us and our 14 weeks of relative peace.

If You Go West, Check These Out

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As a school in music city, Vanderbilt has an endless supply of great live music venues, concerts, and amazing festivals. I have not been to very many myself, but the ones I have attended – Live on the Green and the CMA Festival – have been very positive experiences. This being said, a large majority of the music festivals that I hear about when I talk to other students include Lollapalooza in Chicago, Illinois, and Bonnaroo in Manchester, Tennessee.