Upcoming Shows — Updated 9/8/23 Recent merch score I’ve got tickets to the following shows. Check out the links below for sample cuts on Spotify. 9/12/23 Lemonheads — Asbury Lanes, Asbury Park NJ. Into Your Arms 9/16–17/23 SeaHearNow Festival — Asbury Park NJ. 9/20/23 The Brian Jonestown Massacre — Brooklyn Steel, Brooklyn NY. Vad Hande Med Dem? 9/22/23 Osees — Warsaw, Brooklyn NY. If I Had My Way. 9/27/23 Wine Lips — Baby’s All Right, Brooklyn NY. Eyes 9/28/23 Toad The Wet Sprocket — Count Basie Theater, Red Bank, NJ. All I Want 10/5/23 The Couret ..read more

I’ve got tickets to the following shows. I’ve added links to representative Spotify tracks if you’d like to check them out. 6/24/23. Death Valley Girls — Brooklyn Bowl, Brooklyn NY. What Are The Odds 7/22/23 Horsegirl - House of Independents, Asbury Park NJ. Anti-Glory 7/22/23 THICK - TV Eye, Ridgewood NY. Happiness. 8/2/23 Ted Nugent - Starland Ballroom, Sayreville NJ. Stranglehold. 8/12/23 Dramarama - The Wonder Bar, Asbury Park NJ. Anything, Anything.| 8/18/23 - The War On Drugs - Stone Pony Summer Stage, Asbury Park NJ. An Ocean Between The Waves. 8/20/23 Pixies -Stone Pony ..read more

JFarin Upcoming Shows — Updated 5/30/23 Die Spitz t-shirt added to my merch collection last week I’ve got tickets to the following shows. I’ve added links to representative Spotify tracks if you’d like to check them out. ***NEW 6/2/23 — Young the Giant — Stone Pony Summer Stage, Asbury Park NJ. Superposition. 6/9/23 — Yo La Tengo — White Eagle Hall, Jersey City NJ. You Can Have It All. ***NEW 6/17/23 — Wavves & Cloud Nothings — Le Poisson Rouge, New York NY. Cut You. 7/22/23 — Horsegirl — House of Independents, Asbury Park NJ. Anti-Glory 7/22/23 — THICK — TV Eye, R ..read more

SXSW 2023 ended this past weekend, and was as usual packed with talent. Literally thousands of bands from around the world converged on Austin, Texas, to provide an unbelievably rich cornucopia of musical passion, exuberance, entertainment, and flat-out fun for the week. It’s impossible to see ALL the bands who show up at SXSW, but I saw a LOT of them. By my count, some 45 or so, not counting the ones I walked out of, or the many bands who popped up at Sixth Street bars and street corners. I didn’t love them all, but I sure did like an awful lot of them. I’ve been coming to SXSW for twent ..read more

Otoboke Beaver tops the list of SXSW 2023 showcase artists. SXSW 2023 is less than a week away. I’ll be heading to Austin, Texas with thousands of other music fans, to check out the best in new music from around the world. Some two thousand or so bands are formally on the program as “showcasing artists”, and there are many more “unofficial” bands who will be serving up their work at gin joints on Sixth Street and elsewhere across the city next week. It’s the best. The Offical SXSW Playlist, available on Spotify, runs for 56 hours and 26 minutes. I can’t swear I’ve listened to every s ..read more

The Dandy Warhols are another band that snuck up on me in the past couple of years. How I managed to miss them for the past ten years is another of life’s great mysteries. I got hooked on the song “Good Morning” when it mysteriously showed up thanks to Spotify last year. That led me, naturally, to “Bohemian Like You”, “Not If You Were The Last Junkie On Earth”, “Get Off”, and “Godless”, which are some of their best songs. Their style is a mix of psych-rock, power pop, and synth pop. Easy-going, catchy, melodic tunes that poke fun at hipster culture, relationships, and life in general. Th ..read more

It’s a bluegrass song, full of finger-picking, banjos, and strings, that hits on the themes of nostalgia, and the hard road back from drug and alcohol abuse. Check it out — the vocal and musical harmonies are beautiful, the messages are simple and direct, and it’s a tight little track from a very talented band. You can find the new single on the band’s website, watertowerband.com This single is a follow-up to their album, Fly Around, released in 2020. Water Tower consists of frontman Kenny Feinstein, banjo man Tommy Drinkard, Joe Juice Bergland, and Jesse Blue Eads. They hail from Los An ..read more

JFarin Upcoming Shows — Updated 1/10/23 The New Pornographers return to Brooklyn Steel 5/17/23. I’ve got tickets to the following concerts. I’ve added links to representative Spotify tracks if you’d like to check them out. 2/15/23 — Viagra Boys — Elsewhere, Brooklyn NY. Punk Rock Loser. 2/22/23 — Otoboke Beaver — Le Poisson Rouge, New York. Another Tracey H recommendation, and he was dead on with Tropical Fuck Storm. What could go wrong? S’il vous plait 3/3/23 — The Dandy Warhols — Elsewhere, Brooklyn NY. Bohemian Like You 3/13–19/23 — SXSW 2023 — Austin TX. Shoul ..read more

New Jersey Rocks at Bond Street Bar in Asbury Park 1/8/2023 Well Wisher at Bond Street Basement Sunday night. Bond Street Bar offered up three solid local bands from New Jersey last night. Have A Good Season, Well Wisher, and Latewaves each served up short, tight sets that included old and new material on a Sunday night that was a treat to the Asbury Park crowd that gathered for the early January event. Latewaves I’d seen as an opener for Pollyanna a few months ago. Then, and last night, the trio rocked their garage-style, unapologetic set and got the evening off to a great star ..read more

Nova Twins kill their show at SXSW and go global! Live music came back big in 2022, and I couldn’t get enough of it. By my count, I saw eighty-eight shows, give or take, in venues across New York City, Austin, Pennsylvania, and the great state of New Jersey. My live music year kicked off with War On Drugs at Madison Square Garden in January, and wrapped up with one of Yo La Tengo’s Hanukkah shows at the Bowery in December. Yo La Tengo at Bowery Ballroom for their Hanukkah residency. For me, there is nothing like live music. This past year, I started to write about it. Armed with a cr ..read more