Playlist Rewind: Tapes 'n Tapes and Wild Light at Johnny Brenda's

Before we delve into the review, your Phillyist would be remiss if we didn't tell you about how we almost didn't get into this show Saturday night. Since the show was sold out (seriously), we knew it was important to get like double-confirmation that we were on the press list or else it was no-dice-see-ya-later time. Which we did, since we're cool thorough obsessively meticulous like that.

So guess what happens when we get to the bar? Yep, that's right: no Phillyist on the list. I mean, whoa. What's a blogger gotta do to get his name on the list? Thankfully we were cute—rather, the +1 we brought with was cute—so the nice guy with the clipboard and the highlighter believed our story and let us in. And lo and behold, I should have bought that guy a shot because it ended up being one of the best indie shows I'd seen in a while. The Subjects shocked us with their swingy-rock sound, and Wild Light's reverb'ed melodies had us thinking Strokes instantly. As for Tapes 'n Tapes, well, they had us at sound check.

In short, Tapes 'n Tapes rocked the house. Not only with their tunes, but also with their praise for our World Effin Champion Philadelphia Phillies. These guys knew how to work the local crowd. Hell, the lead singer was even wearing a Dr. Dog t-shirt. Some tunes were definitely experimental, and even though we thought some of the slow progressions were a little too tame and sleep-inducing for half-past midnight on a Saturday, Tapes 'n Tapes always finished hard and had us rocking out, wishing we had lead singer Josh Grier's retro BoSox-era Johnny Damon locks so we could head-bang along. And when band member Matt Kretzman started playing the trumpet with one hand and the keyboard with another, we thought that was pretty dope. When we asked him about that ambi-instrumentism after the show, he shrugged it off and said he is used to playing larger horns, but the trumpet was much easier to tour with because of its compact size. These guys were so cool, we even let them get away with dissing The Fire, which is apparently where they played their last Philly gig. And when they said they hoped to grab a cheesesteak in South Philly before they hit the road again, we set them straight: Joey Vento is a bigot and Pat's, though superior, can be pretty tasteless. Your best bet at this late hour: Jim's on South Street. Mmmm, our mouth waters as we digress.

All this music plus flowing pints of Yards Extra Special brewed just six blocks away... life is good.

Photo credit: Flickr user Nirazilla