By John Pfeiffer
Sylvana Joyce and the Moment
SJATM is quick becoming one of the east coast’s most compelling musical prospects. Blending a fiery style of blues-rock and Balkan Folk music, Joyce and crew have been spinning heads in every place they play. Winners of MTV’s Needle in The Haystack, (which featured the band on both the OurStage and MTV website) SJATM has also been acknowledged as winners of the 5th Annual Ultimate Singer-Songwriter Competition in NYC. With accolades from everyone including NBC’s Jimmy Loyd as well as thumbs up from The Huffington Post, this is an essential, honest rock band on the rise.
Cavemen
Atmospheric and ethereal, New York City’s Cavemen demonstrate their own novel philosophy of Darwinism like no one else. If you’re a fan of groups such as Band of Horses, Cavemen will ultimately appeal to your sense of texture laden enterprise. While the band may be deemed to be fairly new, their progress has been rapid and substantial. With less than a month into the creation, Caveman played a show over at the Bowery Ballroom, opening for the Brooklyn darling, White Rabbits. Since then, they’ve been performing compositions that would inevitably end up on their debut, CoCo Beware while making notable appearances at CMJ alongside Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros and logging time out on the road with peers The War on Drugs and Built to Spill. Cavemen will be playing at Union Transfer in Philly on January 21st.
Elizabeth and the Catapult
Currently contracted to Verve Records, Elizabeth and the Catapult are a hard-working group of movers and shakers. The group has delivered two full length albums under Verve and one self-titled EP, which the band produced and released on their own. Their first LP, Taller Children (2009), was recorded with producer Mike Mogis (Bright Eyes) and was sustained by Commercials for Google, Amazon and Sky TV.
Their second full length, The Other Side of Zero (2010) was produced by Tony Berg (Aimee Mann, Jesca Hoop) and featured Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings on the title track. The Other Side was a turning point for the band, drawing recognition and supporters at an amazing pace. The record even attracted interest from actress Anne Hathaway, who used the song “Thank You For Nothing” in her principal scene in Les Miserables. Hathaway also appropriated Elizabeth in one of her forthcoming movies, casting her in the role of a street musician.
Elizabeth has toured with Sara Bareilles, Greg Laswell, Lenka, and Kishi Bashi. In the past year, she played drums in Kishi Bashi’s band and sang backgrounds for The Waterboys and The Shins. She’s recently finished a new EP with her songwriting mentor Mr. Richard Swift, and is set to deliver a full length she made with Dan Molad (Lucius, Here We Go Magic) in January. Elizabeth and the Catapult will be playing Philadelphia at World Café Live on January 24th.
www.elizabethandthecatapult.com
