#kings barcade

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WKNC + WXDU + WXYC Hopscotch Day Party Photos

Raleigh Neomonde Catering - Kings Barcade

Museum Mouth - Kings Barcade

Jefre Cantu + Greg Fox - Neptune’s

Mamiffer + Jenks Miller - Kings Barcade

Blanket - Neptune’s

Sagan Youth - Neptune’s

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Venue Profile: Kings Barcade

Attending Hopscotch? Wanting to know what to expect? Here’s a little snippet about one of my favorite venues, Kings Barcade.

The venue has hosted some big acts, such as M83, The Avett Brothers, Surfer Blood, and Smith Westerns to name a few. But this year at Hopscotch it will be the location for Lilac Shadows, Wildhoney, Dad & Dad, Jenny Hval, and many more bands to rock out. 

Kings is located on West Martin St and is home to some great decor. The lighting is the coolest aspect of the venue; between the stage lighting and the illuminated crown, one can really vibe with the music, no matter the genre. 

Outside the venue is a great place to hang if you’re trying to get some cool air after dancing your butt off! The beautiful metallic mirrors and hanging ferns are a simple, but nice touch for the place.

Not to mention, Kings has one of the best venue restrooms. It excels in cleanliness.

*All images taken by Katelyn Auger

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Artist Profile: le1f

Born Khalif Diouf, NYC born-and-bred rapper and producer le1f hit the ground running with the release of his first mixtape Dark York in 2012. His standout single, the 5kinandbone5-produced “Wut,” is packed full of quick quips and lively, bopping horns. With his background in dance and choreography, the music video for the single lives up to the hype as le1f revels around scantily clad male models sporting Pikachu masks. The rapper got into a small, but notable Twitter dispute the following year with artist Macklemore, whose hit single “Thrift Shop” bears a similar resemblance to “Wut.”

2013 proved to be a busy year for the producer, as he released his sophomore mixtape Fly Zone in January, signed to Terrible Records in February, dropped an EP in March, and followed up with another release, Tree House, in September. In April of the same year, he performed on the Late Show with David Letterman, becoming the first openly gay rapper to play a major late night show.

All in all, le1f is an eccentric yet grounded artist that’s certainly worth a listen. Check out the music video for “Wut,” bump “Spa Day” off the Hey EP, and ease your way into his style.

Catch him at the fest on Friday night at Kings Barcade. 

[wknc881]

SHOW REVIEW: Ceremony @ Kings Barcade

Last week Ceremony played Kings Barcade with a solid set of opening bands. The first to play was Brother Beast, a Raleigh post-hardcore band that has opened for a lot of great nationally touring bands including Prawn, TWIABP, Old Gray, and Hop Along. Wildhoney is a Baltimore fast-tempo shoegaze band that will also be playing Hopscotch later this year. Last to play before Ceremony was Tony Molina. He gets a lot of comparisons to Weezer and Teenage Fanclub, but in the past Tony Molina and his bandmates have played in a lot of hardcore bands, which is strange considering the music they play now. There we a ton of dueling guitar solos and they even ended their set with a cover of Thin Lizzy’s “Soldier of Fortune.”

My introduction to Ceremony was through their 2010 album, Rohnert Park. Some fans of the band’s earliest material noticed a departure for the band on that record. The band’s sound was becoming less influenced by powerviolence. They were moving away from their hardcore roots, and five years after the release of Rohnert Park they released The L-Shaped Man which marked a full-departure from their old sound. Now, the material they’re putting out is pretty reminiscent of the source of the band’s name, a Joy Division song. They opened with two songs from their new album to an interested crowd, but the crowd really got rowdy in reaction to the next song they played. Ceremony introduced themselves as a band from Rohnert Park, California. Then, their drummer stared playing the unmistakable top hits of “Sick.” It was one of my favorites of the night, and I was glad that they played some of my other favorite songs from Rohnert Park, “M.C.D.F.” and “Open Head.” They played an old school cover of “Pressure’s On” by the Dischord Records band, Red C, along with a song from Ceremony’s 2006 album, Violence Violence. It was a bit strange hearing their new, post-punk songs in the mix with their older hardcore stuff, but it still worked well. Despite the more mellow sound of their new music, Ceremony still put on a very energetic show. Also, it was cool to see Ross Farrar end the show with a shout out to Brother Beast’s upcoming album, Pregnant God.

-DJ Nasty Nate

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Museum Mouth, Naked Naps, and Astro Cowboy- January 24th at Kings Barcade

Museum Mouth

Naked Naps

Astro Cowboy

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Naked Naps | Museum Mouth | Astro Cowboy Show

So last Saturday I went out to Kings to see Astro Cowboy, Museum Mouth, and Naked Naps. In short; it was awesome. This was the first time that I had seen Astro Cowboy since they added a bassist to the lineup and the difference was amazing. Their sound was well rounded, their playing was tight, and their cover of “Tonight” was … smashing.

Next Museum Mouth sauntered onto stage. Their performance made me even more excited for when they play Double Barrel Benefit on February 14th at Cat’s Cradle, and I didn’t think that was even possible. The band’s front man Karl Kuehn gave a quick shout out to the Lounge before launching into a raucous rendition of “Crocodile”. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7l0vnZclzg&t=4m21s

There was also much talk of a Museum Mouth/Naked Naps split to be released soon.  When Naked Naps took to the stage excitement in the crowd was high. They played all of their songs –all of them! This made the requests being shouted out unnecessary, but still fun to do. It was defiantly not “like and awkward first date” like the band said one review had claimed them to be.

So yeah I guess all in all my Saturday  was pretty good.