University campus radio KWVA  88.1 FM presents Action Action, Something For Rockets, and Men, Women and Children, plus Eugene’s Ahimsa Theory today. This lineup of talented musicians will play at the WOW Hall with doors opening at 8:30 p.m. for a 9 p.m. showtime.
Action Action’s sound is a combination of bubbly, synthesized pop and heavy guitar riffs reminiscent of indie rock. Long Island Press calls the band’s music “a dark, moody, melodic voyage into a world of buzzing ’80s electronica and chainsaw guitars.”
The band – formed in 2004 by members of The Reunion Show, Count The Stars and Diffuser – has sold 50,000 copies of its debut album, “Don’t Cut Your Fabric to This Year’s Fashion.” Action Action has spent a large chunk of 2004 and 2005 touring to promote its album and found that the lifestyle that comes along with it can be draining and demanding.
“Most of the record was written on tour in the back of our death cart (van) on my laptop, twice, to be specific,” front man and songwriter Mark Thomas Kluepfel said on the band’s Web site on MySpace. “The first set of songs was written on my previous laptop, which was stolen along with everything else I owned, after a show in Chicago. That left me to reconstruct as much as possible, and in some cases, start over.”
Now Action Action returns with a second album, released on Jan. 24, 2006 by Victory Records, “An Army of Shapes Between Wars,” which aims to build on the band’s previous release by adding more layers of synth and strings. Each song features lyrics that seem to float along with synthesizers and rich guitar pedals, which affect the wave signal of the guitar to give it a varied sound.
On MySpace, Kluepfel said “An Army” is “like waking up after an intense dream knowing all the secrets, only to fall asleep and let your world of answers end. … I think the brutal honesty of past mistakes are evident in the dark melodies and chord structures, but a sense of optimism can be felt in some of the lyrics.”
Fans of Depeche Mode, New Order and The Postal Service will flock to Something For Rockets’ 2003 self-titled debut album that blends upbeat dance with dreamlike melodies. Rami Perlman, the son of violin genius Itzhak Perlman, and Josh Eichenbaum met while attending Brown University and went on to record a three-song EP. They began to play sellout gigs at such Los Angeles venues as The Echo, Knitting Factory and The Scene. Something For Rockets added jazz-trained Barry Davis to their lineup to add more depth to their sound on-stage.
“Evocative, intelligent and stylish; the result is a sound that is both vintage and future, dark and playful, all anchored by the romantic sentiment of young-and-hopeless self-destruction,” is how Something For Rockets described its sound, according to its official Web site.
Men, Women and Children is based in New York and consists of TJ Penzone (vocals), Rick Penzone (bass), Todd Weinstock (guitar, former member of Glassjaw), Jason Gimmule (guitar), Nick Conceller (keyboards, programming) and David Sullivan Kaplan (drums). This explosive sextuplet just toured the nation with England’s Gang of Four and Brand New’s lead singer, Jesse Lacey, who has been a disk jockey for two of its East Coast shows.
“We really just want people to hear us and come to the show. That’s how this band is going to stick out and be unique,” Conceller has said in an interview featured on the Suicide Girls Web site about an upcoming concert.
Local alternative rock band Ahimsa Theory is made up of Gabe Bledsoe (vocals/guitars), Warren Baumann (bass) and Dustin Riddle (drums). The band spent much of 2005 touring the states to promote its first album and plans on entering the studio this summer to record an EP. Ahimsa Theory continues to make an impact on the Northwest music scene and is waiting to be picked up by an indie label.
“We feel like we are really coming into our own with these new songs by moving into a new direction without abandoning our old sound,” Bledsoe said about the band’s next album.
Tickets for today’s WOW Hall show are $8 in advance, $10 at the door.
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