28 degrees taurus

When opener Druids took the stage at Great Scott, the three cryptic performers, safely concealed by druid cloaks, droned through an intriguing set of sparse beats, lethargic synth melodies, and pitch-bent samples. A few audience members lurked in the damp shadows of Great Scott, swaying slowly, entranced by the dark vibes emanating from the stage. Others retreated to the bar to drink and wait for the more accessible acts of the night. Druids played on, impervious to the audience; in fact, the band didn’t even look at or talk to the audience. In any case, the sound was good, and the sparse arrangements filled up Great Scott with disarming collages of sound, thanks in part to the understated, often-atonal melodies coming from Jess Barnet’s Alesis Micron.


With the rain not showing signs of letting up, the second band seemed like a perfect fit to the night’s bill, especially considering their name. Seven Sunless Days sounded a lot like a female-fronted Depeche Mode — sparse guitar arpeggios, anthemic drumming, and tortured, delicate vocals. While the band occasionally bordered on the melodramatic, Kimberly Burk’s virtuosic, operatic range proved more than capable of standing up to the overstated, synth- and bass-heavy arrangements. The three-piece performed with evident resolve, although their lack of an onstage bassist (the bass was relegated to a sequencer) made their visual performance a tad awkward.
By the time 28 Degrees Taurus took the stage, the venue had in a flash become much busier, and it was clear most of the night’s concertgoers were there to see these guys. It was well deserved, too, as the band’s fun, psychedelic take on basement rock perfectly exuded a carefree aura. As the room took on the air of a party — the audience perpetually feeding the band Jager shots — 28 Degrees got progressively drunker, and in turn, progressively better. Guitarist Jinsen’s reverb-soaked guitar work complimented the band’s large, boisterous sound, and the vocal interplay between him and vocalist Karina Dacosta was playful and effective. Highlights of the set included a guest horn performance from Bryan Murphy of The Shills and drummer Kyle Courcy taking off his shirt onstage, apparently, for the first time.


Guillermo Sexo were a perfect end to the night; their sound was a more focused take on psych-rock, and the crowd loved it. For a band that recently went through a line-up change, it didn’t show, as Guillermo Sexo hammered through their 40-minute set confidently. The performance was loud and passionate, and the sound was great. Noell Dorsey’s vocals were mixed perfectly and delivered with just the right amount of gusto to send the audience into manifest fits of pleasure.


-Review by Adam Arrigo; photos by Kris Ireland - Northeast Performer Magazine

Local rock plows ahead
Winter offerings you won’t have to shovel
By MICHAEL BRODEUR
December 26, 2007 10:01:21 AM

ENERGETIC: It’s only a matter of time before the rest of the world digs in to Hooray for Earth.
Not every local rocker is hibernating or joining Bang Camaro this winter. Some of them are actually being productive — laying down tracks that you and yours will be rocking out to well into next year’s thaw.

This past year was a stellar one for 28 DEGREES TAURUS. They toured their æthereal little butts off, released a few new tracks, prepared a pair of new releases, and, most important, landed their coyly pop-tinted blend of Sonic Youth, Slowdive, and Blonde Redhead at the center of the local rock radar. Jinsen’s wash of guitars soaked in chorus and static make a sort of Cocteau Triplet out of Karina Dacosta’s voice, which has a knack for streaking by like a comet. They’ll release the long-promised Underwater Love Sequences EP at Great Scott on January 3, playing along with ACTION CAMP, OKAY THURSDAY, and BROKEN RIVER PROPHET. Then they’ll vamoose on a winter-defying East Coast tour and return to bestow their proper full-length (Something To Feel) at T.T. the Bear’s on February 7.

HALLELUJAH THE HILLS released their Collective Psychosis Begone on Misra this past year to nationwide smiles, and justly so. Each song is a perfect marriage of reckless abandon and, well, recklesser abandon. On January 4, the boys will perform the entire CD front-to-back (first time evah) at the Middle East upstairs, on a bill with FACES ON FILM and REPORTS. Perhaps by then there’ll be some dispatchable information on singer Ryan Walsh’s next endeavor, the DEWEY DEATH METAL SYSTEM.

After six years and 129 shows (eight of which were out of town), the beloved popsters of SCAMPER will cease scampering, as well as synchronized-jumping. It’s difficult to be sad over a band who make everybody so damn happy, but I’ll try. It’s extra hard because their farewell show on Groundhog Day at the Middle East downstairs is a solid bill featuring ALOUD, HARRIS, and BAKER.

One of the biggest surprises of the past year has been Allston’s THIS CAR UP. In their short existence, they’ve made quite a rep for themselves, thanks to exuberant live shows bolstered by big horn sections, smooth Casiotones, ample on-stage antics, and the sort of hyper-genuine indie pop that might be boring if it weren’t played with such clear-eyed conviction. A smattering of new songs from the as-yet-untitled album (freshly recorded in DC by T.J. Lipple of Aloha) is posted to their MySpace page, but for the full effect, check out their release show at Great Scott on February 9 with the SHILLS, MEAN CREEK, and A HERO NEXT DOOR.

In case you’ve made a New Year’s resolution to destroy your own face with blasts of molten rock, you should mark your calendar for NEPTUNE at Great Scott on February 16. The line-up is impressive enough, with HELMS, ANIMAL HOSPITAL, and a floral installation by Andrew Plummer all promising to do you right, but the important part is that once the show is over, Neptune’s new full-length Gong Lake will be a part of our world — and what a different world that will be. A sneak preview hurt my brains in the best possible way. Following that, the group will take a tour down to Texas for a Radium/Table of the Elements showcase at SxSW.

If the songs smuggled over to me from HOORAY FOR EARTH’s forthcoming EP Cellphone are any indication, the band won’t be runners-up (as they were in this year’s Phoenix/FNX Best Music Poll) for long. Each track bristles with energy and the sort of gimmick-free confidence you don’t see much of these days. Never samy, always ambitious — it’s a matter of time before the nation at large gets over the band name and digs in. On February 29, Hooray for Earth ring in the leap year with the release of Cellphone (on Cambridge’s own Dopamine Records) at the Middle East downstairs, along with ZAMBRI and AGE RINGS.

Oh, and speaking of Age Rings: they’ll be using that same date to release a digital-only single that the Phoenix’s own Will Spitz characterizes as a teaser for their “forthcoming-better-than-the-White-Album double album,” the viscously titled Black Honey, which they recorded with Jack Younger at his Basement 247 studios in Allston. Early signs indicate some endearing pop songs with interest-piquing titles à la “Vanessa’s Neck.”

Brooding and unstoppable, the vets of BLACK HELICOPTER have once again been hard at work recording a set of new songs at their Analog Divide studio for a forthcoming full-length on Ecstatic Peace. Whereas their past records were held together by the mortar of some predetermined concept, bassist Zack Lazar asserts that they have “run out of ideas for concepts” and are now content to release an unbound pile of further ear-rending awesomeness, “shooting for March.” In addition, the band will be included in a forthcoming 10-record box set of seven-inch singles from Ecstatic Peace (which will also feature MV+EE and Thurston Moore), and they’ll enjoy a jaunt to SxSW to play a label showcase and, if they’re lucky, have their faces destroyed at the aforementioned Neptune show.

Over the past year, KETMAN have taken a knack for aggressive innovation, an odd fascination with Esperanto, a love of Czeslaw Milosz, and a staunch refusal to suck, and forged them all into what could be Boston’s most exciting power trio. At times, the songs on their forthcoming homonymous full-length evince the meticulous roar of DC bands like Fugazi or maybe even Kerosene 454; elsewhere, Ketman unleashes the succinct ferocity of West Coasters like the Minutemen and No Knife. On January 10 at Great Scott, they play with PET GENIUS, CODETTA, and the phenomenal (and recently reunited) DISAPPEARER. The album won’t be out till at least April, but if you’re looking for an album to look forward to, this is it. - Boston Phoenix

Most bands take some time between releasing new material. Apparently 28 Degrees Taurus didn’t get the memo.

The Allston-based trio, which has been building a reputation for its piercing neo-psychedelic live show, releases a new EP, “Underwater Love Sequences,” Thursday night at Great Scott (1222 Commonwealth, Ave., Allston; 9 p.m.). After a 10-gigs-in-11-nights East Coast tour that starts Friday, the band returns to hit T.T. the Bear’s Place (10 Brookline Ave., Cambridge) on Feb. 7 to release a full-length album, “How Do You Like Your Love?”

That makes two release parties in just more than a month. When your record label is a credit card, as guitarist Jinsen Liu points out, such liberties are possible.


“We’ve just been really busy all year, so we wanted to end a phase,” Liu said. “We just want to get writing again.”

That means getting out nearly 20 songs and a handful of remixes decorated in homemade art and DIY packaging.

On stage, the band prides itself on volume, both literally and figuratively. Songs drag out to the point where a muddy reverb mess is the only logical conclusion. But on CD, tracks like the droney “Something to Feel” and the bouncy, Asian-pop influenced “Aquarian Love” take on a dreamlike quality, a world where Slowdive- and Sonic Youth-reverb coats a backbone of traditional Chinese and Japanese folk music.

But before it gets too serious, along comes a song called “Jager Shots,” the black licorice-flavored booze of choice for Liu. When vocalist/bassist Karina Decoste calmly demands “One more Jager shot/I wanna party all night,” it’s clear 28 Degrees Taurus’ direct influences know how to have a good time.

“We always joke that our ambition is not to get on the cover of Rolling Stone, but instead to become an honorary Jagermeister band,” Liu said. - boston herald

28 DEGREES TAURUS
Summertime EP
7-song CD
I put 28 Degrees Taurus on the forefront of the race to what may be a top collection of music to get high to in college. Droning, droning, droning music in an alternative vein, mostly in the key of D, with high wispy ethereal female nymph vocals gently tries to subdue you into thinking everything is all right. Since people from the city get meaner as they get older, and because I was in a bad mood already, it just gave me more of a reason to be critical of the homespun disc (which means made and pressed on computer at home), and that’s not really fair. I can tell this band puts a whole lotta soul into their productions, though I picture their audience sitting around with drool hanging out of their mouth and flies buzzing on their foreheads. I used to have summertimes this mellow. What made me listen to it a second time is the fact that I needed my girlfriend to explain to me who they sounded like. (Mike Loce) - The Noise

28 Degrees Taurus exists since 1996 and one blesses the chance to have put to us on their track thanks to the compilation of the label Tell-All Records. `Judicious No of separation' is the fifth exit of this formation, being summarized overall in certain Jinsen Liu based with Andover, MA, sometimes helped of one or the other musician.

Very quickly, one conceals a certain air of familiarity with other formation like The London Apartments or The Blue Hour with the difference perhaps that 28 Degrees Taurus them is more minimalist still. One however finds in the center this same song androgyne, reverberated and these guitars éthérées on vaporous and emotional melodies.

More still than its school-fellows, 28 Degrees Taurus seems to pay tribute with the sheogazing of My Bloody Valentine and also - though that a little less - with that Slowdive, with the difference that here the tone is a more intimist and resolutely solo, of the bedroom pop éthérée, luminous, euphoriant and melancholic person, finally very close even if in register sound relatively different from the fact that Chuzzlewit or Kevin Huelbig Jr can do.

My comments compared to the contributions of 28 Degrees Taurus to compilation Tell-All Records were dithyrambic, the listening of this disc comes only to confirm and intensify these impressions. Put aside Pia Fraus, nobody had managed to sublimate at this point the heritage of My Bloody Valentine, 28 Degrees Taurus makes a success of an ideal, new transposition of it up to now, slowing down it with the format pop bedroom

Inintelligibles words in the flood vocal crystalline, being reverberated and rather acute of Jinsen, this one with the good idea to include them on its site, which offers a new dimension to the listening of this small 32 minute old jewel and 10 songs.

For the listener indie lambda, 28 Dismantle Taurus, from its very particular style, functions with “that passes or that breaks”, generating either the trouble or an unquestionable enthusiasm. A crystalline electric guitar, a very sparing battery and the song dreamer of Jinsen for wrongfully lascives acidulated melodies, green and flowered like nature at the end of the spring which does not know yet the dryness of the summer, nor the process of fructification. On `judicious No of separation' one smells key MBV very extremely but transcribed in an impressionist and diluted way, colors pastel under a high sun in the sky. `Follow the suntides' is bucolique and in love, magic, as one can reach tops with a saving in average extreme.

The songs follow in the same handkerchief of pockets, rather similar from/to each other without to give the feeling of repetition, just to wrap us in a fragile euphoria that a simple white cloud masking the sun could waste. On the unit, three instrumental slips and it is the occasion for Jinsen to try musical constructions a little more complex.

Sometimes more luminous, sometimes more melancholic person, this disc is a secret garden where it is good to take refuge, to find a little freshness and innocence and humer of the fugacious perfumes which transport us to the paradise the space of a few seconds, a small masterpiece intimist that one keeps well preciously, delicately fragile and consequently infinitely invaluable.
Didier Goudeseune Jun 23, 05 - derives.net

The 28 Degrees Taurus album is, upon first glance, not even really an album. Titled 2007 Tour Compilation/Sampler, it comes self-packaged in a purple CVS CD case, the cover a blurry inkjet printout, accompanied by a stretched-out photo of the band, and liner notes giving shout-outs to Goldschlager and “crazy Allston parties.” Most junior high mix-tapes receive more aesthetic attention.

But only moments into the first song, “Aquarian Love,” with its genre-blending mix of a bluesy guitar intro and “ooh-la-la” refrain, it becomes obvious 28 Degrees Taurus is not a joke band at all. It’s as though Mirah joined a bubblegum rock group. The spacey, ambient pop is loaded with guitarist/songwriter Jinsen’s reverb, melding perfectly with the eerie voice of Karina Dacosta. Drums and a good bit of tambourine from percussionist Kyle Courcy complete this unique sound.

If one is not listening carefully to the lyrics (which is easy to do, as Dacosta’s melodic voice is quite mesmerizing), the first few minutes of the album may seem as if 28 Degrees Taurus enjoys twinkling love songs and upbeat ruminations on life. But five tracks in, the listener is met with the distinctive lyrics of “Jager Shots.” “I wanna party all night long / I wanna fucking jager shot / I think I wanna get laid tonight / I don’t care if it’s wrong or right,” croons Dacosta, ironically.

The band’s melodies also possess this strong tinge of the unexpected, as exemplified by the traditional Asian sounds layered over the Sonic Youth-influenced keyboard/guitar interplay. They become most notable in the songs “New Essence” and “When You Know,” which conjure up memories of first learning to play “Chopsticks” as a kid.

The band is able to balance meandering Asian melodies with irreverent, sarcastic — even vulgar — lyrics. Either quality has the potential for being obnoxious, but 28 Degrees Taurus is able to play them off one another with charming sincerity. In keeping with the band’s eclectic influences, the album is equally suited to being the soundtrack to a drinking night with friends as it is to a quiet night of personal introspection. (Self-released)

www.myspace.com/28degreestaurus

-Kate Cole - Northeast Performer Magazine (June 2007 Ed.)

28 Degrees Taurus | Pussycat Lounge | September 21, 2007
Posted by webmaster, Tuesday, September 25th, 2007

Psychedelic, Asian rock band 28 Degrees Taurus flooded the stage last Friday night with their ambient guitar riffs, booming drums, and lullaby vocals. The band played with fellow Boston band Gunfight! And newly formed experimental group, Quiet Loudly. The show took place at The Pussycat Lounge, where the downstairs is a strip bar and the upstairs looks like a bachelor pad with plush couches and a bar where bands perform.

The night started out with an uplifting and exciting performance of Post-Country band, Gunfight! Whose country roots twang and post-punk guitar and bass riffs create a really fun-loving energy on stage. They twist around their sound, pumping out clashing drums and organic bass lines, with controlled scalding vocals and guitar solos that dance around the rhythm guitar creating circles of a dance-y/ country style flow. Gunfight! seemed to be having a great time playing with each other, dancing and turning to face one another as they hit the climaxes of each song.

They were followed by Quiet Loudly, an ambient/experimental band located in Brooklyn who did a chillingly psyched-out cover of Lou Reed’s “Walk On The Wild Side.” The band moved all over the map with heavy distortion and beautiful breakdowns to blues-influenced guitar with stretching vulnerable vocals. Their flowing rock and roll/grunge/Post-Punk influenced style was extremely evocative and impressive. They ended with an epic song entitled “Stairway to Free bird,” which was full of smooth and colorful guitar solos, really vibrant and experimental drums accompanied by spastic bass lines. Someone commented during their set that though we were in a strip club, Quiet Loudly was “Much more fulfilling than boobies.”

Lastly, 28 Degrees Taurus played a set very fitting with the shiny paper stars on the walls. The band’s sleepwalking/psychedelic, night rock, pulsed through the sound system and lead singer/bassist Karina DaCosta sweetly sang soft and echo-y lyrics as she plucked out her bass lines. The music would change from a very light and happy atmosphere to almost demonic with Jinsen Liu’s roaring growl vocals on top of shaking drumbeats and a Sonic Youth style/Asian guitar riffs. 28 Degrees Taurus had a great stage presence, and an extremely captivating sound which made for a great concluding band for this excellent show.

www.myspace.com/28degreestaurus
www.gunfightband.com
www.myspace.com/quietloudly

>>>Lauren Piper
- CMJ.com

Weekend Picks:

Opening for the Flaming Lips-inspired Bon Savants at Great Scott on Saturday night is 28 Degrees Taurus, a threesome that plays music so cute it could be on the "Juno" soundtrack. The sound is best described as lo-fi, dreamy, romantic rock that falls somewhere between Sonic Youth and Asian folk music. Listen for the good-mood, singsongy track "Aquarian Love." 9 p.m. $10. 617-566-9014. greatscottboston.com

(Handout photo) - The Boston Globe

Opening for the Flaming Lips-inspired Bon Savants at Great Scott tonight is 28 Degrees Taurus, a threesome that plays music so cute it could be on the "Juno" soundtrack. The sound is best described as lo-fi, dreamy, romantic rock that falls somewhere between Sonic Youth and Asian folk music. Listen for the good-mood, singsongy track "Aquarian Love." The show also features the Peasantry and Aderbat. 9 p.m. $10. Great Scott, 1222 Commonwealth Ave., Allston. 617-566-9014. greatscottboston.com - The Boston Globe

28 DEGREES TAURUS
How Do You Like Your Love?
11-song CD
Hot on the heels of a 7-song EP (Underwater Love Sequences), 28 Degrees Taurus releases their debut full-length, How Do You Like Your Love? that runs the gamut from moody, pulsing post-punk darkwave ("Single Suicide Mode") to poppy grooving rockers ("Waves of Love"), and then some.
Guitarist Jinsen Liu has an expansive palette of sounds that call to mind Ride-style shoegaze bubblegum (frontloaded on the first few tracks), while the latter half of the record glides on some instrumental drones ("Love is Underwater") that wouldn't sound out of place on The Cure's Pornography. Bassist Karina Dacosta's vocals float nicely atop Liu's psychedelic churning, accenting the delicate "Moments, Phases & Timing" into a piece that melds the sounds of the Cocteau Twins with The Chameleons. The forceful "Crash & Burn" fuses the minor-key ferocity of NYC hipsters Versus with anthemic shouts and eastern scales (another hallmark of this band.) The propulsive, noirish tremolo dance-rocker "Low Light," a potential hit-in-the-making if ever there was, is one of the real standout tracks in this collection, which overall is highly recommended among local CDs. (Chris Pearson) - The Noise - cd review 2/08