Yeah, I celebrate Earth Day… any day that Earth is playing a nearby show, of course! The legendary Seattle-based group are one of the few genuinely worthy of “iconic” status (an otherwise overused and devalued term), having more or less spawned entire new genres of music in their storied career. With Dylan Carlson its sole constant member, I’d certainly recommend checking out Even Hell Has Its Heroes, Clyde Petersen’s 2023 documentary on Carlson and the struggles and triumphs he has shared with Earth since the early ’90s. I’m going to stop with the biographical details now though, operating with the assumption that most of y’all are already firmly on the same page as me regarding Earth’s towering stature in the world of avant-garde guitar music (and beyond), but if by some chance you haven’t delved into their catalog – too vast and intimidating, maybe? – there’s no reason you can’t remedy that today. As for me, I wasn’t clued in to what they’d been up to lately, or even why they were on tour. All I knew is that Earth were coming to town on a blustery Monday night and I wasn’t gonna miss it.

Up against a few competing events – indie darlings Wednesday at Union Transfer, The Bad Plus at Solar Myth, and perhaps most damagingly, the Philadelphia Eagles taking on the Green Bay Packers on ESPN – the below-capacity crowd at Johnny Brenda’s clearly wanted to be there. There were simply too many other enticing options that evening (including the highly-regarded “staying at home”), and while I was a little surprised (and offended on Earth’s behalf) that the show didn’t sell out weeks in advance, I appreciated the ability to move freely about the room. This included chatting with friends about the opening act Stebmo, the nom-de-plume of one Steve Moore. If you’re like me, when you hear “Steve Moore” you think “Zombi”, and while the prospect of an Earth-opening slot from that Steve Moore still feels entirely plausible, it was a different guy. This Steve Moore is a pianist / trombonist / composer who has played with a list of brow-raising notables to include Sufjan Stevens, Bill Frisell and Sunn O))). With straight brown hair cascading down to his ass, Stebmo sat at his Wurlitzer and coaxed out some dreamy, Sun Ra-esque meditations, his nimble fingers playfully running the keyboard alongside a fresh-cooked cosmic drone. To my delight, he picked up a Casio SK-1 sampler keyboard (a late ’80s childhood classic), held it vertically, and improvised melodies from its hearing-test tone-setting directly into the microphone, the sort of spontaneously beautiful musical gesture I’d expect from Dan Higgs.

Our hearts and minds were clearly open and ready to receive, even down to the stumbling backwards-baseball-cap-ponytail-and-sunglasses guy who was crushing domestics directly in front of the stage. I had heard from a member of Earth that part of Stebmo’s set on this tour involved “a talk”, and after not even ten minutes of music, he put the Casio down, introduced himself, and entered into a kind-hearted ramble. Or should I clarify, extended ramble – Stebmo clearly had some loose parameters in mind for where he intended to take us, but he did so in a boldly unfocused, unhurried way, either not noticing or not caring how frequently he repeated himself or where he was headed. After sharing his gratitude for the audience and Earth, he went into some basic music theory / The Science Of Music details, playing single notes on a trombone and then explaining those single notes to us. Eventually, he concluded his talk with thoughts on the healing power of music. Maybe this doesn’t sound so bad, and I’m not saying it was bad, it was just long, painfully so for anyone in the audience with a lumbar spine over the age of thirty-five (I’d say that accounted for 100% of the crowd). I could feel the patience and goodwill of my fellow attendees draining like old iPhone batteries – Stebmo was a likable person, it’s just that I can’t think of anyone at all that I’d want to stand quietly and listen to for twenty-plus minutes until they eventually settled on the point of “music is a powerful and special thing”. He played himself off with another couple short tunes on the Wurlitzer, as sweetly satisfying as an ice cream cone after working a double shift.

It was barely ten minutes before Stebmo returned to the stage, this time as part of Earth’s ensemble. Turns out we were celebrating some sort of anniversary for Earth’s Hex; Or Printing In The Infernal Method. Twenty years, apparently… jeez! Dylan Carlson took center stage, alongside Bill Herzog on bass, Adrienne Davies on drums, Moore on trombone and keys, and Brett Netson on guitar. Carlson, in his appealingly squeaky speaking voice, explained that the group would be performing Hex in its entirety, and they proceeded to do exactly that. It’s my third favorite Earth record (behind Pentastar and The Bees Made Honey if you’re keeping score), and listening (and watching) them perform it front to back was a real treat. Davies remains the group’s most potent secret weapon, controlling her limbs with the grace and poise of an Olympic fencer. Under Carlson’s leadership, Moore’s trombone filled the room alongside Herzog’s precise bass – it was certainly easy in that moment, following Stebmo, to appreciate instrumental, talk-free music. We were on Earth time, to be sure, and if a clock had been visible on the wall, I’m certain it would’ve slowly blurred itself out. For music that invokes a Cormac McCarthyian vision of the quietly violent American desert landscape, the group looked the part, too. A friend of mine pointed out that Netson bore a striking resemblance to one of the produce purveyors at our local farmer’s market; we later concluded that the entire band looked like they had been selling organic eggs and hand-cut flowers earlier in the day, too late to drive back to Lancaster in their rusty pickup truck.

Having concluded Hex, I required no further sonic nourishment, but they threw us a special treat. Carlson confirmed that Earth are working on a new album, scheduled for tracking in March of next year, and announced that they’d end with a new one from that. It might’ve been called “Scalp Hunter Blues”, but I can’t confirm exactly what Carlson said over the audience’s rousing applause. It should come as no surprise that this song, while different from prior Earth material, was completely great. Herzog opened with an unexpectedly funky bass-line, and the song slowly revealed its form, Moore’s dappled keys recalling a Joshua Abrams Natural Information Society vibe that thrills and chills. Can you believe we’re getting a new Earth album in 2026? If you needed a good reason to stick around for another year, look no further.

“It’s been way sold out… some guys came here all the way from Indiana for the show, they were camping out for it”, says my doorman friend at Johnny Brenda’s as we hustle past the small queue of folks who actually need their IDs to verify over-21 status (there are countless perks to going bald and grey!). I had been looking forward to this gig since it was announced a few months prior, as all three acts are personal faves that have yet to hit their artistic peaks; it’s rare to catch a diverse sonic bill that goes three-for-three with popularity and creative output on upward trajectories. Unlike most hot tickets for guitar music these days, this was set to be a night of freshness and originality as performed by relatively young people. I had timed it perfectly with my seasoned show-going companion: it wasn’t more than five minutes we were in the door before Morgan Garrett and his band had taken the stage.

(As a quick aside, it’s about time I addressed the elephant in the room: my resolutely atrocious band photography. I have taken every single accompanying live photo since I started posting show reviews, and if I’m being generous with myself, the best I’ve ever gotten is “not terrible”. Let’s say I only share them here for basic documentation purposes, so please excuse the extreme lack of artistry, color correction, clarity and depth as this series continues onward. Pretty much any artist I’ve written about, save for Bill Nace, has some sort of social media presence where you can surely find far superior live photos. Again – I apologize.)

Keen Yellow Green Red readers will recall that I wrote up a Morgan Garrett performance earlier in 2025 (it’s easy when I review ten shows a year), and all my previous glowing praise rings true once again. Quick summary in case you missed it: Garrett is a towering figure on vocals and acoustic guitar, centered between Jackie McDermott on drums and Zach Darrup on electric guitar. Their music remains a horrific amalgamation of noise-rock, sludge, noise and ASMR, as if Sightings went black-metal or Swans were torn to shreds by Lisa “Suckdog” Carver. More than anything, it occurred to me that if Art, the ultraviolent clown from the Terrifier series, had a band back in his high school days, this would’ve been it. With the addition of an interconnected strobe, the performance reveled in extremes, from scalding mayhem to silence inversely deployed as a jump-scare. Garrett goes harder while sitting down than most hardcore frontpeople do standing up, to be sure. Perhaps it’s honest to note that my band, Pissed Jeans, has enlisted Morgan Garrett and his band to join us for some shows in January of next year, but doing so is a confluence of interest, not a conflict of interest. Why do you think I want to play with this guy, because it will somehow make us all rich?? Precisely not – I want to return to that sensation of having to perform after the crowd already had their scalps blown back, a shock I still deeply recall from having to follow Vexx multiple days in a row some ten years ago.

Invigorated by Morgan Garrett, I rode that energy into Her New Knife, one of Philly’s most promising gaze-wave upstarts. Their Chrome Is Lullaby EP from late 2024 struck such a chord with me that I cold-called the band a few months earlier to see if I could put it out on vinyl for them, but no worries – Julia’s War has since stepped up to provide the physical form such a work demands. Their music picks up on the most pensive Sonic Youth moments, loops them into a paranoid spiral and then kicks on the overdrive pedals right before we start clawing our own faces. Whether quiet or loud, Her New Knife are writing consistently engaging and memorable tunes, emo but guarded, pretentious but real, shoegaze but definitely not shoegaze. They have been road-dogging it lately, to the point where the drummer on stage was a fill-in for their actual drummer, who was also in attendance at the show but tired from a recent flight(?). These Zoomers and their self-care! The fill-in brought more energy to the performance than I’ve heard in their recordings (and was the set-opening, Jimmy Eat World’s Clarity-esque song a new one?), though the band’s presence remained quizzical and slightly detached – I never got a good look at the taller guitarist’s face, as he kept his head down and to the side for the entirety of their set, even when switching guitars! While sharing thoughts with a new pal from our spot in the balcony during their performance, we actually got shushed by a random guy who is going to have a very frustrating time if he continues to expect silence from the surrounding crowd at amplified rock shows. We respected his wishes, though immediately after the set, I told a certain world-renowned avant-harpist about it (she was also there enjoying her evening), and in true Philly fashion, she was offended on my behalf and ready to start some shit with him. What’s more humbling, being beaten up by a guy at a Her New Knife show, or having your harp-playing friend beat him up for you? Thankfully we were all too dignified to find out.

Two impressive local performances in the books, it was time for Water From Your Eyes to kick off their United States tour in support of their newest Matador full-length, It’s A Beautiful Place. I saw guitarist / songwriter Nate Amos grinning devilishly as he watched Morgan Garrett’s set off the side of the stage, so he clearly knew he had to bring it himself. Having found myself in the front bar area on the other side of the venue’s hourglass layout, I had relinquished my choice balcony spot (in favor of unscolded socializing), and rather than break any more rules of social decorum, hanged back for most of Water From Your Eyes’s set. Their recorded music is so fluent in the way electronics and programmed trickery are intertwined with big grungy guitars and pop vocals that I was surprised to see a full live rock band on stage, vocalist Rachel Brown wandering freely while singing in her wraparound shades. Integrating the electronic elements as appropriate, the group easily maneuvered through even their trickiest material, like the single “Playing Classics”, which resembled Daniel Lopatin soundtracking the hardest Crash Bandicoot levels on the studio recording and the chaotic fourth hour of an LCD Soundsystem set live on stage. Water From Your Eyes songs demand concentration from their listeners, let alone the people playing them, but the group generally seemed unimpressed by their own talent, young yet old enough to carry some of that seen-it-all-before NYC aloofness. Perhaps in a different time and place I would’ve connected more strongly with their performance, but the studio trickery and omnivorous sound palate of Water From Your Eyes’ recordings appeals more to me than the traditional rock setup that interpreted those songs on stage, vocals direct, guitar direct, drums live. Everyone is sick of laptop-karaoke by now and wants to see actual musicians doing actual musician-things on stage, and yet here I am wishing Water From Your Eyes somehow came across more artificial in person… maybe that shusher had the right idea all along.