The Witzard

Mikey Erg with Jeff Rosenstock, Alex Clute & Lou Hanman (CREDIT: Emily McKern) "Mikey Erg continues to set the gold standard for hooky Punk love songs. Love At Leeds is him at the top of his song-writing game—just one finely tuned ear-worm after another," writer Dan Ozzi gushes within a press release. Love At Leeds is the realization of many dreams for Mikey Erg. A life-long music obsessive, growing up in the early 90's, there was one sound he'd always hoped to capture on his recordings: the sound of Steve Albini. Steve's credits include Pixies, Flogging Molly, Iggy & The Stooges, and, of course, Nirvana's iconic third album, In Utero, one of Mikey's absolute favorite records. Mikey had never in his 20-plus-year recording career ever been able to make a fully-analog recording. Love At Leeds was the perfect time to rectify all of that. Love At Leeds by Mikey Erg Utilizing the same group of musicians that helped him realize his debut solo alb...

The Sad Tomorrows, L-R: Mike "Hunchback" Catalano, J. Nixon, Brian Gorsegner & Jeff Schroeck (CREDIT: Stan Rawrysz) The Sad Tomorrows is a new band featuring a bunch of New Jersey Punk-adjacent veterans (some might say royalty!) from groups like Black Wine, The Ergs!, Hunchback, NIGHT BIRDS, and Screeching Weasel. While relying on the elegant melodies and top-notch songcraft that characterizes the members' other projects, The Sad Tomorrows recall an earlier era of Alternative music, before Melodic Punk branched out and calcified into Indie Rock and Pop-punk. Their snappy, energetic, and open-hearted songs bring to mind 80's bands like The Lemonheads, Big Drill Car, Sebadoh, Indie-era Goo Goo Dolls, and Soul Asylum... artists that bridged the gap between Hüsker Dü's angsty Post-hardcore Pop and the more polished and anthemic music of the 90's Alternative Rock boom. If that boom were still happening, the suits would be lined up outside The Sad Tomorrow...

Dead Best's Brian Sokel, 2021 (SOURCE: Brian Sokel) Brian Sokel is a Philadelphia native. Sokel played guitar in the influential Punk/Dub band Franklin (sometimes, ! franklin) from 1992 until the band's demise in 1999. They released numerous albums and singles on various labels. Sokel on to play in AM/FM with fellow Philadelphian Michael "Mike" Parsell (Frail) and was the primary song-writer. AM/FM released numerous albums on Polyvinyl Records in the early 2000's. They toured numerous times, but, ultimately, disbanded in 2004. Sokel has, also, spent time throughout his career playing music with Atom & His Package, short-lived Misfits-covering super-group T.V. Casualty , Fracture, The Jai-Alai Savant with his one-time Franklin bandmate Ralph Darden, Aspera Ad Astra, and Gonner. Sokel took a 10-year period off from making his own music between about 2003-13 after which he briefly formed a new project, Gonner, with Parsell and one-time Franklin bassist Roy Binn...

Long-time friends Adam "Atom" Goren & Brian Sokel followed interwoven paths through the Philadelphia Punk scene in the late 90's and early 2000's. While Sokel brought riffs to the Dub & Hardcore-blending ! franklin and was the primary song-writer and multi-instrumentalist for AM/FM , Goren was playing in Punk bands Fracture & Armalite and exploring the use of sequencers in his eccentric solo project Atom & His Package . In their respective projects, the two toured The US & Canada together, released each other's music on self-run labels, and Goren would even pay tribute to Sokel's band on the Atom & His Package track "For Franklin." Sokel briefly appears on Atom & His Package's "Out to Everyone" from Attention! Blah Blah Blah. and "Upside Down from Here" from Hair: Debatable, as well as TV Casualty's self-titled 7-inch of Misfits covers. Despite their closeness, Goren & Sokel had never ...

Adam "Atom" Goren pictured with Good Clean Fun in Akko, Israel (SOURCE: Adam Goren) We've Got A Flyer On You will (hopefully!) be a new recurring column here at The Witzard. It's set to feature, examine, and re-visit mixed bill/genre, once-in-a-lifetime, iconic, and otherwise noteworthy Punk/Hardcore show flyers and their corresponding line-ups. As often as possible, we plan to speak directly with the promoters, bookers, flyer artists, soundmen/women, show attendees, and, most importantly, the artists themselves. If all goes well, we're even hoping to, eventually, cover a handful of shows we attended ourselves in years past, as well. For this slightly re-vamped edition of We've Got A Flyer On You, we'll be spotlighting a noteworthy musician, rather than a singular infamous show, for each installment. Adam "Atom" Goren is an Oreland, Pennsylvania-based musician, singer-songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. Goren is best known for his one-man...

Moor Jewelry (CREDIT: Bob Sweeney) Moor Jewelry —sometimes, known as " Moor X Jewelry "—is a collaborative Philly-based project consisting of Camae Anywa (Moor Mother) and Steve Montenegro (Mental Jewelry.) Don Giovanni Records released Moor X Jewelry 's debut collaborative EP, Crime Waves , back in June 2017 to both widespread critical and fan acclaim. Prior to Crime Waves , two early Mental Jewelry tracks, actually, appeared on Moor Mother 's 2017 album, The Motionless Present , released on UK-based The Vinyl Factory ; one of those formative tracks, "Big Crime," would end up re-appearing on Crime Waves and the other, "Remember," remains a Motionless Present -only exclusive. Moor Mother has since shared a solo album, Analog Fluids of Sonic Black Holes (2019) on Don Giovanni , as well as six appearances across Zonal 's 12-track 2019 Relapse Records album, Wrecked . Together, Moor Mother x Zonal , additionally, released non-album cu...