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Interview with Claud

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Pacifica recently sat down with Brooklyn based bedroom-pop artist, Claud.  Tune in on Friday, October 20th @ 12:30PM to hear their conversation.

No matter your age or station, Claud’s new album, Supermodels is the sort of record you can hear yourself in. Claud’s engrossing, poignant, and often pointedly funny second album is a confident diary of the mercury of life and love. Imagine yourself in a crowded concert hall, singing along to buoyant but frustrated “It’s Not About You” or the beautifully resilient “Spare Tire,” which sublimates old sadness into new winking, wry new strength.. Through the sea of twisted faces, Claud makes eye contact and grins, all sly and sweet and sad. That’s how Supermodels feels—an intimate connection, a chuckle and a sigh, a gift to share amid all this isolating noise.

Claud approaches all of Supermodels with new depth and the kind of humor that only comes with undeniable new confidence, rendered in structures and hooks that are deceptively sophisticated. Genre becomes Claud’s playground, an obstacle course full of supposed barriers to climb over and cavort upon. Where previous album, Super Monster was rendered mostly in their childhood bedroom, Supermodels was created in Claud’s own space, with a team of confidants and collaborators.

Interview with Benoît Charest, 10/21 @ 5:30pm

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On Saturday, October 21st @ 5:30PM, Film Close Ups hosts, Gregory Scharpen & Chris Michel speak with Canadian composer, Benoît Charest, ahead of the Cal Performances Cine-Concert of The Triplets of Belleville on October 21st & 22nd.

The charming animated French feature film The Triplets of Belleville swept the globe when it was released in movie theaters in 2003, raking up dozens of awards and nominations and attracting a cult following among film buffs.

Through music and images (and almost no dialogue), writer-director Sylvain Chomet tells a story of a caper involving American gangsters, Tour de France cyclists, and a trio of colorful vaudevillian sisters out to expose a crime ring.

Composer Benoît Charest leads his eight-piece orchestra in a live version of his Oscar-nominated score, evoking the streets of 1920s Paris and “Le Jazz Hot” and featuring fun live sound effects to accompany the film. “[A] bracing blend of silliness and sophistication…. It’s comic, touching and a visual knockout” (Rolling Stone).

Interview with David Arkenstone

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Tune in on Wednesday, October 18th @ 2PM to hear Excuse My French in conversation with composer // musician // performer, David Arkenstone.

5-time Grammy nominee David Arkenstone has established himself as one of the best contemporary instrumentalists of our time. This visionary continues to create distinctive tracks that inspire the imagination. A musical storyteller, David is passionate about taking listeners on a journey, creating sonic tapestries that evoke every emotion.

From his first Grammy nomination in 1992 through his latest Grammy nomination in 2022, David Arkenstone’s music has become the soundtrack to our lives with unforgettable NBC Sports themes such as The Kentucky Derby to epic gaming music for World of Warcraft, from Music Inspired by Middle Earth to area music as you stroll through Epcot at DisneyWorld.

His latest tours bring a lively candlelit evening of music blending neo-classical piano, new age, Celtic, progressive rock, orchestral, and world music to Northern California. With over 100 million Spotify streams and 60+ CDs, David’s music holds something for everyone, taking concertgoers on a wondrous musical journey from first note to last.

Cardboard People to Play Sat 10/21 @ 9pm

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Members of Berkeley’s Carboard People will play on this week’s edition of KALX Live! Founded by producer Jim Greer and singer Yunoka Berry, Cardboard People draw inspiration from a diverse range of influences from Prince and Stevie Wonder to Tyler the Creator and Kate Bush. The band will hit KALX Live! as a duo playing music from their debut 2023 self titled record. We’ll get up to speed with the band and uncover how they manage to gather their jukebox of styles into one crew without combusting. You can next catch them live across the bridge on October 28th at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater and the 30th at Neck of the Woods. DangerVenture is your host this week.

A Weekend at Portola 2023

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Review By Riley Saham Photos by Addie Briggs

As I approached Pier 80, the site of the second-ever Portola Music Festival on Saturday, September 30th, I was struck by its expansive waterfront views contrasting with the pier’s industrial architecture. This juxtaposition spoke to a deeper contradiction at the heart of the Portola Festival. Portola claims to highlight the underground club culture of San Francisco; however, due to their inflated ticket prices (around $450 for the two-day festival), it actually caters to the wealthier crowd that has begun to dominate the city in recent years. Just looking around the festival grounds, I found myself obsessively wondering who these people sold their soul to in order to attend this festival.

While the ethos of the festival was debatable, the quality of the performances and music was not. The first show I caught was a performance by The Dare, which captured the aesthetics of an early Tumblr grunge-era, and Harrison Patrick Smith is a definite contender for “sexy white boy of the month.” His stumbling-drunk demeanor gave him the stage presence of a less problematic Matty Healy. This heady act was only diminished by the fact that it was one of the earlier sets of the day, making any inebriated dancing feel a bit out of place.

Next, I moved to the warehouse stage to catch Overmono’s set. Having seen them earlier this year at 1015 Folsom, I was highly anticipating a repeat performance, and I was not disappointed. The warehouse stage was the most impressive one at Portola, located in a massive airplane hangar that took five minutes to walk from the entrance to the stage at the other end. This industrial sublime only heightened Overmono’s high-energy performance, illuminated by the setting sun behind their stage.

Following Overmono’s set, I moved over to the Pier stage to watch Nelly Furtado. As the sun set, the crowd’s energy swelled, and the excitement for Furtado’s performance was palpable. Her Y2K classics “Maneater” and “Promiscuous” had everyone singing along, enhanced slightly by the addition of electronic beats, making them feel both familiar and new at the same time.

After the sun had set, the industrial grunge of Pier 80 could be fully appreciated. This greatly complemented Maddy Maia’s DJ sets, interspersed between other artists’ performances at the Pier Stage. Her high-energy remixes were extremely clever and kept the energy going late into the night.

In between two of Maddy Maya’s sets, I caught Jai Paul’s performance; however, I found myself somewhat disappointed. The mixing made it incredibly difficult to hear his voice over the undeniably funky bassline. While the lounge-style music was well done, it would have been a better fit for earlier in the day.

As the night progressed, the sets became more and more elaborate. This was best captured in Eric Prydz’s performance of HOLO. The music consisted of house techno beats, but the true draw of the performance was the visuals. Ginormous humanoid 3D projections moved on the monitors behind the stage, transporting the audience into an extraterrestrial liminal space.

The whole day built up to the final, and my most anticipated, set of the night, Underworld. The duo, formed by Karl Hyde and Rick Smith, is best known for their contributions to the Trainspotting sSoundtrack, with their track “Slippy Nuxx.” I found myself deeply impressed by their seamless ability to mix live vocals into the blends of their songs. They played many of their most well-known songs, like “Cowboy” and “Long and Dark,” but mixed them into a single continuous set. This was all complemented by the light show, flashing colors along to the songs’ distinct beats. It had been a while since Underworld had performed in the U.S., and it was definitely worth the wait until the end of the night.

As the set wrapped up, I reflected on my weekend at Portola: encompassed by a deep sense of confliction , but which ultimately delivered an experience that transcended it. Portola is definitely here to stay, leaving an undeniable mark on the cultural landscape of San Francisco.

Wilco Interview

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Tune in on Saturday, October 14th @ 11:30AM when Red Rider hosts Wilco members, Nels Cline and Mike Jorgensen, for an in-studio interview ahead of the band’s SOLD OUT show at The Greek Theatre in Berkeley later that evening.

Throughout the past two-plus decades Wilco has won multiple Grammy Awards, released 13 studio albums, as well as a trio of albums with Billy Bragg penning music to lyrics by Woody Guthrie. They have founded their own record label (dBpm Records) and festival (Solid Sound).

Latest album, Cousin, was recorded in the band’s legendary Chicago studio—The Loft—over a period of two years, the ten new tracks are written by band leader Jeff Tweedy, and feature musical performances by the long time lineup of Nels Cline, Mikael Jorgensen, Glenn Kotche, John Stirratt, Pat Sansone and, of course, Tweedy on lead vocals.

After a short detour back into their country-influenced roots via last year’s Cruel Country double album, Cousin sees Wilco back in their more familiar progressive and experimental rock territory. Adding a unique and new element to the recording process is the attachment of Welsh singer/songwriter Cate Le Bon as producer—the first time an outsider has been actively involved in a Wilco recording session for more than twenty years, since Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Le Bon brings her unique musical perspective to the band’s trademark sound, and provided them with an inspiring new challenge to push their musical boundaries.

Photo Credit: Annabel Mehran