eX-Tradition Apocalyptic Silver Release Show
Published 1.10.26
On Wednesday at Danny's, many gathered to celebrate eX-Tradition's new release! Opening for them were Early Grave, Fantasma, and Laughing Cocks. This was a bill more united by friendship than by genre. Most of these guys are straight up punk bands and I'm less than qualified to talk about them (but I'm doing it anyway). There are some through lines; a couple of the openers go into post-punk territory, which I'm discovering currently means punk music you can dance to. I'm just relieved that it's stopped meaning an indie rock band that wants to be different.
Early Grave was a solid opener! I've been meaning to see them because one half of Destructos is in there, but this band isn't really like that at all. I was moving though, which means the music was good. I'm sure the quality is there, I just don't like hardcore music that much (sentences like this could get me killed). To the genre's credit, the sets are always fast which is what I'm looking for on a 4 band bill that starts after 8 (i love sleeping). If this paragraph somehow enticed you their way, you can listen to their demo exclusively on youtube.
Fantasma are from New York but are also Brazilian, which means my preconceived biases cancel out in this case. Out of the openers, I would say these guys are the most similar to eX-Tradition. They were pretty dancey, which I of course like and some of their songs were very emotional!
Laughing Cocks are from New York too. They were very very good and I was having a lot of fun during their set. Greg is a funny guy. New York decided they actually didn't have enough stuff so they had to take him too. In all seriousness though, the set was really good. Everyone was smiling and laughing and the only people who aren't moving are the ones that never do. (it's never too late to change guys, nobody's too cool to dance). Atm there is no place online where you can hear their beautiful music so if you get the chance to see them I would take it!
This brings us to the main event.
eX-Tradition is a badass post-punk band from Philadelphia. To every young goth person who has waxed poetic to me about how Specimen and Christian Death played together at the Batcave for less than 10 dollars a ticket and that the good old days are long gone and there's no "real" goth scene any more, certainly not in Philly, this is for you. eX-Tradition is goth as fuck.
It was wonderful to see that people at the show were there very intentionally. The new album, Apocalyptic Silver was played in its entirety and you could see and hear people getting excited that their favorite track off the record was getting played. I was right there with them, my favorite song on the album is Hellfire Spits :). Also, you know the set was good because somebody threw a couple crumpled singles at Florence's feet.
^Evidence^
The whole album is great, and is definitely a worthy buy. There are some heavy hitters like the one previously mentioned and Obsidian Silence, and some moody, understated tracks like The Orchard. I loved the EP too, but the band's sound has really crystalized. In the recording the drums sound extremely huge on some tracks at certain moments, and not always in a good way. It's generally present in the recording but sounds worse on cassette (I'm not a vinyl-head, so in some ways that's my cross to bear).
If you haven't listened to Apocalyptic Silver you can do so here, and if you're coming to the club but not going to shows you're seriously missing out!