SEERD is the father/daughter industrial rock band you didn't know you needed
Plus, the Valley ranks high for 'hidden' music scenes.
If you’re looking for a band with an odd and interesting backstory, there’s SEERD.
The band is Curtis Shamlin and his daughter Kayla, duel vocaling over a soundtrack of melodic industrial metal. It’s core members were parents of children at an Armenian community school in Fresno, where Shamlin served as principal/superintendent and his daughter coached.
These were longtime musician types with a list of local bands to their credit (Mynis, The Next Page, Fusion Porn). One of them was an established EDM DJ (the Coldharbour Recordings artist Mike EFEX).
Shamlin himself was in a few established bands in the 1990s and 2000s, including GRYP and Speakers for the Dead. The latter had an album out on Magna Carta Records in 2006.
Shamlin even wrote on autobiography on his exploits as a “rock-n-roll principal,” which you can read about in this Breitbart piece from 2014.
SEERD played local support for Otep in June and is currently working buzz off a pair of singles; “I Won’t Comply,” and “Love and Enemy.” A full album is expected at the beginning of next year with a tour to support.
Modesto has the country’s No. 1 ‘under the radar’ music scene
I won’t say that you should trust some random online ticket reseller to tell you about the local music scene, but if you did or do, you’ll want to take a look at this story from The Modesto Bee.
It says that Modesto is the best “under-the-radar” live music destinations in the whole of the U.S.
That’s according to CheapoTicketing.com, which surveyed some 3,000 “music lovers” to come up with the list of 120 cities.
Modesto topped the list, just above two beach cities in Florida. Other California cities on the list were Bakersfield (No. 9), Stockton (No. 11), Santa Cruz (No. 35) and Visalia (No. 85).
Fresno did not make the cut, but maybe the survey was based on population size or some other disqualifying factor. The whole thing is short on details about how the survey was done or exactly what constitutes “under the radar.”
According to the survey, “music enthusiasts can experience a variety of genres, including rock, blues, country and jazz,” in a variety of venues, “from the open-air performances at the Mancini Bowl in Graceada Park, to the intimate shows at the Gallo Center for the Arts.”
Also: “Downtown Modesto comes alive with ‘Music in the Plaza’ during summers, where local musicians serenade the streets.”
The Modesto Bee adds some context, for instance the Mancini Bowl just finished its popular MoBand concert series, and hosted the 13th Modstock Music Festival last Sunday.
Modesto also has a Porchfest, which preceded the Tower Porchfest by several years and had more than 110 acts playing 68 porches last May.
I would add, The Fruityard, where Air Supply plays Aug. 19 with the Little River Band.
Self-promotion alert: New Old Man, “A Simple Task b/w Traveling Time”
My solo project New Old Man released a pair of singles on Bandcamp last week.
“A Simple Task” is an ode to Gordon Lightfoot, which I decided to work up and record following the singer’s death in May. You might hear some direct refence in Lightfoot’s “Ballad of Yarmouth Castle.”
“Traveling Time” is one of several songs written specifically for this project. It has some ’50s rock-n-roll underpinning that might not be totally obvious and a Pixies thing that wasn’t at all intentional, until it was.
The songs can be found on digital platforms now. “Traveling Time” can be heard tonight on both the Local Show on KFSR and the Homegrown show on New Rock 104.1.
That’s it for this week. Remember you can now hear me on the Homegrown Show Sundays at 8 p.m. on New Rock 104.1 FM and follow my other writing at The Fresno Bee. If you have anything you think I need to be looking at or listening to, feel free to let me know: jtehee@gmail.com