Power Trip at Black Cat

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RAM, the mythical band at DC's premier global dancehall Tropicalia

RAM is a legendary band of Haitian roots and voodoo rock music, that was first established in the 90s and who?s fame goes well beyond Haitian borders. The band formed by Richard and Lunise Morse incorporates instruments from traditional Haitian music, such as drum, cornet and ?graj? as well as rock music instruments (guitar, bass, drums, keyboard). Their concerts held every Thursday at the hotel Oloffson has become a must for the nightlife lovers and curious tourists.

RAM is a drum-roots-driven powerhouse band from Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Ancient folkloric polyrhythms intertwine harmoniously with Punk Rock guitar riffs and swinging Caribbean keyboard melodies, led by the entrancing singer, Lunise, all combine for a truly magical experience on Thursdays at Hotel Oloffson in Port-au-Prince, Haiti ? where RAM has consistently gigged for the last 25 years.

The band derives its name from the initials of its founder, songwriter, and lead male vocalist, Richard A. Morse. The band?s music has been described by Morse as ?Vodou rock ?n? roots?, and has been one of the prominent bands in the mizik rasin musical movement in Haiti. RAM began performing together in 1990, and recorded their first album in 1996. The band?s music incorporates traditional Vodou lyrics and instruments, such as rara horns and petro drums, into modern rock and roll. The band?s songs include lyrics in Haitian Creole, French, and English.

Rasin is a musical style that began in Haiti in the 1970s when musicians began combining elements of traditional Haitian Vodou ceremonial and folkloric music with rock and roll. This style of modern music reaching back to the roots of Vodou tradition came to be called mizik rasin (?roots music?) in Haitian Creole or musique racine in French. In context, the movement is often referred to simply as ?rasin? or ?racine.?

$18 advance / $20 at the door
Doors 8PM
Showtime: 9PM

DOORS: 7:30PM
$12.00 adv - $14.00 day of
all ages

serpentwithfeet
https://www.facebook.com/serpentwithfeet/
serpentwithfeet is an avant-garde vocalist and performance artist whose growing body of work is rooted in dueling obsessions with the ephemeral and the everlasting ? key components of his artistic journey from a childhood stint as a choirboy in Baltimore through his time at The University of the Arts in Philadelphia, where he studied vocal performance before relocating to New York City. His forthcoming debut full-length album soil is a return to the sensibilities and wide-eyed curiosity of his musical youth before symmetry and sterile soundscapes ruled the roost. With the release of soil the chameleonic serpentwithfeet (born Josiah Wise) rediscovers and ultimately returns to the unhinged version of himself he was sure he had outgrown.

Lee Mo
https://www.facebook.com/LeeMoMusic
One of the newer voices on the Philadelphia music scene, Lee Mo is taking the city by storm. Known for her killer vocals, soulful feel, and impressive music sensibilities, Lee Mo has graced the stages of some of Philly's hottest venues. Born and raised in Baltimore, MD, she is the musical product of many influences: gospel, jazz, and soul, to name a few. She started in church, singing with her siblings in the children's choir. At a young age it was clear that music was her gift, having written and composed songs before the age of ten years old. She grew up listening to Yolanda Adams, Kim Burrell, Whitney Houston, and Ella Fitzgerald, who have all influenced her distinct soulful and jazzy sound. In high school she cultivated her gift in singing and playing the trumpet, and she also realized her love for music production. In high school she was a member of both the world-renowned Baltimore City College Choir as well as the Baltimore City College Marching Knights. With the choir and band she was able to travel all over the east coast, performing on a weekly basis. During her time at "City," she was inspired to further her career as a performer at Temple University, where she received her Bachelor's in Vocal Jazz Performance in May 2014, studying under Philadelphia's own jazz legend, Joanna Pascale. During her time at Temple, Lee Mo met trumpeter and Vertical Current bandleader Christopher Stevens, and soon became one of the band's primary featured vocalists.Young in age, but mature in sound, Lee Mo knows what she wants from the music, and each performances provide nothing less than an authentic, free, and spiritual experience.

DOORS: 7:30PM
$10.00 adv - $12.00 day of
all ages

Katie von Schleicher
http://www.facebook.com/KatieVonSchleicher/
Katie Von Schleicher rose from intern to artist on Brooklyn label Ba Da Bing with Bleaksploitation, a self-recorded 2015 mini album of irreverent, fuzz-laden tunes. On her debut full-length, Von Schleicher strikes again on the magic that comes from her warped and uncompromising sound. Shitty Hits channels the bright, sunny radio burners of the 1970?s, songs you drive to, carefree, and songs you can cry to, which The Guardian describe as ?Portishead meets the Beatles,? and NPR?s Bob Boilen calls ?one of those constant repeat records for me.?

Conjuring the home recorded sound of Paul McCartney?s McCartney or Jeff Buckley?s Sketches For My Sweetheart The Drunk, Shitty Hits was created on a tape machine at Von Schleicher?s childhood home in Maryland. Where Bleaksploitation courted a kind of sonic nihilism, Shitty Hits shows confidence, growth and unflinching self-realization. Inhabiting the roles of producer and engineer, Von Schleicher cements her voice as one to be reckoned with, parsed and pored over, on an album that is ?never less than beguiling? (Pitchfork).

DOORS: 7:30PM
$12
all ages

Frog Eyes
https://www.facebook.com/FrogEyesOfficial
Frog Eyes have made their last album. 17 years after their teetering debut, the Vancouver band unveils Violet Psalms?a giddy lament; a gnashing jubilee; a rain-drenched allocution on hope vs. horror, paradise vs. pride, Marx and Brexit and bad acid trips.

It's an ending like a beginning. "We were trying to pretend it was our first record," Carey Mercer says. This is their final record, Frog Eyes' last gasp?but the art-rockers wanted to capture the energy of a debut, the freedom you feel "when there's no expectation that anyone will actually listen." They made it at home, burrowing under the house where Mercer lives with drummer Melanie Campbell. The goal was to blot out the world, focusing on what they could grow down there, four musicians in a basement. Could they squeeze out ten songs? Was there enough paste in the tube to squeeze out 10? "In the end there was. Which is rad."

No guests, no engineers. A self-invention. Violet Psalms began with its frantic, reverb-drenched guitar, squiggling over a modulation pedal. Next Mercer and Campbell concocted the drum parts?imagining them as onomatopoeia then recording them in fragments, kickdrum by kickdrum, tom by tom, with tailored effects. "The goal was to disorientate," Mercer explains, but also to work by instinct, gut?a cutup of music and image, songs that coil back and kiss. The band pruned as they went, adding Terri Upton's bass parts, taking other parts away. Whereas past LPs used piano, Shyla Seller worked with shimmering synths?chords like bleeding watercolour, shadows casting on a wall.

DOORS: 7:30PM
$13.00 adv - $15.00 day of
all ages

Colouring
https://www.facebook.com/ColouringBand
Fifties painter Mark Rothko, known for his large solid swaths of color, once claimed to have no real interest in the color itself or whatever form it took, only in expressing simple human emotions. In a similar sense, Colouring is the culmination of several sonic hues -- instrumental and electronic, pop and underground, heart and body -- but the aim is all feeling. London's Jack Kenworthy imbues his work with a wide-eyed relatability, whether he's exploring elation, obsession, or even melancholy over a swirl of lush house rhythm, post-dubstep atmosphere, art rock eclecticism, and sticky hooks. And as for form, the singer/pianist/producer isn't alone. Colouring is rounded out by bassist Dom Potts, guitarist Sean Reilly, and drummer Alex Johnson -- a lithe, powerful team for this mercurial but driven music.

DOORS: 6:30PM
$15.00 adv - $18.00 day of
all ages

Lewis Capaldi
https://www.facebook.com/lewiscapaldi
When Lewis Capaldi?s debut single Bruises exploded in mid-2017 it seemed from an outside perspective to have all the hallmarks of an overnight sensation. How could this 20-year-old with a soul-wrenching voice that sounded like it had been hewn from granite seemingly emerge from nowhere with a song of such emotional depth?

A stripped-back and almost painfully raw meditation on love and loss from a writer who seemed like he?d already lived several lives and had the scars to prove it, within weeks it had racked up an astonishing 20 million Spotify plays and topped streaming charts around the world.

OCEAN ALLEY
Saturday June 23 @ DC9 Nightclub
1940 9th Street NW, Washington, DC
All Ages | 8PM Doors

On the back of releasing their 2nd Album 'Chiaroscuro' on March 9 2018, Ocean Alley will tour North America for the first time ever in May & June.

Oozing with cool and a pulsating bass line, their latest single ?Confidence? is the third single from their new album 'Chiaroscuro'. The title, traditionally related to the artistic contrast of light and dark tones, captures the underlying theme heard across the 12 album tracks ? in both subject and sound they explore the power of duality, taking on alternate interpretations including right and wrong, control and surrender. From the hazy, hopeful tones on the paradoxical ?Happy Sad?, to the wistful yet commanding howls on ?Knees?, and warm, rich rolling guitars on lead single ?The Comedown? which was voted at #48 in triple j?s Hottest 100 of 2017, each song is drenched in equal parts distortion and dreaminess, pairing blissfully scuzzy riffs with intoxicating echoing vocals, to create the ultimate fusion of psychedelic reggae and laid-back surf rock.

It's been a long time coming, but the band will finally hit the road across North America, taking in dates from Los Angeles to New York, as well as throughout Canada.

Tickets go on sale 10AM Local Time, Friday March 9.

Purchase 'Chiaroscuro' | https://oceanalley.lnk.to/Chiaroscuro

'Chiaroscuro' is released independently worldwide on Friday March 9.