Mothers & Karaoke at The Bakery, Atlanta

Last night, the Athens band Mothers graced us with a performance at Atlanta's The Bakery.  It was a late-night set - doors were at 9:00 and the headliners didn't even start until 11:30 - and we almost didn't go.  We were more surprised than we imagine just about anyone else when we pulled ourselves away from the t.v. at 8:30 and actually got our butts out the door and into our car.

Graffiti at The Bakery

We're glad that we did, as it was a great night of music and our first exposure to the band Karaoke.

Karaoke are a sort of Gen 2 Atlanta band, made up of members of some of our favorite former Atlanta bands.  Singer/guitarist Grace Wayne used to front the band Del Venicci.  Stand-up drummer Adrian Benedykt Switon also plays in Shepherds, and it was quite entertaining watching his inventive performance.  Guitarist Tymb Gratz was a founding member of Mood Rings, and bassist Chris Yonker also once fronted Hello Ocho and is a co-founder of The Mammal Gallery. In any event, the wealth of experience really shows and they performed a great set with a lot of variety and changing textures.  It was never boring - a neurologically sequential experience all the way through - and we look forward to hearing more from them.  Here's a video that's as notable for its Atlanta locations as for the song itself.

Not that their set took anything away from headliners Mothers.  Mothers is basically the vehicle for Athens, Georgia singer, guitarist, and keyboardist Kristine Leschper.  She even performed the first song of the set solo with just her electric guitar before the rest of the band joined her.

We find it difficult to describe Mothers' music - they're very unique, and at the same time kind of all over the place.  "Singer/songwriter" might be the best catch-all category if one had to categorize them, but their set last night ranged from indie folk to dream pop to folk rock, with splashes of new wave and punk thrown in for good measure.  They sound like no one else, but at the same time evoked bands as diverse as Lower Dens and Daughter and Y La Bomba, without being derivative of any of them.  Here's a typically untypical sample, the rhythmically driving Pink which they used to close out their set.

So, even though we didn't get home until near 1 a.m., we're still glad we went.  It's certainly not a complaint -  more like an observation - but even though it's only early May, it got pretty warm in the non-air-conditioned and poorly ventilated performance space at The Bakery.  We're going to have to think twice before going back for a show there in, say, August.