Queen of Swords, April Magazine, Try the Pie

EARLY SHOW! Queen of Swords (Toronto), April Magazine, Try the Pie. 5:00pm doors, first band at 5:30pm, $12/15. 21+

Queen of Swords
Toronto-based songwriter/guitarist Aerin Fogel makes shadowy dream pop and mercurial healing-rock under the nom de plume Queen of Swords. Their sophomore album is getting released in June on by Philadephia-based queer and trans-owned indie label Get Better Records.

https://queenofswords.bandcamp.com/album/year-8-2

April Magazine

"The wash of flangers & shimmery reverb have been the foundation in Cali psych ever since the Byrds went electric. And while that sound might've dropped off occasionally, it never dropped out. The Velvets minimalist stylings were infused into the mix by The Dream Syndicate in the early 80's & thus a game changer was born. Clay Allison, Opal, Green On Red all took their charge from that current. Then the Shoegaze scene of the 90's looked at those bands as vectors, things got a little more drenched, so yet more seeds were sown into the fertile terroir. Cut to current climes & the bay area is teeming with the latest iterations: Children Maybe Later, Now, & Cindy easily come to mind. But curiously the band most steeped in the mohair constitution is April Magazine, who (thus far) have been content in the shadows. Up till now they've seemed like characters plucked out of a Kazuo Ishiguo novel-mysterious & ethereal-but perhaps this pressing of last year's cassette only release will flush them out. 'Wesley's Convertible Tape For The South' shows the band defly balancing all those that have come before them while also incorporating flourishes of Les Rallizes DeNudes, Hallelujahs & Nagisa Ni Te into the pageantry."

https://aprilmagazine.bandcamp.com/music

Try the Pie
Led by the self-taught San Jose-based Bean Tupou (they/them), Try the Pie was formed in 2006 and draws upon a Tongan-American and a Bay Area punk background to piece impromptu harmony, poetic imagery, soft guitar melodies, dissonance, and noise. These elements are used to create a sonic collage-work to provide vivid storytelling. The band has since grown to include Nick Lopez (he/him, Ugly Winner) on drums, Bailey Lupo (they/them, Scowl) on bass, and Laine Barriga (they/them, My Friend, Oka Sun) on guitar. Most of lead singer Tupou’s music is based heavily on mixing present and past experiences with both country, indie and Polynesian-influenced songwriting, inherited histories, and oral storytelling of a poetic nature.

https://trythepie.bandcamp.com/