Mixtapes, Masked Intruder and Robots! Everywhere!! Pop-Punked Pressed
Mixtapes capped off an uplifting night of pop-punk at Pressed on May 15th.
The Ohio band had never played in Canada before, being turned away at the border last time they tried to enter the country. ”They let us in this time, even with me three arrests,” said guitarist/vocalist Ryan Rockwell. The band played a great set with some very catchy tunes. There are three things I discovered I truly love about Mixtapes. First, the wonderful mix of soft female vocals with the raspy male vocals is awesome. Second, the fact that the bass player is singing along to every single word with so much passion even if he is not miked up. Third, they have a policy where they try to play all of their songs that the crowd requests. On this night they delivered four request, including ”All the Pirates” and ”Hey Baby” (even if Ryan hates that song).
The band’s new album, Ordinary Silence, is out June 25th, and they gave the jam packed Pressed crowd a taste with the song ”Elevator Day”. Near the end of the show they played a cover of Confident Monkeys’ track ”Paparazzi coke.” They then got the five minute warning from the organizers and powered through ”Moonglow” and then ”Cassettes,” just in time.
Masked Intruder, also making their first appearance in Ottawa, dawned their masks and rocked out Wednesday night. Their masks may have people comparing them to The Aquabats!, but these guys are no superheroes. They are criminals on the run, playing up tempo pop-punk love songs whith a criminal theme. Great examples of this is ”Why Don’t You Love Me in Real Life,” where they sing ”Every night in my sweet dreams I get to hold you in my arms. I tried to get some in real life but just set off your burglar alarm.”
Making sure the hooligans did not step out of line was Officer Bradford, a ”cop from America,” who stood on stage with the band. After standing still through the first few songs, lead singer Blue (because he wears a blue ski mask) asked the crowd if they wanted to party with Officer Bradford. After the crowd erupted, the officer got the mosh pit started. To top it all off, Masked Intruder played a cover of Green Day’s She (a classic off of Dookie).
Opening the night was Ottawa’s one man punk rock explosion, Robots!Everywhere!!.Phil is quite the force on stage with his guitar and drum machine. He had to play a compressed set, so he said ”I am playing just the hits tonight.” The man can sure get the crowd going with great sing a longs, like ”Zombie Smoothie,” ”Call Me Some, Looking For Time”and the theme song he wrote for the Ottawa Explosion Weekend. Check this guy out you can download his EP for free here. And as always support local.
Speaking of local, this sweet evening of delicious pop-punk was the second instalment of My Brain Hurts Volume 1, a concert series by local promoters/record label Finish What You Started. There was also a local celebrity sighting, all three members of Finderskeepers could been seen singing and dancing along.