Music Hall of Williamsburg (Venue Partner)
66 N 6th St
This event has passed.
- When
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Saturday Apr 3, 2010 (9pm)
- Where
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Directions: L to Bedford
- Price
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$12 advance / $12 day of show
- Sold Out!
Like all great stories, it begins with two friends called Matt and Matty. Matty McLoughlin played guitar obsessively, Matt Lamkin also played guitar but fancied himself as a singer/wordsmith too. Both Matt and Matty were frustrated music nuts who decided that they’d had enough of all the bands in their hometown of sunny San Diego dressing and sounding like chilly English new wave bands from the 1960s/70s/80s. “We wanted to start a band that played simple, catchy, smart rock songs,” says Matt. “There weren’t many bands in San Diego doing that at the time. So we did.” That band for the first year or so was McLoughlin and Lamkin alongside a revolving cast of drummers and bassists. They called themselves The Muslims. As they initially played shows in their hometown, there was no problem with the name. As they honed their sound –The Modern Lovers meets The Fall meets The Velvet Underground meets The Ramones: you know, the good stuff – they were just focused on becoming a decent local band. Unfortunately, they became an exceptionally good local band, whose work posted upon their myspace page became a must-stop, shooting them to the top of the Hype Machine, and whose limited edition singles and EP (all recorded by the two Matts alone) became prized assets of collectors on both sides of the Atlantic. By CMJ in October 2008, The Muslims were a quartet having recruited Dave Lantzman on bass and San Diego drumming legend Brian Hill, and they were also the buzz unsigned band. As the press sniffed around them, people started asking: hey, what’s up with the name? Some comments were offended, others offensive. So The Muslims changed their name to The Soft Pack.
