Cape Crush debuts EP Sans Souci at O’Brien’s Pub on Saturday, 3 June 2023.

Proceeds benefit drummer Cody Rico’s recovery from spinal surgery.

Me In Capris, Shiver, and Sonder fill out the four-stack bill.

What is a ‘soft release’?

It’s the kissing cousin of a ‘soft open,’ which you’ll hear about in the food service and hospitality industries when a new establishment debuts.

You know, the industries that are built on the backs of mostly untutored opinions in the key of “I started a Yelp account just to flame Jenny the Bartender who didn’t get me my drink fast enough but I swear to god I’m a fair and balanced personality. Go Redsox!”

A new restaurant, say, has a lot of moving parts and lots of places where things can go wrong. Before you expose yourself to the fully-denuded brutalism of public opinion, why not take a few trips around the block with friends and family? Invite some simpaticos over for a few drinks and tapas, check if all the pistons are firing correctly, before flinging the door wide beneath the red, white, and blue “Grand Opening” banner.

Maybe a new album is not so different? Cape Crush’s new EP San Souci was already running free in the online wilderness as of April 14th. But the release party, in which the band gets to take the record out for a spin in live performance, is another animal altogether.

In this instance, it was a release party at O’Brien’s Pub combined with a medical benefit for drummer Cody Rico. The Whole Kameese has got more details.

There’s a bittersweet flavor in celebrating the birth of an album against the backdrop of medical catastrophe. We live in a country where people who need doctors are treated like customers first, patients second. And if you can’t pay, get out, or wait in a line so long that you’re dead by the time you get to the front of it.

But Saturday was about the music. Good vibes all around. And not a single Yelp account was opened as a result of service at the bar.

Isn’t that what really matters?

Sonder

The solo Sonder opened the bill with a set that was drenched tip-to-toe in a subtle ambient wash of birdsong.

You might recognize the musician as the frontman for this body is all i have in this world, which is such an oppressively long band name to write out that we’re all glad he went with ‘Sonder’ for the one-man edition.

The reverb was thicker, the fingerpicking more delicate, and the chord progressions jazzier than you might have expected listening to his other outfits.

Shout out to a sweet-looking Guild hollow body electric guitar that sang like an angel.

Extra points for the duet with Cape Crush’s Ali Lipman, a cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m On Fire.”

Shiver

How many North Shore bands does it take to pop a punk? Salem’s Shiver is all you need.

The four-piece bounced its way through a set that had the energy of an all-ages show. But there was a layer of melancholy in some of the melodies, if you closed your eyes and listened closely. Shades of Pet Fox.

The introspective brooding comes through cleaner on their studio stuff, like 2020’s See The Light. But there’s nothing somber about the live show, which was all candy canes and bottle rockets.

Cape Crush

Power poppers Cape Crush brought the mob rock to the stage, their three-, four-, five-piece spilling over the lip of the stage. It was a Wu Tang Clan meets Fountains of Wayne vibe. Shades of Arcade Fire, and not just because of the violin.

The band laid out its musical manifesto in the title track of the debut EP Sans Souci. It’s take-no-prisoners, downstroke pop with a velocity that doesn’t quit until the salty closing line. You could see the same energy on stage that you heard on the album, waiting to be slammed like a shot of Pop Rox and Tab. Shades of Weakened Friends.

Me In Capris

Boston’s Me In Capris got back in the studio with a new single “Working Nights,” released last month. You can check it out at Bandcamp and elsewhere.

It’s a precise pop jammer that rocks with mostly clean guitars, playing conservative with the distortion. Shades of an overpowered Games.

You could hear that clean approach in the live show Saturday night. It was vintage rock n roll textures (think: Big Star) translated into a snappier post punk lexicon.

And if you had your ears screwed on right, you might have even understood the lyrics through the PA. An outlier event at O’Brien’s Pub, but no one needs to Yelp about it.

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