In tight pants, a bright red sweater and a naval cap, Charlie Megira looks a little bit like a cartoon character. He has a pencil-thin mustache and speaks in a thick accent exported from Israel. When he sings, it’s a restrained mumble or a series of whoops and shouts. But man, Charlie Megira can play the guitar.
There’s a certain primitive quality in his guitar style, played out on a beat-up looking electric model run through a bare-bones amplifier using no more than a few pedals. It’s not virtuosic, but each note bursts with tone. The sound falls somewhere between surf-rock and the guitar solos of 1950s rock 'n' roll. He makes use of every part of the guitar’s range, going from rumbling blues licks to screaming high-pitched intensity at the very end of the fretboard.
When he sings, Megira’s stage presence diminishes considerably — as does the complexity of his guitar playing. When he’s just playing, though, he struts about the stage and hops down to walk into the crowd, grinning and stepping closer and closer as he effortlessly tears through a solo.
This primitive aura extends to Megira’s two-person backing band, currently dubbed “The Bet She’An Valley Hillbillies.” His drummer — who did not speak a word through the entire evening — plays only bongos, at times managing to make them as full and present sounding as a basic drumset. The bassist, a woman referred to on the band’s Facebook page as “The Dead Girl,” provides a basic but rock-solid groove on every song.
The whole thing felt a little surreal. Some of the audience in the Twisted Branch Tea Bazaar appeared unenthused, but a decent majority seemed to dig it, bopping and shimmying along. When the songs began to run together, Megira suddenly switched it up completely, moving into a Spanish-sounding sway. Between songs, he quipped about Charles Manson and urged the audience to repeat a Hebrew word no one could quite understand.
The night would not have been complete without its openers, though — starting off strong with a brief set by New York alternative band ONWE. Comprised of two guys and two girls dressed all in black, their sound is fairly standard post-punk, but they pull it off well. Their lead singer exhibited tremendous stage presence, dancing flamboyantly and at one point nuzzling a crowd member during a guitar solo. After one song ended, he yelled, “I don’t view ‘man-child’ as a gendered term!” Only a couple crowd members laughed — but throughout the set, he continued in his valiant attempts to engage the small crowd.
Second opener, The Ha-Rang!, was slightly less impressive. They featured interesting use of an organ and strong guitar work for a hardcore-influenced band, but their stage presence was severely lacking. They cut their set short by two songs, as the lead singer seemed to feel the crowd was not into it. The songs they did play were good — particularly a catchy number called “Wild Blue,” and the lack of engagement may have been a consequence of the small crowd — but all in all, the performance marked a low point in the night.
Overall, though, Twisted Branch brought together a solid night of (very loud) music with decent stylistic variety. Megira and his band are really something to experience: vaguely absurd, slightly anachronistic but incredibly energetic and entertaining. The Ha-Rang! may be worth checking out at a slightly more lively venue, and ONWE’s distinct aesthetic and stage-presence definitely make them worth keeping an eye on.
Read More
‘who told you to think??!!?!?!’ reimagines rap as pure art
By Adam Beddawi | August 20, 2017“who told you to think??!!?!?!?!” is in many respects a continuation of milo’s previous artistic form on previous LP, “So The Flies Don’t Come."
Indie pop star for the ages
By Dan Goff | August 1, 2017Tennis vocalist Alaina Moore talks musical matrimony, creative roots
Making Noise
By John Trainum | July 25, 2017"13" is packed with some of Curry’s most high-energy, explosive deliveries yet — but don’t tell that to Curry.
