A strange(r) thing(s) happened to me driving in the car with my 15 year old son recently….I actually, genuinely liked the music he was listening to. This underground garage sound had vibes similar to the Pixies with a little bit of Jesus and Mary Chain, and Joy Division. It took me back to the days of art school hanging with friends late exchanging music artists and catching a lot of I’ve never heard before. Then I went home, listened to those new artists and researched all about them. Now, there was this cool groove playing in my car. Not knowing anything about them I just really dug this indie sound unfamiliar to me. My son said, “Yeah, it’s Finn Wolfhard’s band, Calpurnia.” Since I’m old and dumping information I don’t need, only keeping what I need to survive, I replied, “who’s Finn Wolfhard?” My son said, “That dude, Mike, from Stranger Things!” Which jogged my memory, “Ahhhhhhh, really?!”
So, what did I do, especially since I’m in disbelief it was the character “Mike”, I decided to research the band. Calpurnia is a young group of friends that started an indie rock band out of Vancouver, Canada. The band name comes from the character “Calpurnia” in “To Kill a Mocking bird”. With their combined admiration of the famous greats such as The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, B.B. King, and Stevie Wonder, and their love of music, a band was born. Let me tell you, some of the kids these days are pretty damn incredible musicians and I would put Calpurnia in this category. It’s really sad though to read some of the online comments as most of them talk about Stranger Things and not about the actual music they are producing. Wrong platform folks, this is not the movies.
These kids are between 16-18 years of age and sound better than a lot of the bands on the radio or even the best bar-bands in town. They are pretty amazing since they only formed in 2017. Now everyone has their own taste buds in music, but if you are into the likes of The Strokes, Cage the Elephant, and Mazzy Star, give Calpurnia a go. Check out the lead guitarist Ayla Tesler-Mabe, she is so versatile playing grunge, jazz, and funk… and she’s only 18 years old people! Don’t dismiss the rest of the band, they all have amazing combined talent so sink into a world where sound is not mainstream and they freely experiment with their own vibe – raw and inviting.