Space Bacon performs to a sold-out crowd at Philadelphia music venue MilkBoy.
Sometime last year, four member band Space Bacon began really proving themselves to the music world as one of the greater New York area’s premier electronic jambands. The quartet’s 2020 performances so far, including Vermont, Chicago, and now last weekend Philadelphia, have only helped to further fortify this classification. Philadelphia actually REALLY helped fortify that, with the band playing a sold-out show at music club MilkBoy. But don’t just take our word for it—at the bottom of the article, stream a SBD recording of the show via the band’s official BandCamp page, which you can head to here to purchase and download. (Purchasing the boards helps directly support bands like Space Bacon, especially in our currently pandemoniac concert going situation.)
Two full sets of music from Space Bacon here in Philadelphia put on display the foursome’s expertise for precisely executed yet adventurously manipulated compositions. The night stretched the music from light and climatic to dark and sinister, from fun and funky to intense and rock and roll. The show’s opener, “Rosandra’s Tide,” which clocked in at just under a half an hour long, stands as one of the most blistering live tracks the band has performed yet this year.
Meanwhile their expert sense in segueing between compositional and improvisational ends was on display as well. Both of the sets of the night featured non-stop playing from song one to end, and they hardly missed a single beat or key change anywhere in between. The evening even combined storytelling element into the improvisational experience. Friend of the band Ed Stroud kicked off set two with a humorous nod to the country’s current concern with pandemic virus, via a history lesson about George Washington’s unique method of curing disease.
Bacon’s MilkBoy show also continued a streak across their 2020 shows for showcasing brand new compositional material. Reggae-styled song “The Van” was a debut original here in Philly, and it was an appropriate cool down after searing set of space-rock style jamming (peep the wildly aggressive “Flamethrower” peak coming just before it for the highlight of the entire night). Likewise, the band hit a nice groovy tempo on “Division” earlier in the set, another original that was debuted one show previous in Chicago, IL.
Space Bacon’s eager audience at MilkBoy.
Opening band Cocktail Party Phenomenon perform Limp Bizkit with help from Matt McHuman.
Philadelphia’s own Cocktail Party Phenomenon kicked the start of the night off, also in pretty impressive fashion. Routinely hitting an infectiously fun party vibe in their music, the heavy-handed, five-member funk outfit also showed no fear about stretching music out as a group towards improvisational ends. Midway through one of their originals, without a break in playing, the band invited Space Bacon keyboardist Chris Gironda up for a interestingly experimental take on Hall and Oates’ “I Can’t Go For That.” This was soon enough rivaled by the rendition of Limp Bizkit’s “Rollin'” done with special guest vocalist Matt McHuman, which was actually pretty spot on and which set the energy bar high for the night.
Space Bacon rolls on with their Spring 2020 Tour with a show at Debonair Music Hall in Teaneck, NJ next weekend on Saturday, March 21. Beyond that the tour sees shows from the band in Colorado, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and more. For more information, head to their website here.
As for their Philadelphia show, stream SBD audio of that here below, courtesy of Space Bacon’s official BandCamp page (head here to purchase and download directly). Below that, check out a gallery of images of both them and Cocktail Party Phenomenon from the evening.
