The Growlers, Mylo Jenkins, Tater Famine & More Tonight!

Hey all,

March is here! And as a special treat for all of you, we've lined up an incredible series of guests and live performances that reach across the genre spectrum! Check out our list of upcoming performers for more details, but let's get back to what's happening on tonight's show!

Our first interview comes courtesy of a group that sold out The Crepe Place last weekend, The Growlers.


This multifaceted psychedelic surf rock act rocketed out of Costa Mesa, California in 2006, and haven't looked back since. The band's music shares the same musical shelf space as garage rock luminaries like Ty Segall, JEFF The Brotherhood and The Fresh & Only's but also recall the psychedelic strain of The Entrance Band and The Mantles.

Propelled by the success of 2010's Hot Tropics, The Growlers have been tearing it up all over the country and even around the world. Performances at the FYF Fest in LA (which we covered back in September) and this year's Noise Pop festival in SF indicate that the group is on the rise.

Tune in on Friday night to hear our interview with the group, what it's like to be an up and coming indie rock act, and what expectations they have of themselves for 2011 and beyond.

After that, we'll be playing host to one of Santa Cruz's most promising acts, Tater Famine.

A folk-punk trio from right here in Santa Cruz, Tater Famine have emerged as one of the perennial folk punk bands of our local scene, joining the ranks of similarly thrashy folk such as Blackbird Raum and Matador. The group has steadily climbed the ranks of the music scene in town, having played all over the city, and are quickly becoming a fixture in the city of Santa Cruz.

Not content to perform only within the confines of our town, Tater Famine have taken their act on the road to promote 2009's An Untimely Fashion, and have performed all over the coast and even in Europe.

The Tater Famine boys will be bringing their eclectic sound to our studio up in the forest tonight around 8:30 to play a few songs, talk about their upcoming show at The Crepe Place on March 17th, and tell us a few stories about being a band out on the road.

After that, make sure to stay tuned for our third guest of the night, Mylo Jenkins.

Mylo Jenkins is a seven-piece folk and americana act from Santa Cruz. Lead by Dan Kocher and featuring a roster of Santa Cruz musicians (some of whom perform in the local folk group Tether Horse), they band was on hiatus for a few years, but recently came to play a series of shows at The Crepe Place.

We'll be welcoming a number of the Mylo Jenkins crew to talk about their upcoming show supporting Jared Mees and the Grown Children at the Crepe Place this sunday, as well as what 2011 holds for the group.

These and more when you tune into The Rising Tide tonight at 8:30pm! Listen in at 88.1fm or http://www.kzsc.org/

The Mystery Lights, Blackbird Blackbird, Old Arc and more on The Rising Tide!

Hey everybody,

As you may have noticed, we now have a widget displaying 5 songs from previously recorded episodes of The Rising Tide. As the year progresses, we'll be swapping in and out tunes from recent and past episodes to enrich your blog-viewing experience and, hopefully, entice you even more to listen in to the show live this friday night!

Speaking of friday night, allow me to introduce the first of friday night's guests: Blackbird Blackbird and Old Arc.

Blackbird Blackbird

Blackbird Blackbird is the monicker of Mikey S., a San Francisco-based electronic artist whose work has attracted the attention of the press (The Bay Bridged, The Hype Machine and The Fader, among others) in recent months. Though firmly in the hypnotic and hazey world of chillwave at surface level, Blackbird Blackbird forgoes the vocally-focused approach of the genre for a more glitch-and-dreampop sound that fits nicely between Gold Panda and Baths. Remixes and covers of the likes of Beach House and Modest Mouse demonstrate that Blackbird Blackbird is an artist who refuses to rest on his laurels and not challenge himself.

Tune in on friday night to hear Blackbird Blackbird talk about the upcoming CD release of his debut record, Summer Heart, his forthcoming performance at the SF Weekly's All Shook Down event, and what ever else he has in store for us this year!

Blackbird Blackbird will be joined on air by the local group who will be backing him up at the SF Weekly event mentioned above, Old Arc.

Old Arc

This local two-piece has been burning up lately, amping up their psychedelic synth pop sound with a live show that's equal parts MGMT-inspired tribalism and utter youthful exuberance. Similarly ambitious in scope as Blackbird Blackbird, Old Arc have remixed the likes of Toro Y Moi and Local Natives, and their collection of demo recordings, EPs and remixes have been on rotation on The Rising Tide for the last few weeks.

Old Arc will come into the studio on friday to talk about their live collaboration with Blackbird Blackbird, their forthcoming recordings, and what they have planned for the year as well.

And to wrap things up, we'll be joined live in the studio by our third guests that evening: The Mystery Lights.

The Mystery Lights

Hailing from Salinas, CA, The Mystery Lights relentless garage rock assault has terrorized this part of the state for several years. Sounding like something of a fever dream straight out of a 60s psych festival, The Mystery Lights are poised to deliver the goods in 2011, including the follow up to 2009's Teenage Catgirls and The Mystery Lightshow. The band has been laying low for the past few months, but they are returning to help support the one-night-only reunion of The Spurts at the Crepe Place on Thursday, February 3rd (also playing are Sugar Shack).

Tune in Friday to hear from The Mystery Lights and more!

- DJ PassiveTheory

Gay Genius and The Art Museums on The Rising Tide!

Hey all,

First off, a quick reminder that a number of photos taken of our last two Rising Tide radio programs, including January 7th's show with The Album Leaf, Carry Yrself Home and The Sacred Orchard and last week's program featuring Man/Miracle and Worker Bee are currently available online right here on our Rising Tide photo account! And for earlier photos of performances from last year, check out photographer Brian Baumgartner's photo page dedicated to the photos he took of performances from last year's shows right here.

With that being said, let's dig into the bands who'll be coming up to our treehouse up in the woods this friday night...

The first of these bands is Gay Genius.

Gay Genius

This local two-piece group is comprised of Nessie from Nessie and Her Beard and Tyler from James Rabbit, both of whom are Rising Tide alum in their own right. The duo banded together as a result of a rapturous performance piece at one of SCUM's Panbandamonium events that took place last year and got together to write last year's release, Perfect Dark. The two trade harmonies and lead vocal duties over synth pop beats that recall Casiotone for the Painfully Alone and Soft Cell, among others.

Gay Genius will be coming on to the show on friday night to talk about their collaborations, their forthcoming live performances (including a show this Saturday night, the 22nd) and what the future holds for Gay Genius!

Later on in the evening, The Rising Tide will host SF's own The Art Museums as guests.

The Art Museums

The duo of Josh Alper and Glenn Donaldson have played in a number of folk and americana oriented acts both in Santa Cruz and in the bay area. However, joining forces as the Art Museums has taken their music in a decidedly different direction. As last year's Woodsist-issued Rough Frame EP can attest to, the band plunders the sounds of lo-fi indie pop music from the genre's forebears, echoing The Pastels and Guided By Voices, among others.

The group will be performing alongside The Sandwiches, The Soft Bombs and local artist Rachel Fannan (formerly of Sleepy Sun) at Slim's in San Francisco next tuesday, January 25th. But before that, the Art Museums will come on the radio to talk about the show, let us know about their upcoming work, and regale us with stories of being a band to watch for in the big city!

Tune in for these and more on The Rising Tide on KZSC! Tune in to 88.1fm if you're in the Santa Cruz, Monterrey Bay or San Benito counties, or online at www.kzsc.org starting at 8:30pm!

- DJ PassiveTheory

Worker Bee and Man/Miracle this friday night!

Hey all,

Hopefully some of you managed to catch either (or both) of the Album Leaf shows that recently went down at the Crepe Place, but they were excellent in my estimation. You can check out the photos from Jimmy LaValle's appearance on The Rising Tide (as well as photos of Keith P from Carry Yrself Home and The Sacred Orchard) by clicking here.

But now it's onto the pressing business set before me today, telling you all about our wonderful guests that will be appearing on The Rising Tide this friday night!

First, we'll be having the band by the name of Worker Bee come into KZSC for a chat.

Worker Bee

Hailing from just over the hill in San Jose, Worker Bee have steadily built a dedicated following over the last 4 years. The band's unique take on post-rock, noise and americana has culminated in releases such as 2009's excellent record, Tangler. Worker Bee's music would find itself comfortably placed in anyone's record collection between Tortoise and Nick Cave, among others.

The band will be coming into our studio this friday night to talk about their upcoming show at Cafe du Nord on January 20th and maybe spill the beans concerning their follow-up record to Tangler due out sometime this year.

Next up, we'll be treated to a visit and live performance from Man/Miracle.

Man/Miracle

Though they now call Oakland home, this indie-pop four piece used to call Santa Cruz home and met while going to school at UC Santa Cruz. Drawing on a sound that echoes artists as far-flung and disparate as King Sunny Ade, Wild Beasts, and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Man/Miracle's debut LP that came out last year, The Shape of Things, shows signs of a band that has taken their musical prowess to the next level.

The Man/Miracle boys will be coming into the studio to talk about their forthcoming musical ventures, their experiences on the road touring with artists like Rogue Wave, perform a few songs live in the studio, and talk about their forthcoming show at Metavinyl Records this Saturday night with former Rising Tide guests Hermit Convention and Grizzel Toe (as well as New York's own Dinosaur Feathers).

Tune in for these and more this Friday night on The Rising Tide!

First Show of the New Year! THREE GUESTS!

First things first... HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2010 was quite the year, and I'm going to look back on it someday with a degree of fondness in my heart, especially as far as this radio show is concerned. That being said, we're moving on and have a number of surprises in store for all of you! The first of which being the new blog redesign that coincides with our brand new Rising Tide logo/decal designed by none other than the otherworldly-talented Stacie Willoughby (check out the rest of her art!).

That being said, we're not even waiting until the actual start of Winter Quarter to whip out the BIG GUNS.

Yes, there is a Blazing Saddles reference there, somewhere...

This friday night, January 7th, The Rising Tide will play host to three amazing guests. The first of which is a band hailing from Santa Cruz called The Sacred Orchard.

The Sacred Orchard

This local folk quintet cites freak-folk luminaries like Akron/Family and Bon Iver as influences and has been gaining a quietly growing audience over the past year in the city. They'll be performing at the SubRosa Infoshop and Cafe's Benefit Show this Saturday night, but first they'll stop by the studio to play some songs and talk about their experiences of being in a young and promising local band.

After that, we'll be joined in the studio by Keith Petrocelli of Carry Yrself Home.

This will be Keith's second time coming on the show, and as expected of one of Santa Cruz's busiest music personalities, he has a whole host of shows to come on the air to talk about. Not only that, but we'll also be talking to Keith about his involvement with booking The Rio Theatre in 2011, and what future projects he has in store for the city of Santa Cruz.

But Keith won't be alone when he comes on air this friday night, for joining him on air to talk about the two nearly-sold-out-already shows taking place next week, is The Album Leaf.

Jimmy LaValle of The Album Leaf

The Album Leaf's take on folk and indie rock is as diverse in it's instrumentation as it is profound and appealing in it's quality. Never afraid to incorporate live electronics and loops into his music, The Album Leaf fall along a similar line of modern musicians such as múm and Eluvium, while the San Diego-born Jimmy LaValle has made Santa Cruz his home in the last few years. A pair of upcoming hot-ticket shows at the Crepe Place (see the link above) attests to his ever-constant popularity and prowess.

I'm fucking stoked to welcome The Album Leaf into our studio at KZSC this Friday night and ask about his forthcoming projects, his experiences as a globetrotting musician, and to talk about what makes these two shows at the Crepe so special and so explicitly local.

These and much more when you tune into KZSC Santa Cruz this Friday night at 8:30 pm for the FIRST Rising Tide of the new year!

- DJ PassiveTheory

Seasons Greetings, NYE Show and more!

Hey all,

As I type this, I'm sitting comfortably at home in San Diego enjoying my two or three weeks off from school while being sick as a goddamn tuberculosis sinus infection-ridden mule. Don't ask me how that makes any sense at all, just roll with it.

Anyway, there won't be a typical Rising Tide programme for the next two weeks; the collective's shoes will be filled in by various KZSC DJs programming whatever the hell they want to. This is rather unfortunate, but given the amount of work we have put into the show this past quarter, I'd say that it's only fair to give us a break to spend with our families.

Pictured: Christmas Morning at DJ PassiveTheory's household

That being said, it's my pleasure to let you know that The Rising Tide will be programming on New Years' Eve, and it will be a jam-packed special edition that will be THREE HOURS LONG. That's right! From 7pm until 10pm on New Years Eve, you can tune in to KZSC (88.1fm or www.kzsc.org) to hear a very special edition of The Rising Tide. Will DJ PassiveTheory re-broadcast some of his favorite interviews over the past year? Will there be a super-special guest coming to the station to perform live in the studio? Who knows! (Wrong, I know... Maybe.) You'll just have to tune in to find out!

Also, stay tuned because there will be a blog post in a few days detailing the very first ever Rising Tideys! The Tideys are a series of awards with no actual trophies that I will bestow on some local artists, records, venues and what-not that will only be displayed on this website! This means that they have little-to-no validation outside of this blog! (i.e. Don't read too much into my choices, goddamnit)

Stay tuned for these and much more on The Rising Tide!

- DJ PassiveTheory

P.S. Have a happy holiday, folks!

Recent Photos and Thanks

Hey all,

I've been meaning to post up these photos that our friend, Brian Baumgartner, took of Grizzel Toe and the guys of FolkYeah! a few weeks ago. Enjoy!

Grizzel Toe:


FolkYeah!:


You can check out all of Brian's photography on the show here. If you do, make sure to check out the rest of Brian's photos. He's been taking photos for us since this summer and is about to embark on a voyage which will take him to Australia, so unfortunately we won't have his handy lens and eye for lighting handy for a few months and we're gonna miss him.

That being said, if you or anyone you know would be interested in taking photography of artists performing inside the studio for The Rising Tide, please email us at therisingtideonkzsc@gmail.com and let us know! We even want people to come film performances (because that would be some rad shit).

Peace,
- DJ PassiveTheory

A Friday of G's: The Groggs and Getaway Girl live on The Rising Tide!

Hey all,

It's just about the end of the scholastic quarter at UCSC, and as the leaves turn to brown and eventually hit the ground, most of our collective members are hard at work catching up on the academic travail that they happened to neglect up to this point. Oh well, everybody loves a procrastinator!

That being said, we here at the Rising Tide, as always, are working to provide you the best in local music programming, as well as the focal point of spotlighting a different independent artist live in the studio each and every week. This week we have two such artists.

First off, let me introduce you to The Groggs.


This local garage rock three-piece is slowly becoming an institution in the city of Santa Cruz. If you want to listen to a band whose music feels like a five o'clock shadow repeatedly punching you in the face until you keel ovel, and then makes out with your girl while standing over you... Then this is your band. Echoing recent garage rock revivalists like The Black Lips and Mark Sultan, The Groggs are a band that have made a name for themselves amid a scene as vast and colorful as Santa Cruz's by playing loud and playing fast. They'll join us on The Rising Tide tonight to talk about their recently released EP 3D, to talk about their upcoming shows this month, and play some previously unheard new songs!

Our second guest tonight is a local artist by the name of Getaway Girl.


As Getaway Girl, local singer-songwriter Courtney Jones displays her virtuosity with the piano, crafting gorgeous and captivating songs in the vein of fellow piano-based singer-songwriters like Regina Spektor. Getaway Girl imbues a familiar style of music with a fresh new perspective, using her experiences in the world to break away from the pack and set herself apart from everyone else. Tune in Friday night at 8:30 to hear Getaway Girl perform songs from her new EP, Say It Through The Flowers, and to hear about her upcoming performance next Friday night at the Asana Tea House in downtown Santa Cruz.

These and more if you tune in to 88.1fm or go online to www.kzsc.org tonight around 8:30 and listen to The Rising Tide on KZSC Santa Cruz!

TRT 11/5/10 - Toes n' Folk

Hey all,

Sorry for keeping quiet this week. We've been working up to the last minute in trying to put together an awesome show to kick-start the month of November, and I think we've assembled an impressive lineup for tonight!

First off, we'll be hearing from Britt Govea, the man behind FolkYeah! productions. Britt has, in recent years, established his organization as a linchpin in Nor Cal's indie rock, psychedelic rock and (naturally) folk circles.


He's brought the likes of Animal Collective, The Arcade Fire, Beach House, Conor Oberst, The XX, Dirty Projectors and Cat Power to our neck of the woods, and has also featured local artists such as Mountain Animal Hospital and Sleepy Sun. His booking of the Brookdale Lodge has made it a local music hotspot.

Tune in to hear Britt talk about FolkYeah, it's recent run of successful shows in and around the Santa Cruz area, and perhaps some interesting news concerning the Dean Wareheim (Galaxie 500) show at Don Quixote's next Friday night...


Not only that, but The Rising Tide will play host this week to Santa Cruz's very own Grizzel Toe. Born from the ashes of one of SC's most exciting bands, Grizzel Toe re-emerged this summer and garnered enough attention to open for Wavves at the Crepe Place without having any songs made public! (or... at least none on myspace).

Believe the hype.

These Sonic Youth disciples will be coming in to the studio tonight at 8:30 to talk about their new project, where they think their music will take them, and when (if?) we might be able to get any of their recorded material.

Tune in tonight at 8:30 for these and much more on The Rising Tide! You can tune in at 88.1fm if you're in the Central Coast or www.kzsc.org if you're outside of that range.

- DJ PassiveTheory

New Quarter!!! New Stuff!!!

Hey all,

It's been a while since we've updated this here blog. To be honest... We've neglected it. Neglected it like a redheaded stepchild.

Some things SHOULD be neglected...

But we're back and better than ever! We've regained our ability to host live musical guests on the show and have also configured the show's format away from it's new indie rock/lo-fi rock theme towards one that is more keyed in on playing local music and bay area music on top of playing music of artists who are passing through town.

That's right folks, the likes of Matador, Mountain Animal Hospital and Sleepy Sun played alongside The Fresh & Onlys, Beulah, Deerhoof and whatever else under the sun happens to fit in with that week's vibe.

Last week, we did not have a live local guest (something we'll rectify this week, hopefully), but we did air a pair of interviews conducted with touring artsts as they passed through Santa Cruz. The first was with Baths, an upcoming electronic dance artist from the LA area who is playing the Crepe Place TONIGHT with El Ten Eleven and Sister Crayon. The second interview was with Tokyo Police Club, who played at the Rio Theatre this past Thursday and whose keyboardist, Graham Wright, graciously gave us a bit of his time before taking the stage. We should have both interviews up sometime soon for your own listening pleasure!

We also have a pair of new DJs who have joined the collective: Juan and Aaron! They'll be posting on the blog sometime soon (hopefully) and, until then, keep an eye out on the blog for further updates concerning The Rising Tide on KZSC (every Friday night from 8:30pm until 10:30pm on 88.1fm or www.kzsc.org)!!!