mikingmihrab

By J.Carlson of the Urban Artist's Group If an obscure music enthusiast were to drag his or her net through the depths of the Philadelphia underground, he or she would undoubtedly discover the existence of some rather worthwhile bands and singer/songwriters. Being an obscure music enthusiast myself, I have sought endlessly, especially in Philadelphia, my hometown, for independent bands and singer/songwriters involved in a variety of genres. In that pursuit I have come across artists such as ...

By J.Carlson of the Urban Artist's Group If an obscure music enthusiast were to drag his or her net through the depths of the Philadelphia underground, he or she would undoubtedly discover the existence of some rather worthwhile bands and singer/songwriters. Being an obscure music enthusiast myself, I have sought endlessly, especially in Philadelphia, my hometown, for independent bands and singer/songwriters involved in a variety of genres. In that pursuit I have come across artists such as Mischief Brew, Northern Liberties, Bad News Bats, Da Comrade!, Algernon Cadwallader, The Bee Team, Joe Jack Talcum, Toothless George, and others. Also among these bands from the City of Brotherly Love is a post-punk/garage rock trio that goes by the name mikingmihrab. It was perhaps a year ago that I first received word from mikingmihrab, and that was in the form of a press package. At that time I was hard at work trying to establish my online publication, The Urban Artist Group, a widely utilized source for independent/underground music discovery, as well as a means with which to offer the bands and singer/songwriters with whom we worked some much deserved exposure. Unfortunately, when Michael Adams, singer/guitarist for mikingmihrab, sent me the band’s newly released recording on 7-inch vinyl, “Breaking News,” my record player had already joined that huge garbage heap in the sky reserved for such devices, and I hadn’t gotten my hands on a new one yet. In fact, I sent Michael a piece of online mail telling him that I was in between record players at the moment, and he then sent me copies of the songs in MP3 format. That was very cool of him. Indeed, such things show a great deal about one’s character. Not only did Michael seem like a cool individual, the songs he sent were definitely worth some attention. It didn’t take long for me to decide that I wanted to do a review of “Breaking News.” At this point, “Breaking News” is nearly a year and a half old---still a relatively young release, mind you---and mikingmihrab is currently at work on a new recording titled “Tres Tontos.” So, I eventually decided not to review “Breaking News” but do a sort of band profile, as it were. According to mikingmihrab’s band bio, Michael was born in Long Island, New York, where he started out playing guitar on an A&S Department Store brand acoustic that his father had discarded. It had only one string, but Michael was familiar with the sound of scales from having played the clarinet and was able to form some song melodies on it. After years of practicing by himself, banging around in a noise band with a friend, and then getting a gas station job straight out of high school, Michael made an effort to start a band and play original songs. Then after a short-lived band attempt with two inexperienced individuals, Michael left Long Island behind for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, determined to start over. Having lugged all of his worldly belongings from 30th Street Station to a pad in West Philly to crash with a woman he had only met a week earlier, he was ready to begin his search for bandmates afresh. During that time he ended up jamming with the embryonic Farewell to Treaties one time, playing some open mic gigs, but none of it really bore any fruit, save for acquiring a few new drinking buddies. Zach Price, mikingmihrab’s current drummer, answered a Craigslist ad Michael had placed in 2004, and the two began practicing together at a space on Delaware Avenue. Though nearly classically trained, Zach prefers to play more rock-oriented music. The two bandmates somehow brought a bass player aboard just in time to play the Clark Park Fest, which was headlined by The Low Budgets. That bassist was only temporary, though. At a bar in 2006, Mr. Kevin Cooper was asked by Michael and Zach to play bass for mikingmihrab, and he accepted. That’s when they consider they turned a critical corner in their endeavor. Having played a nation tour with Spondegod and embarked on similar tours in Bobby Kork (with Kermit Hell Lyman III) and The Rusty Nails, Kevin had much to bring to the mikingmihrab table. At that time, Kevin also had his abstract paintings on display at the Wexler Gallery in Olde City. Since then, the trio has recorded a debut album, “Welsh for Mutton Chops,” their 7” EP “Breaking News,” played almost every venue in Philadelphia, and toured as far as Greenville, North Carolina. Upon returning from that tour, they played a show at the Khyber in support of Alan McCabe’s Bernie Bernie Headflap. Now they are about to release their latest recording, “Tres Tontos,” and are seemingly stuck at full throttle, entirely unwilling to give up whatever momentum they’ve gained so far. Recently I interviewed the members of mikingmihrab. The following is from that interview. I would like to begin in an introductory fashion, as is typical of my interviews these days, by asking you: Who are the individuals who make up the mikingmihrab trio, each and each, not just as musicians and singer/songwriters but as human beings of this vast and crazy City Earth in which we all live? Michael S. Adams (MSA): I’m Mike. I usually sign off as MSA or some such variation, because I’m a bit paranoid and lazy, the former being a greater force. I play guitar, sing, and write songs. Kevin Cooper: I'm Kevin. I play the bass guitar. What are you supposed to say about being a human being? I just want to live. As far as being human, I just want to live in a cave. Zach Price: I'm the drummer. Your sound definitely belongs under the categorical umbrella term of rock, though I’d say that hardly does it any justice. Within the confines of that thick rock membrane there seem to be elements of post-punk, psychedelic, indie, and even a little dirty garage, in addition to a slight progressive rock feel as a sort of perceptible undercurrent. Was that the type of sound you were shooting for when writing and practicing for the early mikingmihrab material? Or did it happen purely by chance, resulting from each of your unique musical efforts being thrown into the creative bucket, so to speak, and stirred together to form the fluid sound I have been listening to on and off for the past few months on the “Breaking News” 7-inch? MSA: For part of "Welsh.." and all of "Breaking News" I was genuinely trying to imitate Woody Guthrie and Johnny Cash in the way they wrote their stories and wrote simple arrangements. Some other stuff slipped through when I brought it to Zach and Kevin. I wrote No Hope in the dark laying on my bed in the middle of the night so maybe it was a dream. But Breaking News was a song where I really conscientiously tried to do Guthrie. I kind of moved past that on the new one. So, I guess the sound I wanted was ‘good’ but my mind races. On second thought, I think we’re not so much going for a sound as going for a song. “Breaking News” is two years old, though. We just finished up “Tres Tontos”. It’ll be mixed and mastered by June or July. Kevin Cooper: We just try to make the sounds that we make. The sounds that fit together. It's a puzzle. Forget about it, we have a new one coming out. Zach Price: So to answer your question, yes. Ok. One thing that has been bugging me since first receiving your press package is the band name: mikingmihrab. Please, if you would be so kind, enlighten me as to why you’ve employed the use of this specific moniker for the band? MSA: It’s a compound word I invented and no one else is using it. A word made of miking – as in putting a microphone up to something and mihrab - the corner in a mosque that points towards mecca. They were words in the dictionary I randomly chose for a publishing name when I first started making recordings. It’s a CIA trigger word from the MK-Ultra program. Someone gets clipped every time it’s broadcast. People hate it. I like it. Kevin Cooper: There you go. Being a Philadelphia native myself, I have always felt that I had a rather deep connection to the city, a unique relationship with it that has is evident in every observation and experience, from the narrow, littered streets of the North Side’s Badland projects to the crowded sidewalks and seemingly endless storefronts of South Street, from the Toynbee tiles embedded in the streets to the pigeons scavenging tidbits everywhere, from the graffiti tags on the walls to the train graveyard off from the highway (with old, rusty boxcars and piled railroad ties), and from the melting pot of people one sees while crossing town to the huge red and gold and green Paifang welcoming one to China Town and the West Side’s impossibly long stretches of row homes and the bustling Center City madness. And though I am currently residing almost two hours away from Philadelphia, it is my home and always will be. What are your thoughts on Philadelphia? What are your relationships to the city, if you have any to speak of? MSA: I live in the West part of town. It’s pretty nice but people seem pretty angry most of the time. I might be projecting there. I like every city, even if it’s terrible. I like small towns in the middle of nowhere, deserts, mountains. I guess I feel kind of trapped here sometimes. Most of my friends live here. My son was born here. I grew up on a potato farm that turned into a faceless suburb in less than twenty years, so I guess it’s better than that. I wish it was closer to the ocean. The air kind of stinks, and it’s only quiet from 3am to 6am. It’s a different tribe. Some folks seem overly emotional to me. Philly's a place with people in it. Every city has the same components; they’re just arranged differently. The attitudes of the people are reflected by the state of the city and how much of a burden they have to bear to keep it from crumbling. Kevin Cooper: I guess nothing makes West Philly unique except the raccoons. You forgot the shantytown underneath the old subway near 10th and Ridge. Ha! Or the shit factory up somewhere near 95! Zach Price: I grew up here and it's home. I don't really think about it all that much, because it's just a fact of life for me and always has been. Not everyone knows this, but Philadelphia cream cheese actually has nothing to do with Philadelphia. It was never made here. And DeNic's roast pork is fucking delicious…but everyone actually does know that. What artists, particularly other bands and singer/songwriters, have been most influential in your lives and your music? MSA: Waylon Jennings, CCR, Minutemen, Cash, Guthrie, and Nirvana. Whoever was playing at ABC No Rio that summer when I was sixteen. Billy Joel and Jad Fair. Paintings, sculptures, photographs. Kevin Cooper: Minutemen, ZZ Top, Slayer, Merle Haggard, Hank Williams and you have to put Mission of Burma on there. And fucking The Who. MSA: Oh yeah, Merle! I forgot about Merle! Zach Price: I have to mention the Pixies because in my first conversation with Mike, he asked me what bands I was into, and being put on the spot I just said the Pixies, which I guess earned me an audition. Also, Kevin talks about fucking The Who all the time. Obviously you have played quite a few shows as mikingmihrab. What have been some of your most memorable moments while gigging throughout the city…or anywhere, really? MSA: The best show we can remember is at the Spazz in Greenville, NC. They burned a bunch of furniture at the end. I saw all these roaches scatter from the mattresses. Memorable for being unqualified disasters... Kevin Cooper: Musical train wreck leaving the station, ladies. Zach Price: Yeah, that show wins by far. It was Halloween. We played in a little room that fit us and like five other people, but the sound went out into the backyard, where there were all kinds of creatures and scantily clad women there to enjoy it (or not). What are your thoughts and observations on the Philadelphia music scene? I mean, there are so many great Philly-based bands and singer/songwriters these days, such as Mischief Brew, Da Comrade!, Northern Liberties, The Bee Team, Bad News Bats, Humanasaur, Toothless George, Algernon Cadwallader, Fuck Attack!, Hulk Smash, Yo Man Go, and several others. There are many bands and singer/songwriters, now defunct, that were important, meaningful and worthwhile presences in the music in general, in Philadelphia’s music scene in specific. You, mikingmihrab, are now included in that list of local bands and singer/songwriters. MSA: No one usually gives us any love in Philly except Jeff from the Spazz, Seizure 17 and everyone in HumanInHuman Records (A day after this conversation “Schuylkill River” (Welsh for Mutton Chops) is featured on a Philebrity list of the 10 best songs about PHL). I know I closed a bunch of doors by going to some of these bands shows, getting drunk and acting antagonistic and misanthropic. I don't know many other bands around here personally to be honest. Kevin Riley from Northern Liberties, who are great, has been really cool. He took great pictures of one of our worst shows. I smashed the guitar on my forehead and dripped some blood. That's a good shot. I work with Mikey from Humanasaur. Da Comrade lives down the street from me still, I think. I yelled at them to play faster. Kevin says they’re good. We made friends with Blag'ard from Chapel Hill and have been working with them. Kevin Cooper: My friends are a bunch of great musicians. Rawar, Seizure 17, Wizard Eye and Wally. I've been playing around here for a long time. Yo! don’t forget to mention Alan McCabe (head of HumanInHuman). He’ll get pissed off and kill you! MSA: Oh yeah, Alan’s in Headflap and runs HiH. What are your upcoming plans and hopes for mikingmihrab? MSA: Just to release “Tres Tontos” and get to Europe. There's always the South if that doesn't pan out. Or West! Zach Price: Until the day that I have enough money to retire in a beach house with several expensive cars and at least one pet belonging to an endangered species, I will consider this band a failure. Are any of you in any side projects? If so, which ones? Kevin Cooper: Thee Nosebleeds and Headflap with Zach. Lastly, if there’s anything I failed to cover or anything you’d like to express, talk about, or whatever, please feel free to do so now. The floor is all yours, guys. Kevin Cooper: Is it time to head for the hills yet? MSA: I have nothing to say at this time. I’m not a very good conversationalist. Woof!