On Saturday night, Philly’s Ron Gallo closed out his 2023 tour with a hometown show in Center City. After almost a full year on the road, Gallo and his band performed at First Unitarian Church supported by The Bug Club and Santa Chiara. Gallo spent the last 11 months touring through 11 countries with his 2022 album Foreground Music.
Santa Chiara | photo by Ellen Miller for WXPN
Santa Chiara opened up the night at First Unitarian Church. Gallo himself played bass in Italian musician Chiara D’Anzieri’s project, accompanied by Josh Aaron Friedman on drums and Jerry Bernhardt on guitar. Gallo, Aaron, and Bernhardt also worked on Chiara’s first album, Imported, which was released earlier this year on Kill Rock Stars. D’Anzieri performed the album in full and only swapped the order of a couple songs. The first track on the album, “25,” got moved down the lineup to be the set closer, and she introduced it as the first song she wrote in English shortly after moving to the states.
The Bug Club | photo by Ellen Miller for WXPN
The second opening band, The Bug Club, are a trio from Wales. After a month of touring the US and Canada, they will return to Europe to play more gigs come December. The Bug Club released a new album this year titled Rare Birds: Hour of Song, which clocks in at one hour and four minutes with 47 tracks on it. During their middle set at First Unitarian Church, they played a mix of new and old songs.
Ron Gallo | photo by Ellen Miller for WXPN
Ron Gallo and his band started the set with the new album Foreground Music, played in full. They then transitioned into the “deep cuts” (as Gallo himself referred to it on stage) portion of the set with a crowd favorite ‘Young Lady You’re Scaring Me” and “Kill the Medicine Man” from 2017’s Heavy Meta. Gallo ended the set appropriately with his 2016 song “All the Punks are Domesticated,” which he told the audience was written back in the day when he was cleaning houses in Fishtown. This was indeed an appropriate way to end the night (and ultimately the tour) as the final lyrics of the song are “All of the punks are domesticated / All of the freaks have gone to bed.”
See below for a photo gallery of the night. As for what’s next for Ron Gallo, he commented on Instagram, “I’ve been touring for as long as I remember, after tonight for first time I’ve got no plan besides live a life, make things, and see what happens next.”