Philly Anthems live gets crowd singing, laughing, cheering, and looking ahead to better days
Wednesday here at WXPN we hosted the first of two showcases featuring emerging and established artists who participated in our Philly Anthems project. The Bul Bey, Moustapha Noumbissi, The Flying Vees, Eliza Hardy Jones, Second Star, and Eric Bazilian all performed short sets that included songs they wrote for the project.
If you’re unfamiliar, Philly Anthems is a Pew-supported initiative that tasked the aforementioned artists and several others with composing original songs about freedom, identity, belonging, and hope as part of the nation’s semiquincentennial celebration.
Our second showcase will take place at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 10 right here at WXPN, 3025 Walnut St. in Philadelphia. On the bill are Devon Gilfillian, Lady Alma, Sug Daniels, Grace Gardner, Black Buttafly, and JR Everhart.
Register to attend online here.
The Bul Bey performed first, with guitarist Ish accompanying him, and delivered some smooth hip hop that was clear had jazz in its soul. Before playing his anthem song, Bey played two songs from an upcoming project titled “Depth Before Height,” which he said refers to digging deep into a foundation before building into the sky.
One song, “Pass The Salt,” told of struggles he’s faced during a difficult period in his life. He relayed to the packed crowd something a friend told him: Sometimes you’ve got to eat shit.
To which he replied: Pass the salt. That got a big laugh before he played “North Star,” his anthem.
“I wrote this contribution to Philadelphia’s 250th, “North Star” as a nod to Frederick Douglass’s abolitionist newspaper,” he said of the song. “It is an anthemic look at a city whose social and civic fabric has frayed. Some would even argue it was never as strong as we pretended.”
At the song’s close he enlisted the crowd to sing along with his final chorus of:
I’ve been chasing after freedom but I think I’m wearing ankle weights / 250-year marathon; think I need some Gatorade / Open wounds deep lacerations but I think I’m doing A-Okay
Noumbissi hit the stage next armed with an acoustic guitar and plenty of energy. The Cameroonian native towered over the audience both in stature and charisma, feeling right a home with the WXPN audience.
“I love you all,” he said before giving a lesson on participating “Adeline,” a song from his new EP which drops Friday.
While getting a crowd to sing along to a new song they’ve not heard can be tough, Noumbissi stirred the crowd up enough to get them singing the anthemic ’90s alt rock style hook.
He then played “My Last,” which was written from the perspective of his dying father.
“This is my favorite song to play right now,” he said, recalling how his father died when Noumbissi was just 12 years old and how that impacted his family. But the song analyzes that from his late father’s view; the pain, fear, and anxiety of leaving a family behind.
Noumbissi deftly fingerpicked the song while belting out the powerful vocals, surely eliciting some tears from those in attendance.
His final song was “America,” his contribution to the Philly Anthems project.
“America is her people. A collection of people from innumerable backgrounds that have come together to make this place home,” he said of the song. “I believe ‘We,’ her people, deserve a home that we are proud of. A home that fulfills its responsibility of being a place of love, care, and refuge. An America that is beautiful for everyone.”
He told the crowd the song is, in part, about both appreciating one’s home while also understanding that critiquing it doesn’t negate the former.
At the song’s close, Noumbissi hangs on the “America” almost like bell ringing out, before ending with
You are my home / And I believe that you will be better / You will do better
Our 24 Hour Song Challenge winners The Flying Vees came to the stage next, with vocalist Shannon Vasile joking: “Yes we won the contest, it’s not a big deal.” It is in fact a big deal, as it secured them a spot at our XPoNential Festival, Philly Music Fest, and of course in the Philly Anthems project.
They led with the winning song, “Workman’s Song #1.” Other than vocal harmonies from Vasile, Caitlin Ramsey, Brechyn Chace and Hannah Taylor, the only other “music” for this performance was stomps and wood block hits, driving home the monotony of labor and its seemingly endless hold on everyday Americans.
Next up was their newest and most tragic song, “Monsters,” which dropped on Election Day.
“We’re moving from the plight of the working man to something much worse,” the group joked.
Taylor took up a guitar and Ramsey made her way to the keyboard for a rendition of the song that calls out the evil in billionaire men. While the song largely addresses heavy topics such as sexual assault, corruption, and more, it ends with a message of hope, resilience, and even a bit of vengeance.
To end their set, the Vees got a little more light hearted and performed “Billionaire.”
“It’s a gift buying guide,” they joked. The song is a jaunty and downright hilarious tune about winning over the singer’s heart. But not by gifting chocolates, keepsakes, and anything else; rather by serving up the severed head of a billionaire.
Much like when the Vees performed this at XPoNential Fest, the audience was cracking up at the lyrics. They delivered a crescendoing finish on the line “bring me the severed head of a billionaire” to great fanfare.
Eliza Hardy Jones brought her angelic voice, and the voices of three backup vocalists to the stage next.
First up, she performed “Hip Hip Hooray for the U.S.A.,” a new song about transgender bathroom bans that Jones said will release in December.
She kept it political and played her Philly Anthem, “America the Beautiful,” next.
“I wrote the song with the idea that it would be true at any moment in our history, not just relevant to the current moment,” she said. “We have always been a country founded on the revolutionary dream of true freedom and equality for all, but also built on stolen land by stolen bodies. The inherent dissonance of being a beacon of love of liberty, while also perpetrating violence and oppression, is the true American experience.”
The song addresses school shootings, patriarchal oligarchy, immigration enforcement, and more domestic issues.
“As Americans, we must continue to fight for the ‘better angels of our nature,'” she said.
Listen to “America the Beautiful” here.
Her set ended with a song she wrote with her friend and collaborator, the late Dito van Reigersberg—AKA Martha Graham Cracker. The two wrote “Will You Speak Before I’m Gone” for the the Martha Graham Cracker concept album Lashed But Not Leashed.
Second Star, the new project from Alexis Cunningham and Eric Bazlian, performed their anthem “American Dream” after Jones.
The two were joined on stage by Mackenzie Johnson on guitar and vocals, Danny Black on bass, and David Uosikkinen on drums.
“American Dream,” according to Bazilian and Cunningham “explores the distance between the promise of the American Dream and the complicated reality of living inside it.”
It’s a power pop rock romp with Cunningham on lead vocals and Bazilian laying down some serious rock and roll guitar.
I can’t look away from the war on my screen/ That’s what you get when you get what you wanted / There goes my American dream
After that song, Bazilian did a bit of a costume change and performed three songs with the same band.
First was a more guitar-driven take on The Hooters’ 1983 hit song “All You Zombies.” Bazilian’s liberties with this rendition turned the amps and distortion up to 11, and he even broke out some Eddie Van Halen style fretboard tapping in a fiery solo he laid down in the middle of the song.
His second song of the night was his anthem, “Better Days,” which he said is not a “rah rah” song as some may expect.
He sings in the chorus:
I’m not asking for the sky / I’m not reaching for the moon / But better times, better times / Yeah, better times had better come soon
Bazilian took another killer solo before the closing sing along section that saw Uosikkinen getting a bit of a spotlight on the kit.
Listen to “Better Times” here.
To end the night, Bazilian played “One of Us,” which he wrote for Joan Osborne’s 1995 album Relish. With Johnson and Cunningham on backing vocals, the iconic pre-chorus and chorus had a depth and beauty that rivals the record.
Bazilian once again ripped a solo and in closing the song got a standing ovation. He left the crowd with a parting message: “Better times coming your way.”
