They Are Gutting A Body Of Water Closes Out A Big 2025 at the First Unitarian Church

The local shoegaze trailblazers known as They Are Gutting A Body Of Water (or TAGABOW) may have reached a new peak this year: Starting with their first international tour, the band then proceeded to release the widely acclaimed album LOTTO, playing shows across North America for two months with all their friends. And then, they ended it all off with three sold out nights at the First Unitarian Church — the “coolest place to play shows in Philadelphia,” according to frontperson Douglas Dulgarian. 

The night of December 19th was exceptionally cold and windy, causing the scene at the Church to look a bit odd without any concert-goers mingling outside after doors at 7:30 p.m. TAGABOW had organized three different sets of openers for their Philly shows, with the final night featuring the homegrown groups Cradle and Snoozer. 

Down inside the Church basement, the band had constructed a large platform in the center of the room, lifted about one foot off the ground. TAGABOW is known for performing away from the crowd — turned around on stage, in a circle within the audience, maybe even in a separate room —  and they took that concept a step further on this tour by constructing their own custom stage. The unorthodox setup prompted fans with a more difficult decision than usual when considering their desired angle of viewing, given the 360-degree options. 

Back on the normal stage, both openers consisted of five members, heavily focusing on the guitar. Cradle’s set featured an electronic component that backed certain songs with a layer of glitchy noise, and their compositions added to that blurry, warped atmosphere. While Snoozer also harnessed the power of the electric guitar, they did so with more of a pop-rock edge, opting for catchier songwriting and more present vocals within the mix. Their set ended with a notably explosive song, amping the crowd up for what was to come. 

The members of TAGABOW squeezed through the crowd one by one to wire up their instruments. Their guitar amps were at the front of the normal stage, making the space between the band and the cabinets a dangerous area for the unprotected ear. Dulgarian’s electric guitar and amp were colorfully customized; the green sparkly amp cabinet had a beautiful waterfall scene printed onto its pristine white screen, and the guitar was coated in a colorful blur of photos and had dice for volume knobs. The complete customization of gear appears to be a passion of Dulgarian’s, as he and the band’s guitar tech Bay Dupuy launched Linktrack Customs earlier this year, selling outlandishly designed one-of-one guitars. 

2018’s Destiny XL was well represented by the first chunk of TAGABOW’s set, beginning with the otherworldly “63 skies,” moving into “texas instruments,” and landing on the memorable intro chords of “eightball.” PJ Carroll assisted on guitar, Emily Lofing filled in the low end on bass, and Ben Opatut crashed through the tracks on drums across from Dulgarian, who played guitar and sang while also operating an SP404 electronic sampler, which contained all of the band’s interlude pieces used to tie together their setlist. These shorter ideas were built around video game synths and sound bites, and almost always included a sharp, woodblock-y clap sound. One interlude sounded eerily similar to the infamous Lavender Town music from Pokémon Red and Blue (research this creepypasta on your own will). 

While mostly engulfed in dark distortion, the band’s guitar tones would occasionally dip into a cleaner, emo-esque twinge before devolving back into the churning fuzz. Dulgarian’s vocals were very hard to make out, however this was most likely a choice considering how they are similarly presented on record. The band performed the two nearly instrumental tracks “behind the waterfall” and “delta p” off lucky styles before delving into LOTTO, an album that retains the heavy guitar dominance but borrows melodic sensibilities from anthemic subgenres like power pop and emo rock more than ever before. 

The surrounding sea of fans sang along to “baeside k” and “trainers,” the former providing a standout songwriting moment with its descending chord progression that ends the track. Although it serves as the album’s opener, “the chase” capped off the performance perfectly with its gut-wrenchingly intense guitar and Doug’s lengthy spoken-word piece that progresses with the chords until it’s just… over. The people were moshing to poetry, whether they noticed or not. It’s a scarily captivating track that proves why TAGABOW is renowned within the current shoegaze resurgence. 

With no encore, the band thanked the crowd for coming and shouted out everyone who had helped make the tour happen. After the show, Lofing explained how this tour had been their first with a traveling front-of-house engineer mixing their shows each night. Fiona Gurney, who was also the band’s tour manager, helped set up sound for their unusual stage each night, while also hopping behind the board for the performance, making their ambitious vision possible. 

In February, They Are Gutting A Body of Water will head to Europe for a month on their second international headlining tour. LOTTO, the band’s fourth album, is out now via Julia’s War, Smoking Room, and ATO. For more TAGABOW-approved music, check out Doug’s record label Julia’s War for a plethora of 2025 releases from Philly acts like Her New Knife, Fib, Nyxy Nyx, and Joyer.