Ball of Flame Shoots Fire's Jess Tambelini and Peter Henry

Kind of an interesting pair, I’ll admit.  While Luke Temple’s pseudonymical, lo-fi indie folk project, Here We Go Magic, presents quite a counterpoint to the bombastic sprawl of Ball of Flame Shoot Fire’s latest opus, Jokeland, the convergance of the groups’ styles is definitely a welcome experiment.  I’m already imagining the benefits of charged up Lawrenceville crowd, still beaming from the operatic grandeur of Ball of Flame in full swing, treated to a smoldering set by Temple and Co., which will probably feel more like a somber bedroom recording session than a full on rock show (that’s a compliment). As a fairly consistent showgoer, I can’t imagine a better combination:  grand, epic sweep meets intimate, fragile beauty.

Luckily, Ball of Flame have gotten back into the thick of the Pittsburgh scene with more than a few shows around the area, and with the band finally all together for the first time in months, expect no time to be wasted. With a couple choice opening slots (Wednesday’s show, and the Yeasayer bill with Ponytail at Mr. Small’s later this summer) the band gets a chance to flex Jokeland, an album almost screaming for a victory lap around town after hibernating in iTunes libraries since the CD release show back in January.

BOFSF with Here We Go Magic on Wednesday at the Brillobox along with Camera Obscura at Mr. Smalls tonight  makes these few days leading up to the fourth of July weekend all the more explosive. “Any thing is possssible.”

Thanks to HughshowsRedux for the quality picture.

Here We Go Magic – Tunnelvision

Ball of Flame Shoot Fire – Wishthroat

You can tell singer/song writer Luke Temple likes to keep things enigmatic, between his current moniker, Here We Go Magic, his bare-bones MySpace page, and this shimmering, abstract video for “Tunnelvision” off his latest album, I feel fairly confident in asserting this guy plays it close to the chest.  According to YouTube, this video was shot with a super 8 camera, nails and paint with no post production on the outskirts of some god-forsaken lake in the Catskills.  The song it self is a fragile piece of  folk  as ancient as the mountains, tumbling along with pounding drums and background chantings that sound like a group of people in the woods speaking in tongues.  The only lyrics I can pick out is the well pronounced and syncopated “anything–is–poss–ible,” making me, for the first time in a while,actually feel optimistic about whatever (how’s THAT for optimism).  Lucky for Pittsburgh (which I can tell needs a huge pick me up before the cluster fuck that is St. Patrick’s Day), Temple brought a backing band to tour under the name Here We Go Magic and will be playing the Garfield Artworks with Callers on March 9th at 8:00.