#Jon Wurster

[yourfavealbumisgender]

Beat The Champ by The Mountain Goats is Butch!

requested by anon

[men-who-meow]

there are a thousand songs about love and heartbreak but only one about the best ever death metal band in denton

[karmicbias]

Another fucking amazing Mountain Goats show on the books!

I made and traded pins, sang and screamed and danced and cried.

I met and fist bumped John!

Everything feels right in the energy of that room.

We got a set that feels nearly impossible.

[thebowerypresents]

Michael Shannon & Jason Narducy and Friends (Including Michael Stipe) Celebrate R.E.M. on Saturday Night at Brooklyn Steel

Michael Shannon & Jason Narducy and Friends – Brooklyn Steel – March 8, 2025

Job No. 1 of celebrity-fronts-curious-rock-legend-tribute shows is earnestness: If you’re coming at me with, yeah, a reconstruction of a respectably nonobvious choice like R.E.M.’s Fables of the Reconstruction, I need to know if you’re all in. Job No. 2 is commitment: Are you going to just deliver what was promised or are you going to go for it? If it’s Michael Shannon and Jason Narducy’s traveling R.E.M. show — now in its second touring iteration — it’s commitment and then some, baby. The vibe isn’t dilettante, it’s connoisseur: We’re going on an R.E.M. geek ride through Fables and beyond, and we’re going to really get deep. Sign me up.

The Brooklyn Steel stop on this latest Shannon/Narducy swing made for a thrilling Saturday night, and that was before Michael Stipe showed up. All-in it was a two-set, two-and-a-half-hour, jangle-jangle-jangle capture of Fables and loads more from the R.E.M. grab bag, faithful readings and judicious interpretations alike. 

“Maps and Legends” and “Driver 8” set the tone early and the rest unspooled in a haze of guitar spritz and rhythm roil. “Life and How to Live It,” “Can’t Get There from Here,” “Auctioneer,” the odds and ends “Wendell Gee” … the Fables material crackled, rolling out one after the other in album-side-order. Shannon was the music's faithful vessel, bounding all about the stage and exulting in the fun of it. Narducy was the group’s spiritual core — as Shannon noted as part of effusive praise, Narducy was the reason it was all happening — and led a crack band that fully inhabited the material without overcrowding it. 

That was the key: This was a show for the R.E.M. nerds by the REM nerds, pulling what in the more traditional sense of a tribute show would feel like random pinballing around the catalog — they didn’t play any of the quote-unquote most famous R.E.M. songs — but for the so-inclined made all kinds of sense. Plenty of Murmur material returned (“World Leader Pretend,” “Sitting Still” and, for the first time this tour, “Talk About the Passion”).

The oddity “New Test Leper” turned up from New Adventures in Hi-Fi. A gorgeous “Find the River” nodded in from Automatic for the People, and a choogling “Cuyahoga” from Life’s Rich Pageant. They mixed in chestnuts from the Velvet Underground (“Femme Fatale”), Wire (“Strange”) and Aerosmith (“Toys in the Attic,” with opener Dave Hill sitting in for a guitar battle) that on paper would appear random but the R.E.M. faithful would easily pick out as covers the band had previously recorded.

One of the night’s most tender moments found just Shannon and Narducy in a spare duo, delivering “So. Central Rain” in a slowed-down arrangement. And then, of course, came the thunderclap that sent the place bonkers … no less than Michael Stipe himself joining Shannon on vocals for “Pretty Persuasion,” the last song of the night. It, too, fit — the original members of R.E.M. haven’t been shy about their praise of the band, and have sat in throughout the tour, one time all together — and was a terrific capper to this passion project. —Chad Berndtson | @cberndtson

Photos courtesy of Katie Dadarria | www.instagram.com/dadarria

[mzhyst]

Happy? Wurster? Wednesday?

[k-zit-the-oooze]

Superchunk

Mac McCaughan, Jim Wilbur, Laura Ballance, Jon Wurster

[spilladabalia]

Superchunk - Why do you Have to Put a Date on Everything?

[dustedmagazine]

The Mountain Goats — Jenny from Thebes (Merge)

Like many established artists, the Mountain Goats suffer from preconceived notions about their work. Grow popular enough or stick around long enough and, welp, suddenly you’re the villain. Whether the fans get in the way of enjoying the art, or the artist themself is simply too precious to be tolerated, there are any number of reasons one might avoid their work. Or maybe there’s just so many albums that you don’t know where to begin. Maybe you’re suffering from an oeuvre-dose?

Jenny from Thebes is a sequel to the Mountain Goats landmark All Hail West Texas. Jenny, who we first meet on that album, and who has been a recurring character in Darnielle’s work, returns. While Jenny from Thebes is a self-proclaimed rock opera, it defies the expectations of that genre inasmuch as it’s not a sprawling, self-indulgent double album. Moreover, it stands on its own.

As always, Darnielle can be a bit too expository lyrically. He creates vignettes with each song and sets them within the tableau of the album. What’s especially poignant about this chapter in Jenny’s story is how her home is a shelter for the vulnerable in her orbit. At a time when marginalized communities are under attack with little support from those meant to protect them, a rock opera about mutual aid sends a message that they’re not alone.

Honestly, more artists should record sequels to their earlier work. Unlike what’s happening in relentlessly serialized American cinema, there are characters whose lives we could revisit without veering into Forrest Gump territory. There are themes that evolve meaningfully over time. Dan Bejar did this with “Jackie” and “Jackie (Dressed in Cobras).” Those songs were written just five years apart. They’re excellent! The depth of the Mountain Goats’ body of work —  and their rapt audience — lends itself to this kind of exploration.

Musically, it’s a straightforward indie record with the kind of production we’ve grown accustomed to over the last 20 years. It’s gorgeous. More artists should sound like current-vintage Destroyer and Lambchop. Or, failing that, that one really good Christopher Owens record with the saxophone motif. Horns and strings are good!

With Jenny from Thebes, Darnielle continues to redefine the scope of the Mountain Goats and his evolution as a songwriter and storyteller puts him in rarefied air.

J T. Ramsay

[sinceileftyoublog]

Courtney Barnett, Bob Mould, & Squirrel Flower Live Review: 7/26, Illinois Science & Technology Park Field, Skokie

Courtney Barnett

BY JORDAN MAINZER

The three artists who played the inaugural night of Out of Space Skokie at its temporary new location took advantage of the open space's clear sound and turned up the fuzz.

Headliner Courtney Barnett, three years removed from her third studio album Things Take Time, Take Time (Mom+Pop), made even that album's understated songs come alive, live. Backed by bassist Thomy Sloane and drummer Stella Mozgawa (of Warpaint, and co-producer of Things Take Time), Barnett elevated sad sack jam "Rae Street", the motorik "Turning Green", the wiry "Before You Gotta Go", and jangly single "Write a List of Things to Look Forward To", emphasizing sounds and lyrics performed and delivered much more subtly on record. "Time is money, and money is no man's friend," she sang on set opener "Rae Street", as if to contextualize the drawn-out nature of some of her back catalog highlights: the wandering "Avant Gardener", bluesy dirge "Small Poppies", and driving bass-led "City Looks Pretty". Vocally, Barnett's screamed rasp was as gravel-throated as ever, a perfect contrast to her droll sprechgesang, confirming the status of "Pedestrian at Best" as a justified shout-along.

Barnett

Stella Mozgawa

Barnett

Thomy Sloane

Yet, true to Barnett's penchant for storytelling, the anthem of the night was also the slowest song, perhaps her best: the prescient "Depreston". At once a treatise on gentrification, mortality, and time itself, it's the type of song that stops you in your tracks when you realize you're singing back at Barnett, "If you've got a spare half a million / You could knock it down and start rebuildin'," occupying the persona of the grimy real estate agent viewing what was someone's home as a pure capital good. I suppose, after all, the ease at which we sing the song is a tribute to Barnett's empathy, evidence that those of us who participate in the same society with the same set of restrictive rules, have the potential for good and evil. Or maybe it's just a catchy melody.

Barnett

Barnett & Mozgawa

Bob Mould

Bob Mould, meanwhile, performed solo, but electric, and the set was basically the answer to the question, "What would it sound like if you took away bassist Jason Narducy and drummer Jon Wurster from a normal Bob Mould band set?" Indeed, Mould played at the same breakneck pace as always, running around the stage during solos as if he was hyping up his invisible band. The warmth of his vocals was discernible even beside his distorted guitar tones, whether burning through a Hüsker Dü song or solo material (my one gripe from the setlist: only one Sugar song, the chintzy classic "Hoover Dam"). "Out of Space...out of breath!" Mould proclaimed in triumph after finishing "Siberian Butterfly", nonetheless a reminder to himself to keep on going even when you're the one doing all the work.

Mould

Mould

Squirrel Flower

Local artist Squirrel Flower, the project of singer-songwriter Ella O'Connor Williams, opened up the night, playing what she said may be her last show in Chicago for a while. For one, drummer Jacob Getzoff is going to nursing school, an announcement that garnered rapturous applause from the crowd. Moreover, ever prolific, Williams shared she hopes to take a break from playing live and write and record, despite having released her most recent and best album Tomorrow's Fire (Polyvinyl) less than a year ago. I'm glad I got to catch Squirrel Flower now, then, each song from Tomorrow's Fire leveled up, the slowcore "Almost Pulled Away" becoming full-on shoegaze, the crunchy "Intheskatepark" featuring drums that could have been audible even at the expansive Canal Shores. If you really want to get a sense for what Squirrel Flower sounds like live, though, simply take a look at the project's discography from start to finish. In other words, the same artist who self-released the stark early winter songs from middle america in 2015 is now faithfully covering "Cortez the Killer". To clarify, Squirrel Flower played only original material for Williams' first ever show in Skokie. "I've only been up here to get bagels," Williams said. No word on whether she's a New York Bagel & Bialy or Kaufman's person.

Squirrel Flower

Squirrel Flower

[cubeghost]

left: venue photo, right: avkv85

jon wurster pink suit!!!!

[lennengrad]

had this great pic of john so i decided to fuck around w thé instagram ai backdrop feature 🫡

[metropotamia]

[thebowerypresents]

Michael Shannon & Jason Narducy and Friends – Music Hall of Williamsburg – February 14, 2024

Brooklyn’s Michael Shannon and singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Jason Narducy got to together to play R.E.M.’s universally acclaimed debut LP, Murmur, last summer in Chicago, celebrating its 40th anniversary, and it went so well that they decided to take their act on the road with the help of some very talented friends, drummer Jon Wurster, guitarist Dag Juhlin, bassist Nick Macri, and pianist Vijay Tellis-Nayak. And on Valentine’s Day, they closed out their brief February tour by playing the album in full at a sold-out Music Hall of Williamsburg.

Photos courtesy of Adela Loconte | www.adelaloconte.com

[vernalloy]

[ID: A traditional drawing of Jon Wurster done in pencil, with his hair and the background collaged. He looks forward intently and rests his head on a fist. He is wearing a button-up shirt. The background is composed of blocks of pink. End ID.]

[fourturtlez]

literally look how baby girl he looks

[spilladabalia]

Superchunk - Learned to Surf

When I learned to walk, you know humans roamed the earth, I can't hold my breath anymore, I stopped sinking and learned to surf. When I learned to talk, I found words that weren't worth dirt, I can't hold my breath anymore, I stopped swimming and learned to surf.