Welp. Another year has flown by. This one seemed particularly hectic—what with the Trump-dominated news cycle, all the natural disasters and the #MeToo movement. But this is the music section. So, let’s set aside all of the insanity of 2017 and focus on the insanely great local music that we saw over the last 365 days.

Covet
‘Aries’
Back when Metro first began looking into Covet, the band fronted by Saratoga guitar heroine Yvette Young, they were still putting the finishing touches on the music video for “Aries.” It’s the only official 2017 release from the band this year, but it demonstrates the musical dexterity and songwriting abilities of Young and her bandmates. It also is proof that they’re ready to become full-blown rock stars. In the clip, which they posted on YouTube back in February, Covet completely trash a room—which they built specifically for the shoot in Young’s parents’ garage. In some ways it’s a fitting visual for the song, but there’s also a bit of a juxtaposition going on: while it’s true that Young, bassist David Adamiak and drummer Keith Grimshaw are totally shredding on the track, the song is far more serene than many of Covet’s peers on the proggy, guitar-driven instrumental music scene.

The Gentle Cycle
The Gentle Cycle
Though Derek See and Maxwell Borkenhagen—guitarists behind the local psych rock project The Gentle Cycle—share many interests, it seems that location was the chief bonding agent in their music’s winding lysergic chain. The group, which was rounded out by bassist Todd Flanagan and drummer Craig Heitkam, was composed entirely of veteran San Jose musicians. The self-titled record was tracked mostly live in a studio overlooking the SoFA District. The band used See’s analog, reel-to-reel recording console, which when paired with the album’s vinyl release makes for an especially warm-sounding product. But it wasn’t just vintage gear and good chemistry that made the album work. The energy of the room is palpable. “It’s instant vibe when we’re here,” See says of the band’s rehearsal space and recording studio.

Fritz Montana
Father Mother Sister Brother
Fritz Montana had a good summer. The locally brewed indie blues trio released their first full-length. Father Mother Sister Brother is a catchy, bare-bones, nine-song collection. The band released the LP on June 30 and celebrated the very next day by headlining San Francisco venue The Independent for the very first time. Recorded at Different Fur Studios in San Francisco, the new collection is the culmination of years of work for the band, which started in 2013 but consider the record their first official statement. “We started off wanting very much to be something along the lines of the Black Keys,” drummer Matthew Hagarty says, noting that the Keys album Brothers, and Sound & Color by the Alabama Shakes, were both early influences for the group. It shows—but not in a bad way. Album opener “Everyday” is built around two repeating guitar riffs, verse and chorus, each of which evokes that same sense of distant familiarity that The Black Keys aim for—simple and homey, but not quite nostalgic.

Vector Hold
A Tribute to Rush
Anyone who was pumped about the second season of Stranger Things would do well to check out Vector Hold. The latest two-song set by Pete Rice—a.k.a. the one man band known as Vector Hold—not only channels the buzzy analog sounds of John Carpenter and Survive (who famously composed the title music for Stranger Things). It is also a tribute to Rush. The Canadian prog-rock trio weren’t one of the many ’80s needle drops on the show, though they probably should have been. Sure Billy Hargrove was more of a hair metal dude, but it’s impossible to believe that he didn’t also own a copy of Signals, the 1982 record containing Rush’s epic critique of post-war sprawl, “Subdivisions.” The Vector Hold homage takes care of that, reimagining “Subdivisions” as a crunchy 16-bit instrumental.

Chow Mane
Mooncakes EP
Ask Charles Yan—a.k.a. Chow Mane—where he comes from and he won’t start with his birth. For him, it all goes back to China’s Cultural Revolution, which was the impetus for his family fleeing China. Hard times and family history form the foundation of Yan’s deeply personal, lyrical storytelling. On Mooncakes, the excellent EP Yan released at the beginning of October, he revisits the struggles he experienced growing up the child of immigrants in Salinas and East Side San Jose. But he also drops hard-stunting bars about just how dope his grandmother’s cooking is. On “Dumplings,” Chow Mane fuses the pride he has in his heritage with a trap music trope. The result is this euphoria-inducing line: “Grandma steaming dumplings up on the stove,” Yan raps, before an overdubbed callback cuts in. “Whip it up, Grandma!”

Mike Huguenor and André Jaquez contributed to this story.

In downtown Campbell there’s a building that has been vacant for more than a decade. The former Gaslighter Theater opened in 1970 and has been empty since 2005. But for those who remember its heyday as a venue for local bands in the 2000s, its influence is still felt.

“The Gaslighter was one of the main places that really got me into music,” says Matthew Hagarty, drummer of bluesy rock group Fritz Montana. He remembers thinking, at the first show he played there, “Wow, this is what I want to do for a living.”

Now, that dream is a bit closer to reality. Fritz Montana release their first full-length album, Father Mother Sister Brother, on June 30, and the next day the band headline the Independent in San Francisco for the first time. Recorded at Different Fur Studios in San Francisco, the new collection is the culmination of years of work for the band, who started in 2013 but consider the record their first official statement.

“We started off wanting very much to be something along the lines of the Black Keys,” Hagarty says, noting that the Keys album Brothers, and Sound & Color by the Alabama Shakes, were both early influences for the group.

Fans of both bands will find a lot to like about Father Mother Sister Brother. Album opener “Everyday” is built around two repeating guitar riffs, verse and chorus, each of which evoke that same sense of distant familiarity that The Black Keys aim for—simple, and homey, but not quite nostalgic. Fritz Montana describe the album as being inspired by singer Dave MacIntyre’s parents, who divorced while he was young, which could explain the combination of feelings the album brings up.

“Now that I’ve become the age that my parents were when I was born…I feel like I can better understand what they went through,” MacIntyre writes in the album’s description for press.

As the boarded-up front of the Campbell Gaslighter reminds us, the past is always around. On Father Mother Sister Brother, Fritz Montana seem to be saying that it’s what we create out of it that matters in the end.

Fritz Montana
‘Father Mother Sister Brother’
Jun 30

Many bands plug away for years, playing house parties, clubs and smaller halls before they ever reach a stage inside an arena, assuming they even reach such a stage at all. But the South Bay-bred indie-blues-rock group Fritz Montana were fortunate enough to play at Oracle Arena in Oakland—on their fourth show.

This isn’t to say the members of Fritz Montana haven’t earned their success. The group went up against a slew of great local bands in Live 105’s local band contest before pulling in the most votes and nabbing the coveted opening slot for the radio station’s annual Not So Silent Night concert last December.

“It was beyond a dream,” says Fritz Montana bassist Kevin Logan, who recalls how the gravity of the accomplishment didn’t totally sink in until the group showed up at Oracle the day of the show. “The second we stepped into that arena, we started seeing all the techs, the roadies, the sound guy—it was really overwhelming.”

Since last year’s NSSN, Aaron Axelsen, Live 105’s music director, has continued to play Fritz Montana’s tunes on his weekly local and new music show, Soundcheck. When the group recorded some new tracks earlier this year, he put those into regular rotation on his program as well.

The group’s infectious mix of heavy, blues-tinged alt-rock and high-energy pop—a la The Arctic Monkeys and The Black Keys—has been earning the band a following, at home and around the country. According to Logan, the NSSN gig served as a springboard to bigger local shows and a seven-show run at this year’s South By Southwest.

For a band that is hardly 2 years old, Fritz Montana are certainly making big waves. That doesn’t come as a surprise to San Jose promoter Barbara Wahli, who caught the group’s very first show at San Jose State University.

“I loved the songs and knew they would resonate well with a large audience,” says Wahli, now Fritz Montana’s manager. “They have so much potential and everyone I contact responds positively to their music. My gut tells me big things will happen for the band.”

So far, Wahli’s predictions appear to be on point. Fritz Montana saw a large turnout at the July 26 release party for their new EP, Scaredy Cat, held at the Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco. And in addition to regular spins from Axelsen, they’ve garnered some positive press. The music blog, Infectious Magazine put Fritz Montana on its “best unsigned bands to watch in 2013,” while another music blog, Lucy Out Loud, featured the band on one of its new music compilations.

“Every show I feel like, we build up a little more momentum,” Logan says. “When we started we did not have a game plan. The experience of playing in front of several thousand people, that got us hungry for bigger shows.”

Fritz Montana play The Blank Club on Oct. 24 at 8pm. More info.

The South Bay music scene scores again. Earlier this year, Curious Quail won an opening spot for Live 105’s BFD concert at the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View, and now Saratoga blues-rock trio Fritz Montana are the winners for the local band opening spot at the station’s Not So Silent Night concert this weekend at Oracle Arena.

The band earned a spot on the lineup after its bluesy alt-rock song “Say It So” won the most votes among other Bay Area bands.

“Winning the opening slot at Not So Silent Night has been a very humbling experience,” says Fritz Montana lead singer and guitarist, David Marshall. “We could not have achieved this without the support of our families, friends, and fans. Winning this contest is definitely the highlight of our band thus far.”

Fritz Montana will be performing on the first night of the two-day concert on Friday, before Kings of Leon, Vampire Weekend, Queens of the Stone Age, AFI, Arctic Monkeys and Capital Cities take the stage. Saturday night includes headliners Arcade Fire, Phoenix, ALT-J and Lorde among other bands.

The trio claims San Francisco and San Jose as their home towns, with two-thirds of the band actually residing in the South Bay.