The Witzard

"Sean McGuinness is an American musician living in Philadelphia. He has played with Pissed Jeans, Utensil, The Great Collector, Bazhena, Technician, Navies, Go to Sleep, Like Language, Ready Set, Air Conditioning, Oil Drum, Birth Control, Rat Fist, Des Ark, Dark Blue, STREET STAINS, and Remote Places, among other sit-ins, sessions, and general groupings of friends and strangers," Sean "On The Drums" McGuinness' newly-minted Bandcamp Bio simply reads. As you can see, the long-time Pissed Jeans drummer has his hands in a lot of pots... even the brewpot at Ardmore-based Tired Hands Brewing Company , where he bartenders a few days a week, when not recording or touring with Pissed Jeans. Although, McGuinness is fresh off a handful of local dates with Pissed Jeans, he also played on STREET STAINS self-titled self-released debut with long-time friend and collaborator Chris Richards, formerly of Q and Not U and currently of The Washington Post. And even though I just ...

"In the summer of 2008, Chris [Richards] took the bus from Brooklyn to Philadelphia every Thursday afternoon to jam with Sean [McGuinness] and watch The Olympics. They wrote more than 30 songs. Then, they forgot about them until January of 2013. Chris was now living in D.C. and Sean convinced Aaron [Leitko] to cart his Tascam-388 up to Philly for an afternoon of recording. Captured on tape for the ages, these songs were quickly abandoned once more—until the summer of 2014, when Chris finally recorded the words with Aaron back in D.C. Everybody forgot about the songs one more time, before reconvening to mix them in the spring of 2015. And them—after another two years had vanished into oblivion—PRESTO! Street Stains was released in January 2017 and can finally be forgotten forever," reads the description attached to Street Stains 14-track debut. Long-time friends and frequent collaborators (unbeknownst to the rest of the world) Chris Richards & Sean McGuinness finally unl...

"'The Bar Is Low," which, according to [Matt] Korvette , is "about how every guy seems to be revealing themselves as a sh*thead. It seems like every guy is getting outed, across every board of entertainment and politics and music. There’s no guy that isn’t a total creep,'" reads a fragmented chunk of Sub Pop 's latest WHY LOVE NOW-announcing Pissed Jeans press release; " WHY LOVE NOW picks at the bursting seams that are barely holding 21st-century life together," describes Sub Pop 's press release, which additionally refers to "The Bar Is Low" as a "grinding rave-up." It can only be assumed that Korvette is likely referring to one-time men of power and current American disgrace stories like Bill Cosby , Swans frontman Michael Gira , fallen Indie Rock PR heavyweight Heathcliff Berru , and our newly-elected President Trump . Pissed Jeans recruited New York No Wave pioneer Lydia Lunch , who's worked with eve...

" ["It All Comes Back to You"] has a miles-deep atmosphere of layered synths and drum machines that sucks you in while the love and empathy of the lyrics bubbles to the surface. It's enveloping and all-encompassing, sending you deep in the same way The Church 's "Under The Milky Way Tonight" sends you into orbit,'" Philly 's WXPN The Key enthusiastically wrote about Pink Skull founder Justin Geller 's latest 80's New Wave -leaning project, Remote Places . Geller's debut solo endeavor, Nights and Weekends EP , has already drawn early stylistic comparisons to The Cure , New Order, and The Smiths , as well as a bit more contemporary artists like The National , Washed Out, and Wild Nothing ; or even more befittingly self-described as sounding "like the soundtrack to a modern day re-make of The Breakfast Club . (Sometimes)." Justin Gellar recruited a gaggle of local Philadelphia area friends and musicians for his 5-s...

"It's a song about someone who is tired of being taken advantage of by the free spirit they're in love with. They're trying to deal with the fact that they're not OK with being just a part-time lover. It sounds like Ultravox or a happier version of The Cure or any 80's band that [loved] string synthesizer sounds," Remote Places founding member Justin Geller revealed within a recent Tell All Your Friends press release. Geller, a long-time member of genre-eschewing two to five-man Philly -based group Pink Skull , has likened his upcoming Nights and Weekends EP to "the soundtrack to a modern day re-make of The Breakfast Club " and has already drawn comparisons to New Order , The Smiths, The National , Washed Out, and Wild Nothing . Geller and bandmate Julian Grefe released four sprawling full-length albums and countless EP's and 12-inches further blurring the lines between glitchy lo-fi House , Psychedelic/Krautrock Indie Dance, and f...

"Power-dirge from Pennsylvania ; Pissed Jeans are noisy as a motherf*cker and proud of it on this, their debut full-length, which sounds like a big pile of mud and broken glass ripping through your stereo speaker in the most killer way imaginable," reads a juicy chunk of Sub Pop's overtly descriptive Shallow re-issue mini-press release. Frontman and part-time music critic Matt Korvette along with his fellow Pissed Jean-ers enlisted frequent collaborator Joe Stakun , who previously directed Honeys stand-outs "Bathroom Laughter" and "Romanticize Me," to shoot a clip for "Boring Girls" from their newly-remastered nine-year-old Shallow album (2005). Not entirely unlike Stakun's former creations, "Boring Girls" is an oddly disjointed visual presentation, which perfect matches Pissed Jeans' whole self-imploding Noise-Rock aesthetic; it starts out resembling your run-of-the-mill clip, with our long john-outfitted prot...

Rat Fist are a newly-formed Punk band who you may not have heard about yet; consisting of primary members Sean McGuinness & Randy Randall from veteran Sub Pop Post-Punk bands Pissed Jeans & No Age respectively, along with part-time bandmates Michael J. Sabolick, Jelle de Cremer , and Aaron Farley . They're gearing up to head out on a three-date West Coast mini-tour with Canadian punks rockers, F*cked Up , which will double as a 7-inch re-release jaunt. Rat Fist previously self-released 50 test press copies of their debut 7-inch that were were sold exclusively at their initial run of East Coast gigs, while the second pressing has since been expanded to a batch of 500 limited records. "We will have 7" available for mail order starting next Monday 8/25. Send $7 for shipping in the USA or $10 for shipping everywhere else. Make check out to: Randy Randall 10658 Sable Ave. Sunland, CA 91040 USA... It might take a while for me to get to the orders, so please...