Name: Frankie And The Witch Fingers
Start: 2024-05-04T20:15:00+02:00
End: 2024-05-04T20:15:00+02:00
Location: Doornroosje

A band whose take on garage punk has a heavily psychedelic flavor, Frankie & the Witch Fingers play rock & roll rooted in '60s and '70s influences, but with an edgy energy and broad range of flavors to go along with the trippy but elemental melodies. Along with the usual fuzzy guitars and buzzy keyboards, Frankie & the Witch Fingers season their music with plenty of reverb and period-appropriate studio effects, and their dedication to the sounds of the past is impressive. But the group has songs to go along with their retro style, and the fierce passion of their performances gives their music a kick that adds a contemporary sheen to their attack. The band's garage rock leanings were at their peak on their debut album, 2013's Sidewalk, while their freak flag took center stage on 2016's Heavy Roller and 2017's Brain Telephone. The band's first several albums were sterling examples of home-brewed production, but 2019's ZAM revealed that a studio approach only added to the impact of their music. 

Frankie & the Witch Fingers were founded in Bloomington, Indiana. Guitarist Josh Menashe, bassist Alex Bulli, and drummer Glenn Brigman first crossed paths in 2009 when they were freshman at Indiana University, and in 2011, they joined a group called Prince Moondog, fronted by a guitarist and singer named Alex Barrett. Prince Moondog dissolved in 2013 when Barrett left Indiana for New York City, and after the breakup, Brigman began jamming with guitarist and singer Dylan Sizemore. (Sizemore had already been playing with Brigman and Menashe in another project, Triptides.) While Brigman and Sizemore briefly entertained the idea of forming a guitar-and-drums duo, they decided a full band would better suit their musical ideas, and Menashe and Bulli came on board. They named themselves Frankie & the Witch Fingers (Frankie being Sizemore's cat), and in September 2013, they released their first recordings, an 11-song cassette called Sidewalk that was recorded using Brigman's home-recording setup. 

In 2014, the band left Indiana behind and relocated to Los Angeles, and they struck up a relationship with Permanent Records, which issued their second album, Frankie & the Witch Fingers, in 2015. The band were prolific, releasing a single ("Merry Go Round" b/w "Manta" and "Mystical Rapture") and an album (Heavy Roller) in 2016, with another full-length, Brain Telephone, following in 2017, along with extensive live work in the United States and abroad. In 2018, Glenn Brigman left the band following a tour of Europe to devote more time to Triptides, and Shaughnessy Starr, who had previously played with the group Hooveriii, took over on drums. Entering Silverlake's Studio 666 with engineers Zachary James and Kevin Mills, Frankie & the Witch Fingers released their fifth album, Zam, through Greenway Records in March 2019. The group toured hard in support, and once they returned home, bassist Alex Bulli left the lineup. For the recording of their next album, Josh Menashe and Dylan Sizemore took turns on bass during their five days in the studio. The LP, Monsters Eating People Eating Monsters..., appeared in October 2020, and Nikki Pickle (of Death Valley Girls) signed on as their full-time bassist. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Netherlands

Nijmegen

Doornroosje

Frankie and the Witch Fingers

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Frankie And The Witch Fingers

Doornroosje, Nijmegen

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