Seas at Bernies Tavern

Event Details

Event type: Ages 19+

It’s almost human, the way the ocean can instantaneously switch from sweet serenity to unharnessed rage, harmony to fury, calm to ill. It’s in balancing such opposing poles that post-punk five-piece seas prove their moniker to be so apt, and their art so compelling.

Seas began as Hughes’ solo project – an outlet for ideas outside of his work with long-running post-hardcore quartet Moneen. He wrote and performed his 2011 EPs, Fragments and Dreaming, all himself, but tapped Moneen bandmates Peter Krpan and Erik Hughes to anchor the drums and bass, respectively, for subsequent live shows. Surrounding the release of seas’ debut LP, 2013’s Fade Out into the Night, guitarists/multi-instrumentalists Michael Bolt and Adrian Mottram had joined the ranks, and come the recording sessions for Cursed, the five-piece was formally cemented, completing the continuum from singular to plural, individual to communal.

The result is a notably wider array of influence underpinning these songs, with tinges of the likes of Quicksand, Dinosaur Jr., Mew, and Sigur Ros emerging at various points throughout. The gentler moments are wrapped in an ethereal sonic blanket while the grittier ones benefit from an intensity and urgency that’s undeniably palpable.

That applies equally to his other three bandmates, and is more than clear when seas takes the stage. As on record, the group takes various shapes in the live environment, from stripped-down acoustic iterations to the full-on storm of a full-band show. For the latter, Hughes says his approach is the same as it was when he was 20 – maximum energy for maximum impact.

Though both the words and music sometimes skew towards darker waters, Cursed nonetheless offers a cathartic release of tension and toxicity, and that’s as powerful for the listener as it is its makers. Lyrically, it’s an antidote to adversity; musically, it’s a whirlwind of energy and emotion, ebbing and flowing like the tide for an unparalleled musical experience.

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