Pink Talking Fish Starts Making Sense in NY and PA - October 19th through 21st, 2017

Pink Talking Fish Starts Making Sense” for 3-Night Run in NY and PA, Oct. 19-21, 2017 The two bands will perform three shows in Syracuse, NY; Jim Thorpe, PA; and New York, NY. Story by Kelly D To submit a review or story for consideration hit us at [email protected] Check out the Live Music News and Review.com Facebook page for updates and announcements. If you’ve ever wondered what a full night of Talking Heads music mashed up with Pink Floyd and Phish tunes would sound like, performed live onstage, then keep reading. Pink Talking Fish and Start Making Sense, tribute bands from the Northeast, will bring four hours of tunes, seamlessly blending both bands onstage for a continuous night not to be missed. This unique three-stop run happens next week, from October 19th to 21st, in three different cities in New York and Pennsylvania. Read Ryan O’Malley’s review of PTF’s Stop Making Sense tribute (with guest star Jon Braun of SMS) at the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, NY here. From the youtube channel of Howard F https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8JUmwFY9g8 Both bands will be performing two sets each of what they do best: Start Making Sense from Philadelphia gives you spot-on recreations of the entire Talking Heads catalog and Pink Talking Fish gives you clever and engaging hybrids of Phish, Pink Floyd, and some Talking Heads. Each band’s set will segue right into the next band’s set keeping the music going all night long, so bring your dancing shoes- it’s gonna be a long, excellent night of top-notch performances. With so much talent up onstage, there are sure to be some collaborations between both acts and tons of surprises, so it’s advised to get your tickets quickly and these shows are bound to sell out. From the YouTube channel of wklitz1: https://youtu.be/f4XBCTH0x2Q?t=1m52s The first night will be in Syracuse, NY on Thursday, October 19th. After that, the tour swings down to Jim Thorpe, PA on Friday, October 20th. The entire celebration will culminate in a show at the legendary Irving Plaza in New York City on Saturday, October 21st. Tyler Levine spent some time interviewing Jon Braun of Start Making Sense to get a feel for their preparations for some of these shows. Tyler:  To kick things off, you’re performing in New York CIty with your band Start Making Sence: A Talking Heads Tribute, at Irving Plaza on October 21st. Could you tell us a bit about your history performing in the city, and what it’s like playing in the hometown of the Talking Heads? Jon Braun: Well it’s always an honor to be playing at Irving Plaza. It’s such a legendary venue. Most of the band was born and raised in the NYC/NJ/PA area, so growing up we were very lucky to be able to see countless amazing shows at Irving Plaza. We pinch ourselves every time we step on stage there! Quite a few of us also played at CBGB’s, the Wetlands, the Continental etc in our youth. So our personal performance history in NYC runs very deep. Start Making Sense actually played our first NYC show at Sullivan Hall/The Lions Den (speaking of defunct clubs from long ago!). Howie at CEG was very kind in giving us an opportunity early on when we didn’t have a very large draw and we are super thankful that he took a chance on us. Playing in NYC has always been honor. It’s the best city in the world right?! So when you add to it that it is also the hometown of Talking Heads, it just makes the shows that much more special. As much as NYC has changed over the years there is still a very specific feel to this city that was obviously a huge influence on Talking Heads. You can still feel a lot of those things, even now in NYC. So we try to hone in on that feeling and present it to the audience as best we can. Tyler: How are your plans and setlists coming along for playing with Pink Talking Fish? What can we expect? Jon Braun: They sets are coming along great ! Eric Gould from Pink Talking Fish and I are actually finishing up the sets tomorrow. We’ve been working on them for quite some time. The idea is that there will be non stop music all night. Each band is playing 2 sets but the music won’t stop in b/w sets. One band will be coming on as the other is going off mid song, or at the beginning/end of a song. We’ll have both bands set up next to each other basically. We will be sticking to the Talking Heads material for the most part. But both bands will be playing together on some songs and sitting in with each other as well. It’s going to be a really special event. We’ve spent a lot of time going back and forth with ideas on how to transition from set to set. And how to make the night flow musically between both bands. Making sure that every night of this 3 day run we’re doing is different. Not only will the sets for both bands be different every night, but the transitions and transition songs between the sets will be different every night too! It’s been a lot of work but i really enjoy working with Eric on this type of thing. He’s obviously quite adept at melding a bunch of different ideas together !   Tyler: What can you share with us about any new (old) Talking Heads songs you may be incorporating into your catalog? With such an immense catalog, there have to be some Talking Heads songs Start Making Sense has yet to perform live, right? Jon Braun: Of course! For being a band that was only recording for about 10 years, Talking Heads really do have quite a large catalog. 8 studio albums plus a ton of unreleased, b sides, and live versions. I do have a list of the songs we haven’t done yet. There really aren’t as many left as i thought ! We also throw in some David Byrne solo songs and other random things from time to time. Some of the later material gets more difficult to perform live because we don’t have a horn or string section. So that has kept us from diving into quite a few things on the Naked album. But a few songs that ARE on the list for us to start putting in the rotation are Sugar on My Tongue, Big Country, Popsicle and Perfect World. We’re trying to get those into the sets before the end of the year! Tyler: Start Making Sence has a lot of shows booked for this fall, anything special we can expect for the upcoming shows? Jon Braun: Well we are all really excited for these 3 shows with Pink Talking Fish. These are going to be very unique shows for both bands. We’ve never done anything like this before. Then we have 2 shows the weekend of Halloween which is always fun. As a band we take Halloween very seriously. Last year we were the cast of the Big Lebowski. We’ll be doing our annual X-mas to New Years Eve run this year which is always amazing because we bring out a slightly larger band on those shows than our normal touring band. There are also some international shows in the works right now for 2018 so hopefully those can happen. And next summer we’re going to be doing our 2nd recreation of the entire Stop Making Sense film. We did it in our hometown of Bethlehem PA last year. But this time it will be in the NYC area !! So keep an eye out for that !   “Pink Talking Fish Starts Making Sense” Tour Stops: THURSDAY 10/19: Westcott Theater, Syracuse NY. All ages. RSVP to Facebook event HEREbuy tickets HERE. FRIDAY 10/20: Penn’s Peak, Jim Thorpe PA. All ages. RSVP to Facebook event HEREbuy tickets HERE. SATURDAY 10/21: Irving Plaza, New York, NY.  RSVP to Facebook event HEREbuy tickets HERE. From the video channel of Sharky’s Night https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5p9UeE5KM8U To submit a review or story for consideration hit us at [email protected] Check out the Live Music News and Review.com Facebook page for updates and announcements.