On Stage: Demark’s Oh Land comes to Philly

By Denny Dyroff, Staff Writer, The Times

Oh Land, one of Denmark’s top music exports, is returning to Philadelphia for a special show this month.

The international producer and songwriter extraordinaire , also known as Nanna Øland Fabricius,  is currently touring with Of Monsters and Men. The tour touches down in Philadelphia on September 15 at the Mann Music Center (Mann Center, 5201 N. Parkside Avenue, Philadelphia, 215-566-7900, http://manncenter.org).  

“I’ll do a four-week American tour followed by six weeks in Europe,” said Oh Land, during a phone interview last week. “Then, I have a Danish tour. It’s something special for me to play there.”

Oh Land has been tirelessly on tour globally in support of her fourth album, “Earth Sick” on Tusk or Tooth. The critically-acclaimed album is a soundscape of lush vocals, rich string arrangements, and infectious melodies. Earth Sick also marks a full-circle return to Oh Land’s bedroom production style.

“At the time I started working with ‘Earth Sick,’ it felt very natural to go back to my roots — the way I did my first album in an apartment in Denmark,” said Oh Land. “Only people I know very well worked on the album.”

Ironically, Oh Land never anticipated a career in music. Oh Land was born in Copenhagen, the daughter of Bendt Fabricius, an organist, and Bodil Øland, an opera singer. Following her parents’ path wasn’t a plan she wanted to have.

“It was dance that became serious early,” said Fabricius. “It was important for me that music was not my ambition. Music was fun. No kids I knew wanted to be the same as their parents. I did dancing but I always loved music. I’m happy that I started music later in life.”

Oh Land is a former student of the Royal Danish Ballet and the Royal Swedish Ballet schools.

“I injured my back dancing back in 2006,” said Oh Land. “I had just turned 19 and was a very ambitious dancer. The dance environment is very competitive. You keep dancing through pain or you lose your role. I ignored the warning signs, kept dancing.”

The result was a fractured spine, a slipped disc and an early exit from the world of ballet and contemporary dance.

“I stared doing music because it’s such a solitary life as a dancer,” said Oh Land. “I’d stay after (ballet) classes and play piano in the studio by myself. When I got injured, I started joining the musicians — playing piano and accompanying my classmates.

“It took a few years until I made my first album. Eventually, I stopped dancing. It wasn’t until I was 22 before I really started taking music seriously. I made my first album ‘Fauna’ when I was 23.”

Oh Land followed with the “Oh Land” album in 2011, “Wish Bone” in 2013 and “Earth Sick” in 2014.

“I write all the time,” said Oh Land. “When I was touring with ‘Wish Bone,’ I had already started writing for ‘Earth Sick.’ A lot of was written while I was away — missing family, boyfriend and home. That feeling really inspired the theme for ‘Earth Sick’ — a lot of longing and wanting to be home.

“I came up with the title in a hotel room somewhere in America. It came from astronauts describing what it felt like to look down on earth and wonder what people were doing back home and about getting used to gravity back on earth. ‘Earth Sick’ meant a lot to me metaphysically.

“I did a PledgeMusic campaign to raise the money to make the album. I raised more than my monetary goal so it was great. It took a lot of work. Funding something by yourself takes a lot and the money was needed for things like scores and costumes for the videos. I really worked a lot to collect the money so it was really rewarding when it paid off.

“I was in Denmark and would do arrangements with my dad and then we’d go into a studio with a string quartet. I used an uncle, an aunt and two cousins in that string quartet. We have a ton of musicians in our family.  My mom, who was a mezzo-soprano with the Royal Danish Theater, sang on one track.

“Looking back, I’m very happy to be in music rather than dance. I have a very vivid imagination and ballet was the opposite of that with all its discipline.”

Video link for Oh Land — https://youtu.be/Lh-KioVFXDo.

The show at the Mann Music Center will start at 7 p.m. General admission tickets are $35.

Another act with a Scandinavian link will be playing in Delaware this week.

IVA, a singer-songwriter from Wilmington who will be performing September 10 at World Café Live at the Queen (500 North Market Street, Wilmington, 302- 994-1400, www.queen.worldcafelive.com),has more layers than an onion.

Born Emily Tepe, IVA (pronounced EE-vah) established herself as a strong classical singer who was well-versed in opera and performed with Opera Delaware when she was just nine.

A graduate of Wilmington’s Tower Hill School and Princeton University, IVA, whose ancestry is Swedish, also studied at Juilliard and the Manhattan School of Music.

Later, after graduating from Princeton, IVA began to play the New York clubs and Off-Broadway venues.

Just over a decade ago, she was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship and went to Stockholm to study Scandinavian classical music. It was in Sweden where IVA embraced her opera side and quickly found herself singing with the Royal Opera of Stockholm.

Now, IVA is focusing her energy on being a singer-songwriter crafting and singing smart, intelligent contemporary music. In that capacity, IVA has just released a new EP tiled “Leap.”

“I wanted my artist name to be something that was inspiring and push me to go farther than classical,” said IVA, during a phone interview last week from her home in Delaware. “Iva (Iwa) was my music teacher in Sweden. IVA sounds like a woman standing on a mountaintop.

“I had an opera voice from a young age — loud and focused. A friend got me involved in children’s productions at Opera Delaware. I studied classical music and it suited me. I was also doing Sancta Lucia Fests at Old Swede’s Church in Wilmington ever since I was little and I was Sancta Lucia when I was a senior in high school.”

During her several years abroad studying, writing and performing music, IVA returned to the States where, thanks to an appearance on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien,” she caught the ear of bandleader Max Weinberg.  Weinberg liked her voice and she was invited to return to the show multiple times as a singer and actress.

“My friend Joshua Bell introduced me to Maneesh de Moor, a producer of ambient electronic music whom he knew from Sony Classical,” said IVA. “Maneesh produced my first album ‘IVA’ which was more ambient electronic sound. On my second album ‘Ivalution,’ I worked with an excellent team of songwriters and producers in Sweden. I had been writing songs with other people in Sweden so the album, which came out in 2006, had more singer-songwriter songs.

“Then, I started writing my own songs. I was singing with the Royal Opera of Stockholm at the time. After that, I came back to the states to look for a band. It took me a couple years to write the songs for the new record. And, I did a Kickstarter campaign to finance the recording.”

Soon, things began falling in place.

“I started playing with people and found the right musicians. Sam Nobles is an amazing bass player. I got Tim Sonnefeld from Milkboy Studio as my producer and he got drummer Matt Scarano. The next addition was Nate Gonzalez, an amazing guitarist and pianist who also plays accordion.

“Tim has a great ear and we had a good rapport right from the start. Tim is an amazing producer and person. I played some of my songs for him on piano and he convinced me o play piano on the album. Adjusting to playing piano on stage took some time.

“I recorded ‘Leap’ last February and finished it last September. It just came out in July. I’m still doing classical too. In June, I toured Germany, Poland and Sweden with pianist Julie Nishimura. I was singing Scandinavian songs, Chopin, Copland and Debussy.”

Recently, IVA was awarded the Årets Svensk Amerikan (Swedish-American of the Year) — an annual award presented by the Vasa Order of America since 1960. Recipients, either Swedish or American by birth, have made significant contributions to the relationship between the two countries. Past honorees, including astronaut Buzz Aldrin and actress Ann-Margret.

“I’m the youngest person to ever win the award,” said IVA. “It was a great honor.”

Video link for IVA — https://youtu.be/N5PynD7r61I.

IVA will headline the September 10 show on the Upstairs Stage. The show will start at 8 p.m. and tickets are $10.

Also on September 10 at the Queen, there will be a show on the Downstairs Stage with Wesley Stace opening for the Nighthawks.

Many of Stace’s fans started as fans of the music of John Wesley Harding, a veteran British singer-songwriter who has released over 20 albums in the last 25 years.

Actually, Wesley Stace is John Wesley Harding. Stace adopted his stage name from a Bob Dylan album of the same name a long time ago. Now, he has reverted to the name given him when he was born in East Sussex back in 1965.

Stace’s most recent album — “Self-Titled” — was his first album featuring his given name. Released by Yep Roc in 2013, it featured 16 songs recorded in Philadelphia with The English UK as backing band. It was produced by longtime collaborator Chris von Sneidern.

Stace also has had several novels published as Wesley Stace, including “Misfortune” in 2005, “By George” in 2007, “Charles Jessold, Considered As A Murderer” in 2010 and “Wonderkid” in 2014.

“I decided to go back to my real name for a lot of reasons,” said Stace, during a recent phone interview. “I’ve had it in my mind to do for some time. My novels are done in my own name. I do readings as Wesley Stace and I teach at Swarthmore College as Wesley Stace.

“I write autobiographical and true songs. I wrote 50 songs for the album and referred to myself in the New York Times style as Mr. Stace. So, it would be ludicrous to have an album referring to myself as Wesley Stace and using a different name as the recording artist.”

The New York Times premiered “Self-Titled” with an exclusive “Press Play” album stream.

“I haven’t been in the studio since ‘Self-Titled’,” said Stace. “I had a couple book projects and I’m working on another one now.”

Stace has also been very involved with another project — “Cabinet of Wonders Podcast” on Salon. A recent announcement from Salon.com stated — “Salon is proud to partner with Cabinet of Wonders on this podcast. Since 2009, Wesley Stace has curated the best variety show in America, featuring hundreds of pioneering musicians, writers and comedians. We think that the format and talent will be well received by our devoted readers and are honored to swing open the Cabinet doors to a wide audience and archive this amazing artistic genius.”

“Cabinet of Wonders started a few years ago when I wanted to do an album release party,” said Stace. “So, I got writers and friends together for a presentation. I’ve done 65-70 Cabinet of Wonders since then and just got picked up by Salon.com. There will also be NPR broadcasts of the shows. I’ve done six with Salon already.

“We had a fantastic show in London earlier this year and we did one last year during a West Coast tour. Most are done n New York. It works best in entertainment capitols. Everybody comes through New York so that works best for a show like this. It’s really a fun show.

“I do all the work but I don’t record it or edit it. That’s not my end of the production.. To me, the process is doing the live show and having it be excellent — a once-in-a-month experience. My motive is to have a night that is fantastic.”

Stace has three very different shows this weekend. In addition to the show at the Queen on September 10, he will do a Cabinet of Wonders show in New York on September 11 and then perform at the Haverford Music Festival (Oakmont Field Stage, 51 East Eagle Road, Havertown, http://haverfordmusicfestival.org) on September 12.

“The Wilmington show will just have me as a solo artist,” said Stace. “The next day I’ll do the Cabinet of Wonders show with a lot of artists and then the show on Saturday at Haverford will have me with my band.”

Video link for Wesley Stace — https://youtu.be/0UhYM-xjjAs.

Tickets for the Downstairs show, which starts at 8 p.m., are $40.

Other Downstairs shows in the next week are Civil Holdup (CD Release Show), Widow Maker Social Club, RFA and The Real Feel on September 11 and Pat McGee with Frank Viele on September 12. The Upstairs schedule includes The Show Ponies on September 11 and Jazzy Ash and the Leaping Lizards on September 12.

The Downstairs Stage at the WCL will also feature Dustbowl Revival and Dirty Dollhouse on September 14 and Tony Lucca with Hey Monae and Castle Creek on September 15.

The schedule for the Upstairs Stage includes Melissa Mitchell and The Sociables with Thom McCarthy on September 12, Mipso and Dan Mills on September 13, Kat Pace on September 15 and Crooks on Tape and Teen Men on September 16.

Mipso is a rising young string band from the Chapel Hill/Durham area in North Carolina. The group is currently touring in support of its new album “Old Time Reverie,” which will be released via Robust Records on October 2, 2015.

Spawned from the ongoing renaissance currently enriching and expanding the traditional vocabularies of old time and bluegrass music, “Old Time Reverie” finds Mipso putting time-honored tools to work on new terrain. The album is a collection of thoughtful, poetic ruminations on the moral complexities of the New South, using a mix of a traditional and more contemporary instrumentation.

After years as a trio, Mipso added fiddler and vocalist Libby Rodenbough to the existing lineup of Jacob Sharp (mandolin), Joseph Terrell (guitar), and Wood Robinson (bass). All were students at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

“Joseph was one of the first people I met in school,” said Rodenbaugh, during a phone interview last week from her home in Saxaphaw, North Carolina. “The only music I had played before that was classical violin.

“He asked me to jam with him. It was terrifying — but I caught the bug. I left school and went to a folk music school in Chicago. I was studying banjo, mandolin and guitar — and I brought my fiddle along to jam.

“While I was gone, the three boys started the band. When I gotr back, I just played local shows with them as a featured guest. Then, they asked me to join the band on a permanent basis. I was hesitant at first because it was three boys singing love songs.

“There wasn’t a particular moment that made me decide to do it. I just started having so much fun playing with them. And, it was either join a band or take a lousy entry-level job somewhere. I was also starting to really enjoy playing live and writing songs.”

Mipso played a lot in the Golden Triangle area (Chapel Hill/Durham/Raleigh), built up a strong fan base and eventually began to spread out to new areas. The band released its debut album “Dark Holler Pop” in 2013.

“We’re an all-acoustic instrument band,” said Rodenbaugh. “Our songwriting is more poppy than traditional. We’re a very versatile band. We can play quiet cubs or rock-our rooms — even without a drummer.

“With our songwriting, there is generally a single songwriter and then we do the arrangements communally. A lot of adjustments are made during the arrangements. Our songs have a lot of four-part harmonies.”

Video link for Mipso — https://youtu.be/_Tghe2lD4YM.

Mipso’s show at the World Café Live will start at 8 p.m. with opening act Dan Mills. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 day of show.

Another interesting show in Delaware on September 11 will take place at The Grand Opera House (818 North Market Street, Wilmington, Delaware, 302-652-5577,

delawaresymphony.org)  when the Delaware Symphony Orchestra presents “Remembrance & Redemption.”

The orchestra, under the baton of David Amado, will perform George Tsontakis’ “Laconika,” César Franck’s “Le chasseur maudit” and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s “Requiem.”

The featured performers will be soprano Mary Wilson, mezzo-soprano Meg Bragle, tenor Brian Downen, baritone Grant Youngblood and the Mastersingers of Wilmington with director David Schelat.

The concert is slated to begin at 7:30 p.m. with tickets priced at $66.

Based on the true definition of the word “unique,” there are really very few things that can claim to be unique — especially in the world of popular music where copycat acts and songs are more the rule than the norm.

But, unique is the perfect word to describe GWAR. There is, never was and never will be a band like GWAR. The Virginia-based costume-wearing thrash metal band, which will perform a show on September 16 at Reverb (1402 North Ninth Street, Reading, 610-743-3069, www.reverbconcerts.com, exists in a universe all its own.

The tour — “30 Years of Total World Domination Tour” — also features Battlecross, Gloominous Doom  and Butcher Babies as the opening acts.

When GWAR first arrived on the scene back in the 1980s, no-one would have — or could have — ever imagined that the group would still be playing to packed houses on a 30th anniversary tour in 2015.

GWAR was a metal band with music performed by outrageous characters that looked and acted as if they had stepped out of a horror film done science fiction style. Wearing elaborately grotesque foam latex costumes, the band’s live shows were best described as raunchy, graphic, obscene and over-the-top.

According to the band’s mythology, GWAR is a group of alien monsters who were banished to Earth millions of years ago as punishment for their cosmic crimes. GWAR was frozen in the wasteland of Antarctica, to wait for the cosmic summons that would herald their return to the stars. But fate intervened, and GWAR was de-thawed by global warming.

Led by pig-nosed lead singer Oderus Urungus, they began wandering the world, where they were quickly discovered by music mogul and mob boss Sleazy P. Martini. Transformed into the ultimate heavy metal band, they set about the business of destroying the human race with this savage sound, throwing great “concerts” where thousands of humans would be lured to their deaths.

In 2013, GWAR has released “Battle Maximus,” the band’s most mind-melting musical masterpiece to date. GWAR’s current lineup includes Beefcake the Mighty (bass), Pustulus Maximus (guitar), Balsac the Jaws of Death (guitar), Jizmak Da Gusha (drums) and Blothar (vocals, occasional bass guitar).

“We’re working on material for a new album — writing new songs to make a new record,” said Blothar, during a phone interview last week from a tour stop in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

“That’s what GWAR does. But, records don’t mean much. It’s all about the live show. GWAR has the best live show. People come to watch the destruction onstage every night. And, not many people survive. Humans are ground into cat food. We kill all enemies of GWAR who attack us.”

A number of people are “beheaded” in every show — including personalities from the news. Victims have included O. J. Simpson, John Kerry, Mike Tyson, Jerry Springer, Osama Bin Laden, Michael Jackson, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Adolf Hitler, Lady Gaga, Sarah Palin, and every American President since Ronald Reagan.

“We do kill one presidential candidate — but not Donald Trump,” said Bliothar. “He says a lot of funny things so we keep him around.

“There is a lot of (fake) blood in our shows — 100 gallons of blood every night and we shoot it all at the audience. There aren’t too many safe distances in a club. Just ask our soundman. We empty the tanks at the end of the show and turn the hoses on the humans.”

GWAR’s  founding member Oderus Urungus (Dave Brockie) was found dead by a roommate in his Richmond, Virginia apartment in March 2014. The cause of death was later confirmed to be a heroin overdose.

“Onerus is missing,” said Blothar. “He left us a little more than a year ago. Everything we do is an homage to Onerus and his slave Dave Brockie.”

Video link for GWAR — https://youtu.be/Dbnm-0r3suM. 

Battlecross is an intense metal band from Detroit featuring Kyle ‘Gumby’ Gunther (vocals), Tony Asta (guitar), Hiran Deraniyagala (guitar) and Don Slater (bass). The band’s fourth album “Rise to Power” was just released in August on Metal Blade Records.

“This is the first time we’ve gone out with GWAR on an extensive tour,” said Deraniyagala, during a phone interview last week from a tour stop in Baton Rouge. “In 2013, we did a few dates with them, including a New Year’s Eve show.

“Battlecross has been around for awhile. Tony and I grew up together. We’ve known each other since we were kids. We got a band together in high school. In 2007, this form of Battlecross started. It was more heavy guitars and we just played the local scene.

“Then, we signed with Metal Blade and put out our second album ‘Pursuit of Honor.’ The rest is history.

“We had toured our first album for awhile. We did some smaller tours and then jumped on whatever tours we could. In summer 2012, we did the Metal Hammer’s Trespass America Festival Tour and that was a big move for us.

“In 2013, we were on the Orion Music + More Festival with Metallica and later did the Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival. Last year, we did shows in Brazil in August and went to Europe with Killswitch Engage.

“We started working on the new album last fall. We did the writing in September and October and then recorded the album in February at Audiohammer Studio in Florida. Everything about ‘Rise to Power’ was very organic and natural. We just started writing songs and letting everything flow.

“We agreed to shut out everything around us. We wrote what we felt and then let everything come together naturally. We had Jason Suecoff as our producer. He was awesome to work with. It was a great experience.”

Video link for Battlecross — https://youtu.be/oIWZsP1Wm40.

The show at Reverb will start at 7 p.m. and tickets are priced at $16.

Regarded by many as one of the United Kingdom’s greatest cult bands, Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats are back with their fourth full-length studio album and a North American tour — a tour that brings them to this area on September 13 for a show at Union Transfer (1026 Spring Garden Street, Philadelphia, 215-232-2100, www.utphilly.com).

“The Night Creeper,” which was just released on September 4 via Rise Above Records, features a lead single titled “Waiting for Blood.”

Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats were formed in Cambridge, England by Kevin Ryan Starrs several years ago. The band’s influences draw heavily from the late 1960s and early 1970s and they are known for using vintage instruments and recording equipment.

“It actually started out as a solo project,” said Starrs, during a recent phoneinterview from his home in London.

“I had songs I wanted to record and was unemployed at the time. That was the ‘Volume 1’ album that I made in Cambridge with a lot of different musicians. My next album was ‘Blood Lust’ in 2010.

“I put a band together around the time of ‘Blood Lust’ but it didn’t last long. It ended up being just me and the drummer. It was too difficult so we decided to call it quits. Then, the album blew up.

“People really wanted to hear the band. There was no promotion. It was all word-of-mouth. It was only on sale at our website. I just sort of snowballed. Rise Above Records decided to release it on vinyl. That’s when the success of the band really started to happen.

“We put out the ‘Mind Control’ album in 2013, toured with Black Sabbath and did festivals all around Europe. The album reached to a lot of genre’s fans — metal, old rock, pop music and psychedelic. ‘Mind Control’ was a lot different than ‘Blood Lust.’ It showed that we were willing to change. It allowed us to do whatever we wanted.”

Recorded at Toe Rag Studios in early 2015 with engineer Liam Watson, “The Night Creeper” sounds like “Black Sabbath meets Phil Spector.”

According to Starrs, “The idea is that this album could have started life as an old cheap, grime-covered 25 cent pulp paperback like the type sold at news-stands outside train stations. But then perhaps it is adapted into a film noir, which itself is then re-made twenty years later as an ultraviolent, slasher Italian Giallo film. The album follows this aesthetic lineage as it descends from trash to noir to something discernibly darker.”

“The Night Creeper” is definitely an album with its own very distinct vibe.

“After a tour of the United States last October, we came home and started writing songs. It took us three days to track the whole album — all of us in the same room playing together,” said Starrs.

 “We did all the basic tracks live and then I’d work on it at home at my own pace — adding harmonies and keyboard parts. All the layering took time. All the mixing was completed in May. We’re doing four or five songs in our shows on this tour.”

Video link for Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats — https://youtu.be/m1yrtGaIkcI.

The show at Union Transfer, which has Ruby The Hatchet and Ecstatic Vision as the opening acts, will start at 8 p.m. Tickets are $20.

Upcoming shows at the Sellersville Theater are Lisa Loeb and Ben Kessler on September 11, Who’s Next on September 12, Corb Lund & Whitehorse on September 14, In the Bar on September 15 and Jeff Daniels on September 16.

Tommy Keene, who will perform on September 15 at Boot and Saddle (1131 South Broad Street, Philadelphia, 215-639-4528, www.bootandsaddlephilly.com), is a L.A.-based Maryland native who has been writing and performing tasty, guitar-driven power pop music for over three decades.

He has recorded 11full-length albums, four EPs, three compilations and one live album over the course of his career. In the last six years, Keene has released four studio albums.

His new album “Laugh in the Dark” is the latest in a fruitful partnership with North Carolina’s Second Motion Records label and was released on September 4. Keene’s previous album “Excitement at Your Feet” was an album of all cover songs.

“It was a lot of fun making a cover album,” said Keene, during a phone interview last week from his home in L.A. “I had such a plethora of material to draw from. I just picked songs that I could Tommy Keene-ize.

“I started writing for the new album in January 2014 and wrote until October. I recorded the drums in Memphis in November and then finished the album here at my house. I have my own studio and I have a lot of keyboards, guitars and basses. I can do everything here except the drums and mixing.

“I go through periods where I don’t write songs or even pick up a guitar for maybe as long as nine months. The covers record took about a year-and-a-half to make. So, I was fresh at the time to start writing. I usually get about 20-30 ideas.

“I’ll come up with a guitar figure — a modal pattern. Then, I flesh out a song around it. It can take a while until I see if good songs are coming. I always overwrite. With the new album, I had 15 songs done with lyrics and then picked 10 for the album. Right now, there are six of the new songs in my live set.”

Video link for Tommy Keene — https://vimeo.com/27493943.

Keene’s show at Boot & Saddle will start at 8:30 with opening act Hurry. Tickets are $12 in advance and $15 day of show.

Boot & Saddle will also host a twin-bill on September 16 with a pair of great female artists — Ambrosia Parsley, former lead singer of Shivaree, and headliner Holly Miranda. 

On September 11, Destructo will be getting dance music fans whipped into frenzy when he does his show at Rumor Nightclub (1500 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, rumorphilly.com, 215-988-0777).

Destructo is actually Gary Richards, a music business veteran from Los Angeles who is a DJ as well as a music executive and concert promoter.

“I just do shows on weekends,” said Richards, during a phone interview Wednesday afternoon from his West Coast office.”I’m in L.A. during the week. I run a festival company. That’s my day job.

“I started Destructo a while ago. I’ve been clubbing and making music for about 20 years. I’ve always been into electronic music going back to Kraftwerk and Afrika Bambaataa. In the early 1990s, I put Destructo onstage.”

Destructo has not been a constant on the touring scene since its inception but it has always been there.

“I never put it to bed but I went back-and-forth between DJing, managing artists and putting on shows,” said Richards. “Around 2007, I realized people weren’t buying EDM (electronic dance music).

“They weren’t buying music at all because they can get it for free. I used to have record labels that were with Interscope and A&M but not anymore. For EDM artist, it’s all about performing live for the fans.

“When I go onstage, I have my music and a full visual package. I won’t have screens with me for this East Coast trip. It depends on the configuration of the clubs or the festivals. I never do the same show from night to night.

“I have all my tunes. Some shows are more house and some more hip hop. Last weekend, I was in Europe. In Ibiza, they wanted house. Paris was hip hop and trap and Manchester was more rave. Then, there is g-house which is a blend of electronic house and hip hop.

I don’t get caught up in labels and genres. You just have to make good tunes. It’s either good music or it’s not.”

Destructo’s most recent recording is the “West Coast EP,” which features YG, Ty Dolla $ign, Too $hort, Kurupt, Problem, and Warren G.

“All the guys on my mixes are West Coast hip hop guys,” said Richards. “For my live performances, it’s just me. It’s a lot different than being out with a band. When I go on the road for shows, there is only one person.”

Video link for Destructo — https://youtu.be/K7Vvpqddhv8

The show at Rumor will start at 10 p.m. Tickets are $10. 

Poor Yorick. Night, Tithonos and Bad Metaphor on September 11 and Mercury Radio Theater, Kitty Rotten and Lettuce Prey on September 12.

The Steel City Coffee House (203 Bridge Street, Phoenixville, 610-933-4043, www.steelcitycoffeehouse.com) will host Cliff Hillis and Amy Fairchild on September 10, Amy Correia on September 11 and Jim Boggia on September 12.

Chaplin’s (66 North Main Street, Spring City, 610-792-4110, http://chaplinslive.com) will present Zach Alex, Eric Reavey, Sarah Kervin and Jake Currie on September 11.

The Ardmore Music Hall (23 East Lancaster Avenue, Ardmore, 610-649-8389, www.ardmoremusic.com) will present Dumpstaphunk and Royal Southern Brotherhood on September 10, Splintered Sunlight and Dirk Quinn Band on September 11, and Snarky Puppy and House of Waters on September 16.

Burlap & Bean Coffeehouse (204 South Newtown Street Road, Newtown Square, 484-427-4547, www.burlapandbean.com) will have Charlie Phillips on September 11,

JD Malone with John Beacher on September 12 and Johnny Boy Whaler Hootenanny on September 16.

The Keswick Theater (291 N. Keswick Avenue, Glenside, 215-572-7650, www.keswicktheatre.com) presents Little Feat on September 11, Sinbad on September 12 and Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell on September 13.