Carpark Records Fêtes 25 Years with Speedy Ortiz & Phoebe Rings

When Todd Hyman established Carpark Records in 1999, the landscape of the music industry looked a lot different.  I know this because I’m old enough to remember running to Tower Records to buy a CD single of then-emerging artist Britney Spears’ new hit song, “…Baby One More Time.”  When Carpark launched, music fans still hoarded booklets upon booklets stuffed with compact discs (I’ll never forgive myself for trashing the jewel cases, by the way).  Digital music sales were in their infancy–Napster was the biggest thorn in the record industry’s side.  Apple would not launch iTunes until January 2001, and its first iPod wouldn’t hit shelves until November of the same year.  

Even more impressive is that, in the 25 years since Hyman signed his first electronic artist, Carpark Records has lived through a shift to digital sales, multiple economic downturns, the ever-challenging streaming bubble, and a worldwide pandemic.  Yet through all of the turmoil we’ve experienced on a global scale in the last quarter-century, Carpark has never wavered from its commitment to being an independent label.  Now based in DC, what began as a small operation in a New York City apartment has grown to include artists representing a myriad of genres, a publishing company, and four separate imprints (including Sadie Dupuis’s Wax Nine label).  So it comes as no surprise that all four musical acts shared the same sentiment on Monday night:

“Thank you, Carpark.  Happy Birthday!”

The four musical acts on the bill of Monday night’s show at Johnny Brenda’s offered an excellent cross-section of the various types of music the Carpark Records of today represents.  From instrumental soundscapes to inventive folk-pop; 1970s-tinged dreampop to pure rock and roll, the Philly edition of Carpark Records’ 25th birthday show had it all.

Dylan Baldi

Widely recognized as the front-person of Cleveland, OH-based indie rock band Cloud Nothings,  Dylan Baldi has been residing in Philadelphia since 2021. While he continues to produce music with Cloud Nothings, whose eighth LP, Final Summer, was released in 2024, Baldi has embarked on an instrumental solo project. This solo work signifies a shift from his role as Cloud Nothings' lead singer — notably, it contains no lyrics. Instead, his compositions stand alone to convey emotion, with listeners immersed in the dynamic highs and lows of a symphonic soundscape, akin to a musical painting that allows each person to find their own meaning. If you're unfamiliar with Dylan Baldi's current projects, I recommend visiting his Bandcamp to give his solo project a listen–with an excellent pair of headphones.

@

Though Baltimore-based folk-pop duo @ are no longer signed to Carpark, the label has an integral part in their history.  The project began during COVID lockdowns in 2020, when singer-songwriter Victoria Rose, then based in Philly, began sending musical ideas via iMessage to her friend Stone Filipczak, who was living in Baltimore.  The name @ is a nod to their virtual beginnings; much of their debut album, 2023’s Mind Palace Music, was created via iPhone voice memos.  

@’s music is a custom blend of old-school, acoustic folk with ultramodern digital flourishes.  Rose and Filipczak are outstandingly emotive storytellers, presenting their songs with a haunting warmth that lives somewhere between melancholy and hopefulness.  There is a theatrical quality to their music, especially when Rose adds her clarinet. As the resident theatre nerd on staff, I would totally invest money in an @-scored piece of theatre.  The duo’s performance seemed to be the highlight of the evening for their fellow labelmates–Phoebe Rings’ Crystal Choi was in front of me for part of the set, and she was absolutely buzzing with excitement.  And although she later referred to her enthrallment as “cringe,” it illustrates how spectacular Rose and Filipczak are as musicians that an artist from New Zealand who has been touring North America with her band called this a highlight of her first trip to the States.

Phoebe Rings

Phoebe Rings has had quite the year.  The New Zealand band released their debut album, Aseurai, on Carpark Records in June of this year, and they hit the road supporting labelmates (and fellow Kiwis) The Beths on their North American tour this fall.  In fact, the group’s appearance at the Carpark celebration was their third consecutive date in Philadelphia–the band played two sold-out shows with The Beths at Union Transfer on Saturday and Sunday before hitting the stage at Johnny Brenda's Monday night.

Phoebe Rings’ music is ethereal yet grounded.  The layers of magical, sparkling synths and funky, bass-driven grooves are sometimes paired with lyrics that aren’t as shimmering as the music sounds.   Sure, the protagonist of the song “Mandarin Tree” is dreaming, but they are dreaming about finding a stable place to live amidst an ongoing housing crisis in Auckland.  The title track from their debut album, “Aseurai,” is beautifully sung in Korean (lead vocalist Crystal Choi’s native language) with little hints of influence from disco greats like The Bee Gees.  In the Korean language, Choi describes the meaning of “Aseurai” as  a  “poetic expression…[meaning] around you in the atmosphere, hard to reach, [and] fading away.”  She dedicated the song to her grandmother, who recently passed away. 

But it never gets too dreary with Phoebe Rings, which is what makes this quartet so fantastic.    All four members (Choi on vocals and synth, Benjamin Locke on bass, Simeon Kavanagh-Vincent on guitar and synth, and Alex Freer on drums) add distinctive flair to each song.  Locke took lead vocals on the track “Get Up,” and with all four members sang on the song “Drifting.”  Phoebe Rings are paving their own lane in the pop sphere, and I am looking forward to following where they go next.

Speedy Ortiz

In 2016, Speedy Ortiz’s lead vocalist and guitarist, Sadie Dupuis, decided to take a break from her band and make a solo record.  In a 2017 interview with Nylon magazine, Dupuis explained that when the lease on her Northampton, MA apartment ended, she knew she wanted to leave the Boston area but wasn’t sure where she would land.  Dupuis was fond of her experiences touring through Philadelphia with her band and already had a network of musician friends living here.  She decided to rent a home in the city for two weeks to see whether it was a fit.  During those two weeks, Dupuis wrote nearly all of her first solo album, Slugger (released under the name Sad13), and she’s been living in Philly ever since.  

Naturally, Speedy Ortiz moved with Dupuis, and in the decade that followed, the lineup changed as the group and its members became fixtures in the Philly music community.  In 2018, multi-instrumentalist Andy Moholt (who grew up in Hatfield) joined the band on rhythm guitar and keys.  Brooklyn bass extrordinaire Audrey Zee Whitesides also joined Speedy that year, eventually leaving New York for Philly.  The current Speedy Ortiz lineup was cemented in 2019, when Joey Doubek (a collaborator of Katie and Alison Crutchfield) became the band’s permanent drummer.  

As the band took the stage, an electric charge surged through the crowd.  The current built as each musician picked up their instrument.  It fanned into the auditorium, ran toward the back windows at breakneck speed, and zipped up the worn but sturdy staircase leading to the balcony.  And as Speedy Ortiz blasted into the first chords of “Ghostwriter” (from 2023’s Rabbit Rabbit), the crowd at Johnny Brenda’s snapped into the circuit, the whole room lighting up as everyone fed the voltage right back into the band.  We were plugged in.

The fourteen-song set was a tour of Speedy Ortiz’s discography–from earlier tracks like “Basketball” and “Silver Spring” from the 2012 EP Sports, to songs like “Ballad of Y & S” and “Plus One” from their most recent LP, Rabbit Rabbit.  All four members are remarkably energetic performers. Whitesides plays her bass with an effortless finesse, as if the instrument is an extension of her body–at one point taking a brief seat on the steps leading to the stage, as if she might tie her shoe while still strumming.  Moholt shifts seamlessly between guitar and synthesizer, swaying in sync with the soundwaves.  Watching Dupuis absolutely shred it on guitar using her fingernails as a pick was a masterclass in raw musicianship.  And in the back, Doubek drives the set with precise rhythm, grinning nearly the entire time.

Speedy Ortiz has helped put Philadelphia’s music scene on the map, but even with the many accolades the band has received, they remain grounded. The group members caught up with the bar staff between sets, even thanking every person in the venue by name before they finished their performance, and they stayed focused on their fellow labelmates whenever they took the stage. Like Carpark Records, the members of Speedy Ortiz are advocates for music in all its forms, and regardless of their origins, they are now champions of Philadelphia.  And in true Philly fashion, Eagles score updates were offered in between songs.

Setlists

Phoebe Rings

Daisy
Lazy Universe
Not a Necessity
Aseurai
Mandarin Tree
Get Up
Drifting
Fading Star

Speedy Ortiz

Ghostwriter
Plus One
Ballad of Y & S
Raising the Skate
Casper (1995)
The Graduates
Silver Spring
Pioneer Spine
Basketball
Curling
Swell Content
Lucky 88
No Below
Taylor Swift