Modern Skirts and Heypenny at Vinyl

Athens darlings the Modern Skirts and Nashville power poppers Heypenny played a show at Vinyl in Atlanta last night.

Even though the Skirts don’t draw as big of a crowd in ATL as they do in ATH, everyone was enjoying the show. They played several new songs, keeping the crowd entertained with John Swint channeling a member of the high school drum line while beating on a bass drum and front man Jay Gulley gesticulating off the stage and into the crowd with a tambourine. The Skirts were having some minor sound issues, but other than that they seemed to be having fun playing their upbeat indie pop tunes such as “Eveready” and “Radio Breaks.”

After the Skirts came the high-energy performance from Heypenny. They came on stage donning costumes that were half robot, half Ninja Turtle, and I knew the performance would be interesting. And Heypenny didn’t disappoint. They added walls of sound to their keyboard/guitar/bass/drums quartet with a two-man horn/tambourine section and two funky fly backup singers. They all worked together to create a kind of quirky retro pop on songs like “Oh No.” I must say that the highlight of Heypenny’s performance was their cover of Beyonce’s “Single Ladies,” which had the crowd – including the Skirts’ Gulley – laughing, bouncing around and singing along.

Both bands put on a great show as part of last night BMI music showcase. The Modern Skirts play the 40 Watt in Athens this Saturday night with The Love Language and ExcaliBrah. I advise you to check it out.

-Kristen Callihan
currently listening to “Oh No” by Heypenny

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