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UID:c3395f4f-ae4c-433a-9de4-15f2803db7bd@360exp.net
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DTSTAMP:20260928T161940Z
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DTSTART:20261112T020000Z
DTEND:20261112T050000Z
SUMMARY:Dave Hause and the Mermaid
LOCATION:Club Congress
DESCRIPTION:Doors 7pm | Show 7:30pm | Advance $20 / Day of Show $25 + Dice 
 Fees | 21+\n\nW/ Crimewave 66\n\n“As far back as I can remember\, I alwa
 ys wanted to be in a rock and roll band.”\n\nDave Hause had an epiphany 
 rewatching Goodfellas. “There's that scene in the beginning where Henry 
 Hill says\, ‘As far back as I can remember\, I always wanted to be a gan
 gster.’” The Philly-bred\, California-based singer-songwriter always l
 onged to be in a different kind of mob.\n\n“This record is my realizatio
 n that\, as far back as I can remember\, I always wanted to be in a rock a
 nd roll band. This record is that rock and roll band distilled into 10 son
 gs.”\n\nThis record is …And The Mermaid. And those 10 songs offer a we
 lcome shock to the system\, blending Hause’s signature lyrical elan and 
 gift for surging melodies with his keening vocals and some deliciously sha
 rp musical elbows courtesy of the titular group.\n\n“I had made a couple
  of records in a row in Nashville\, and I was super happy with the outcome
 s\,” says Hause of 2023’s Blood Harmony and 2021’s Drive it Like it
 ’s Stolen\, both produced by Will Hoge with top-flight session musicians
 . While they certainly had their muscular moments\, those records were mor
 e in line with the Americana-tinged music Hause had been making as a solo 
 artist. He ended up on several solo tours\, as well as some duo outings wi
 th his brother and collaborator Tim\, which necessitated stripping the son
 gs back. “It occurred to me how far I’ve come from my roots\,” he sa
 ys. “Punk rock just isn’t where my muse has been for the last couple a
 lbums.”\n\nBut as he pumped electricity when playing those solo songs wi
 th his occasional band The Mermaid at his celebratory weekend festival Sin
 g Us Home in Philly the last few years\, he realized\, “I was just missi
 ng plugging in and turning up. I was missing the energy that it takes to d
 eliver that show.”\n\nWhile the former leader of beloved Philly punk roc
 kers The Loved Ones has been no stranger to going to 11\, it had been a mi
 nute since The Mermaid — whose current iteration includes brother Tim Ha
 use on guitar and vocals\, bassist Luke Preston\, keyboardist Mark Masefie
 ld\, and drummer Kevin Conroy — had done a proper tour. And they’d nev
 er recorded together.\n\n“This is the first time I've taken that band in
 to the studio and been like\, ‘No matter what\, damn the torpedoes\, we 
 are going to sound the way we sound. I'm not going to Nashville and gettin
 g the murderers row of players. This is our sound\,’" says Hause of the 
 mission statement for …And The Mermaid\, which is being released on Haus
 e’s Blood Harmony label.\n\nNearly 20 years into his career\, the collec
 tion also represents a number of other firsts. It is the first album in hi
 s solo career where the entire band has been invited to contribute to the 
 songwriting process. It contains Hause’s first cover on an album of orig
 inals\, a harmony-laden rendition of “Bible Passages” by Tim McIlrath 
 of Rise Against — “I finally was just totally comfortable enough to pu
 t a song I believe in that someone without the last name Hause wrote on my
  record." And it’s the first time he’s recorded outside the U.S.\n\nWi
 th a little help from the Canadian government (in the form of a grant)\, T
 he Mermaid decamped to Vancouver in January 2025 to co-produce the album w
 ith Jesse Gander (Japandroids\, White Lung) who also served as engineer an
 d mixer. “Jesse is about my age\, so he's just as fired up on Minor Thre
 at as he is on Bryan Adams\,” says Hause of the obvious kindred spirit\,
  with whom he had been chatting over the years. “The sonic references we
 re really aligned\, and I love his acumen and his approach. It's also a gr
 eat studio\, in one of my favorite towns\, with tons of gear.”\n\nThe ba
 nd and Gander tracked over 20 songs in two weeks\, and Hause found himself
  grateful for the varying point of views that having other voices in the s
 tudio offered\, even as he retained final say as bandleader. “It went re
 ally well\,” he says of the creative collaboration. “We've cultivated 
 a ton of trust and transparency. I would be an absolute fool to be this fa
 r in and assume that an idea shouldn't at least be considered. The older y
 ou get\, the closer you can stay to the river of creativity\, the better y
 our life is. I had full faith that these four people that I've been workin
 g with in various iterations over the years are trying to do just that.”
 \n\nIt was Tim\, who is also one of his older brother’s biggest fans\, w
 ho helped Hause rediscover his inner rock and roll animal. “One of the t
 hings that Tim said when we were four or five songs into making this recor
 d was\, ‘wow\, I'm most excited for the fans for this one\,’” Hause 
 says. “‘Without hindering your creativity or making some preconceived 
 decision to go back to your roots\, you are going to stoke out every Loved
  Ones fan who we might've lost on a finger-picked gentle version of someth
 ing. Every rock fan of ours\, this is what they want.’”\n\nBrother Tim
  was right\, and the album wastes no time announcing itself. “A Knife in
  the Mud” kicks off with a trumpet herald that gives way to a galloping 
 groove that feels very much like the rock and roll cavalry is on the way e
 ven as Hause announces that vultures are circling to attack and balefully 
 intones “There’s no knight coming in on horseback/It’s a fight for a
  knife in the mud.” The first of the album’s several anthemic choruses
  kicks in just when all hope is lost as Hause defiantly sings “We ain’
 t going down easy/We ain’t going down at all/We’re never gonna die.”
  But Hause wonders\, is that a good thing? “Maybe it might not be the be
 st thing that this cockroach-like species that we are is going to keep pro
 liferating\,” he muses.\n\nThe full-tilt fist-pumping pummels through th
 e next four tracks. “Cellmates\,” a fast and furious chronicle of surv
 ival complete with galvanizing “Whoa-oh-oh” refrain\, balances the ten
 sion between the triumph of surviving and the rueful surveying of the wrec
 kage of that survival as “we mainline nostalgia like amphetamine.”\n\n
 “The initial inspiration was getting sober\,” say Hause. “A lot of u
 s made it out of really bleak times where we were in a lot of pain\; using
  and abusing drugs and alcohol to mitigate that pain. I'm almost 10 years 
 sober and I found myself running into old friends. We'd end up being like
 \, ‘Hey\, remember that time?’ And what we’re describing was fucked.
 ”\n\nBurning guitars undergird the emphatic vocals of “Look Alive” w
 ith Hause contemplating the end of the world and hollering “If I’m gon
 na pay for my sins/Goddamn I wanna sin some more” and engaging in anothe
 r round of righteous “whoa-ohs” that will no doubt lead to robust sing
 alongs at live shows. He lets them come organically\, he says of choosing 
 just the right spot for an exclamation. Then he runs it by his twin six-ye
 ar-old sons\, noting\, “If they're pumped and they can remember this\, e
 verybody will.”\n\n“I really do believe that songs are best when we al
 l sing them\,” he says of the community of the live space. “Everybody'
 s busy\, so remembering every single one of my little lyrics might be a lo
 t for your average person with a job\,” he says with a laugh. “But if 
 you give them a ‘whoa\,’ it gives them something to latch onto.”\n\n
 “Mockingbird Blues” is a restless ode to feeling unmoored that takes a
  pleasingly dissonant left-turn with some saloon piano licks that amp up t
 he song’s sense of displacement. And “Revisionist History” — inspi
 red in part by Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book The Message — is a dizzying\, pu
 nk-inflected rocker that careens through the last 60 years with a look at 
 how the good old days weren’t always good for everyone and maybe we shou
 ldn’t be trying to turn back time.\n\n“That song ties to ‘Enough Hop
 e\,’” he says of a deeper cut that takes the POV of those in power lau
 ghing at the working class. “And it ties also to ‘We mainline nostalgi
 a like amphetamine’ from ‘Cellmates.’ That's the common thread\, tha
 t the personal can become political. If we're so afraid of the future\, no
 t only are we going to hang around like we're cellmates in a prison yard\,
  but we're also going to revise history to make it look rosier than it act
 ually was.”\n\nThe album downshifts ever-so-slightly with the skittering
  ‘Yer Outta My Hair\,” leading into the burbling guitars and soul-sear
 ching of “Bible Passages” and the midtempo pop-punk stomp of the delig
 htful “Rumspringa\,” which took a few musical cues from his pals the D
 ropkick Murphys. “May Every Last Fever Break\,” a poignant parent’s 
 wish for their children\, fittingly featuring more interlaced sibling harm
 onies from Tim\, brings the album to a soft landing as the faint trumpet h
 erald from the album start fades out\, signaling it may be time to put the
  weapons down and rest awhile.\n\nHause says that venturing into — and b
 eing fully embraced by — the Americana/singer-songwriter space for a few
  years ended up leading him back to a version of where he began. “It gav
 e me enough confidence to come back to the rock and punk thing and be like
 \, ‘I got nothing to prove. I'm just going to do me.’"\n\nFortunately 
 he is not doing it alone and is eagerly looking forward to taking these so
 ngs and his band on the road\, plugging in and turning it up and reveling 
 with an even bigger gang\, his fans.\n\n“The band is called The Mermaid 
 because being in a band has always felt like something I’ve had for a mo
 ment\, and then the whole myth of it just swims away. If that keeps being 
 the case\, I want a musical document of the time we spent together.”\n\n
 He hopes those fans have a similar epiphany when listening to…And The Me
 rmaid that he had in making it: that being part of something larger than y
 ourself can bring a different sense of meaning to your life.\n\n“I hope 
 people take away the belief that we can do things that are greater than ou
 rselves when we decide to work together\,” he says. “That's what a ban
 d promises. That's what a live music event promises. It's what a festival 
 promises. It's what relationships promise. If you can work together\, it's
  better than being isolated and living in fear. It's messy. It can be ugly
 . You're going to get into arguments. Somebody's going to get the last pie
 ce of cake and you're going to give that person shit but\, hopefully\, the
 re's enough goodwill in the mission that you can forgive each other and kn
 ow ‘This is greater than I could do on my own.’”\n\nBoletos: https:/
 /dice.fm/event/g5xmmb-dave-hause-and-the-mermaid-11th-nov-club-congress-tu
 cson-tickets
URL;VALUE=URI:https://360exp.net/events/c3395f4f-ae4c-433a-9de4-15f2803db7b
 d
STATUS:CONFIRMED
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