Funny thing about mikingmihrab, the oddly named but intensely infectious folk influenced post punk garage band that’s been the pride of Philadelphia’s underground indie scene these past few years—they’re always clowning, so you never know when to take them seriously. But when they’re out there rocking--as they’ve done at The Khyber, Danger Danger Gallery and cool holes in the wall like J.R.’s, they’re transcending the clutter and making a major impact. Ready to expand their reach beyond their local base, the quirky but intensely rocking trio—frontman guitarist Mike Adams, bassist Kevin Cooper and drummer Zach Price—follows their 2008 debut EP Breaking News with their first full length recording Tres Tontos, their most pop oriented set to date.
The title of the album, “Three Fools” in Spanish, is a perfect example of the band’s sense of humor. While working on the project, the band had been feasting a lot on ZZ Top and it’s a twist on the legendary group’s 1973 classic Tres Hombres. They also gravitated to an aerial shot from a ZZ Top live album that included the line: “Just us and 30,000 of our friends.” Even though Adams says that mikingmihrab takes their songs more seriously than they take themselves as a band, this kind of imagery has fueled their ambition.
Still, the craziness: A local journalist building an online publication got wind of the band and asked Adams for a copy of Breaking News. Adams sent it to him on 7” vinyl before breaking down and emailing some MP3s. Then there’s the way Adams and Cooper start out in Adams’ basement with random ideas thrown onto a 4-track recorder while both are a bit blitzed. Somehow it all works, sounds great—and yeah, fully gets the party started. And then there’s the band name itself, which happened randomly a few years back when Adams had his dictionary opened and on two consecutive pages spotted two incongruous words that had a cool alliteration: mikingmihrab.
Beyond all that and the fun they have performing, the songwriting is also developing in cool and unique ways on Tres Tontos. They just tell it like it is: The upbeat, manic and crazy “Walking Wine” is about an incident where Adams was walking down the street with two guitars and a backpack full of gear and was so drunk that he fell down on the sidewalk with all the stuff. He got upset about it at the time, but it makes a great song now. The mid-tempo, stomping and “militaristic” “Bloody Fingers” is an apocalyptic romp that begins with a girl committing suicide and runs from there. “February Lamb,” which features some of Adams’ most intricate guitar work, has a martyr theme (i.e. sacrificing the lamb before spring), while the Lou Reed-esque “Bottle Jockey” gets back to the alcohol soaked fun that defines mikingmihrab when they’re just out having a blast.
mikingmihrab formed in 2004 when Price, a Philly native who almost went to Julliard, responded via Craigslist to Adams’ ad for a drummer. Price showed up at an hourly rehearsal room and they began working on a set. Adams had moved from St. James, NY a few years earlier after trying to start a band there and had a nice backlog of material. The two messed around but wrote a lot of great material over the next two years, then played with a stand in bassist at the 2006 Clark Park Festival. One night in a bar, they met Allentown, PA native Cooper, who toured the U.S. with Spongegod in the 90s and also played with The Rusty Nails. They asked him to join mikingmihrab numerous times before he agreed in 2007. Their sound is coming together beautifully, but in some ways, Adams feels he’s just barely hanging on economically, mentally and socially – all of which will inspire incredible shows and powerful songs in the future.
