Last night (August 3), the Mill Creek Tavern in West Philly felt like a college student center, as academics from UPenn and the University of the Sciences co-mingled with hipsters, hippies, and bar regulars. The show was intimate, but each group brought with them their own cadre of dedicated fans, all of whom were won over by the other bands.

While Holland's Racoon yodeled and whistled their way through an acoustic riff rock that sounded like the Proclaimers covering U2, a large, round man in Bermuda shorts ambled around the Trocadero Theatre last night (Dec. 20), obviously long past caring what others might have thought of him. Where did he fit in the demographic of this audience

With bangs dangling in their eyes and hoodies pulled over their heads, rockers from across Philly braved the cold and made a pilgrimage to the Electric Factory last night (Dec. 6) to experience a holy trinity of post-hardcore madness. Hometown heroes mewithoutYou opened for the sold-out crowd, cramming its five members onstage

The complex arrangements of the Born Ruffians' jangly Pixies-ish sound warmed up the hipster crowd Monday night (Oct. 8) for an evening of hypnotic harmonies and honey-colored drones. But projected over Caribou on the stage of the First Unitarian Church basement were criss-crossing patterns of light and color, controlled not by anyone at

Philadelphians' had two opportunities in the last year to catch the Decemberists, but only at last night's (July 15) show would you have seen the band of bookworms bumping up against Sean O'Loughlin and the Mann Festival Orchestra.