Fort Lowell Records at Cruel World Festival

Four Fort Lowell Records artists were represented yesterday (May 14) cat the Cruel World Music Festival in Pasadena CA: [L-R] Mike Yoas of Desario [Sacramento CA], Kevin Unwin of fairweatherfriend [Tucson AZ], J Holt Evans III of Lauds [Wilmington NC], and Tracy Shedd [Wilmington NC]. 💛🧡❤️💖

OUT NOW: KITIMOTO "Bats!" [Digital Single]

The third single from your new favorite indie rock band — KITIMOTO — is out today; from their debut album — Vintage Smell — due out June 24th on 12inch vinyl. “Bats!” is available on all digital platforms, and as a very special surprise on this Friday the 13th, KITIMOTO has included a *Bonus Track* — “Aphex Djinn” — with the digital single! Check it out today, and CLICK HERE to preorder their LP before it’s sold out! 🙀 For fans of Built to Spill, Parquet Courts, The Pixies, and Spoon.

Listen: JPW – “Wealth of the Canyon”

[Repost from Petal Motel; by Lara Bennett, May 3, 2022]

Petal Motel is beyond thrilled to announce and premiere the first single “Wealth of the Canyon” from JPW’s debut solo album, Something Happening / Always Happening, out September 9th on Fort Lowell Records.

JPW is of course the moniker for none other than Jason P. Woodbury. It’s no surprise that the tastemaker’s first full-length is a gorgeous blend of favorite sounds, yet something completely unique and brand new. Inspired by the rural expanses of Jason’s native Pinal County, Arizona, soul searching, and the influence of his expansive record collection, Something Happening / Always Happening showcases how the Transmissions podcast host’s voice seamlessly transforms into something extremely pleasant to listen to. “Wealth of the Canyon” highlights Jason’s Mayfield-like falsetto, the organ and percussion working together to weave a hypnotic, laid-back groove, and an echoing guitar line accented with subtle sounds of the desert, like an eagle screech. This song could not get much cooler, but I promise that there is so much to look forward to with the full album release.

Pre-sale will be live on June 9th so follow Fort Lowell on Bandcamp

The album was produced by Michale Krassner of Boxhead Ensemble

Some words from Ben Chasny:

It’s got a killer vibe like that Donnie and Joe record but with a cool Jesus and Mary Chain melodic sense, but waaay more laid back, desert-style so it sounds totally unique.

And a few more from Ben Seretan:

Every jangly guitar chord ever broadcast over AM radio is still out there vibrating, one wave among many in the ever-expanding cosmos. They hear Roy Orbison’s three-octaves loud and clear at the other end of the galaxy, the Vox Continental minor/major organ stabs from ’96 Tears’ teeter around the edge of some celestial Kirby Crackle, The Ronettes’ broken hearted melodies bounce off purple deserts on the dark side of Venus. The songs are out there, you simply have to tune your instruments to them.

Jason Woodbury is a galactic citizen, dialing in from the Sonoran Desert on planet Earth. Something Happening / Always Happening is the debut from his project JPW. It’s a collection of songs you might hear on the radio after a cosmic camping trip, familiar but far off. Songs for stepping out of the spaceship to crack a goddamn cold one on a blurry summer day, taking a moment to enjoy the smell of freshly cut grass.

Woodbury’s voice may be familiar to those interested in the more theologic strains of American songwriting. For the last decade, he’s penned liner notes and criticism, and contributed to Aquarium Drunkard, hosting the weekly Transmissions podcast and Range and Basin on Radio Free Aquarium Drunkard on dublab, a radiophonic showcase for his love of comic books, science fiction, and mysticism. All of that is legible on the surface of Something Happening / Always Happening, but here listeners are gifted with another side of Jason’s voice: his singing, which is just as unhurried and serene as you’d expect.

Mostly self-recorded by Woodbury with longtime musical collaborators Zach Toperek and Zane Gillum, the album was produced by Michael Krassner of Boxhead Ensemble, a long running instrumental combo which has aligned members of Dirty Three, Califone, Will Oldham, Gastr del Sol, Jim O’Rourke, and many more. A natural outgrowth of their work together on Range and Basin and shared love of Arizona’s diverse topography, Krassner wandered deep into the sounds, adding guitar and piano to the ghostly tones, percolating Rhythm Ace drum machine beats, and sand dune surf guitars. The result is mood music in a sense—listen casually and you might even miss the unexplained aerial phenomena before your eyes. But by the time the final / title track, built on a sample of Link Cromwell‘s (Lenny Kaye) “Crazy Like a Fox,” reaches its atomizing 9th minute, Woodbury’s thesis is clear: not only are we all made of star stuff, that stuff is alive and vibrating. Adjust your frequencies and hear it sing.” 

Jason P. Woodbury · Wealth of the Canyon

Cover Photo by Dorothea Lange, November 1940 Taken in a cotton field near Coolidge, Arizona; via US National Archives and Records Administration

OUT NOW: JPW "Wealth of the Canyon" [Digital Single]

JPW is the moniker for Jason P. Woodbury, host of Aquarium Drunkard's weekly Transmissions podcast and Range and Basin on Radio Free Aquarium Drunkard with dublab.  Today, JPW's first single -- "Wealth of the Canyon" -- from their debut album -- Something Happening / Always Happening -- is out as a digital single on all platforms.

"“Wealth of the Canyon” highlights Jason’s Mayfield-like falsetto, the organ and percussion working together to weave a hypnotic, laid-back groove. This song could not get much cooler." ~ Petal Motel

See JPW perform live in concert at Hotel Congress on Saturday, May 21st in Tucson, Arizona; click here for full concert information and to purchase tickets.

Jason P. Woodbury · Wealth of the Canyon

Explore the magic mind behind the 'Black Lives Do Matter' art installation: Greyson Davis

[Repost from StarNews Online; by John Staton, May 4, 2022]

He's a man of many names, not to mention games.

As a visual artist, he goes by HP Fangs, which is short for Happy Fangs. His rapper name, if you will, for his past and future life as a hip-hop musician, is Haji P, short for Haji Pajamas.

His students call him Mr. Greyson, kind of like his personal Facebook page, which is "Regular Greyson." 

For boring and vaguely legal reasons we'll call him Greyson Davis. But whichever name you know him by, he's a Wilmington artist like none other whose eye-catching work runs the gamut from playful to profound.

"Me and my therapist are working through all of my names," Haji P said with a laugh during an interview in the classroom where he works teaching art to middle-school girls at Girls Leadership Academy of Wilmington, or GLOW, where he's been employed since 2016. 

"Middle-schoolers are still down to be weird," Davis said, which is why he prefers teaching students of that age. 

He looks like the coolest teacher you ever had — long braids, black ball cap with "Santa Cruz" in Gothic lettering, a form-fitting black T-shirt with his own illustrations and the slogan "make art" — and Davis is always down to get a little weird, as evidenced by some of his work on the classroom walls, like one of a bright pink brain emitting a noxious green cloud that spells out the words, "Brain fart!"

It's the kind of irreverent sentiment that endears him to his students, whose work Davis promotes on his social media channels and encourages during regular meetings of a school-wide art club. 

"Anything I do I try to make them a part of it," he said. 

Keep smiling

If you live in Wilmington, you've probably seen the work of HP Fangs whether you know it or not.

If you've driven down North Third Street in downtown Wilmington where it turns into the Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway, you've seen Davis' large-scale installation spelling out the words" Black Lives Do Matter" in giant letters decorated by everything from the visages of Black luminaries to the work of iconic Wilmington artist Minnie Evans to his own trademark logo, turning up as a gap-toothed grin punctuating an exclamation mark.

The Wilmington City Council recently approved the installation, which first went up in 2020, to stand for another year. 

The HP Fangs hallmark is an illustration of a toothy, cartoonish grin that shows up in many forms, from little stickers for local ice cream shop Boombalatti's to a recent billboard asking people to "smile," just to cite two examples.

The visual is an HP Fangs original, but there's something so comfortable and familiar about it that it feels like it's always been part of your consciousness, whether it's a smiling rainbow heart or just that grin, sometimes capped with a gold tooth, coming out of and obliterating the darkness.

Troubled times

Before he became a teacher and an artist, Haji P — the name was inspired by the character Hadji from the old Johnny Quest cartoons — was best-known in Wilmington as a hip-hop artist, performing with such groups as Brown Co. and Rec League. He also released an excellent solo album, "Neighborhood Kid," back in 2010.

But back to art for a second: Davis currently has a piece in the "State of the Art/Art of the State" exhibit at the Cameron Art Museum, where he's a teaching artist. He also recently had an exhibit of his '80s-inspired illustrations at the second Princess Street location of the Memory Lane comic book shop, which has been featuring Davis' work on its walls for years. 

A huge comic book fan, as well as a devotee of '80s and '90s pop culture — "I don't do anything besides read comics and watch cartoons," Davis said, "I'm like a 12-year-old" — Memory Lane is where you can find him most every Wednesday when new comic books are released. Memory Lane, he said, is also "one of the reasons HP Fangs is a thing."

In addition to caricatures of '80s favs like Alf, Calvin & Hobbes and Pac-Man, Davis makes plenty of original work as well. 

Some of it is for Davis' daughter, a "beautiful monster" who's 6, and whose picture Davis keeps hanging above his desk. He started drawing and writing for her not long after she was born, and he still makes coloring books for her, mostly pictures of "dumb animals being goofballs."

Doubling down on his creativity, Davis said, helped him get through a major rough patch by providing him a new path forward.

Within a year in the middle of last decade, he said, a split with his ex-fiancee led to a custody battle over their daughter. Then, the father he never really knew reached out to him, dredging up all sorts of emotions made even more complicated by the fact that Davis' father was extremely ill (he ultimately recovered).

Also around that time, Davis, who is Black, was the victim of what he calls "a racially motivated attack" in Leland. 

It was a lot for Davis, who'd been dealing with depression since moving from Hawaii to Fayetteville as a teenager, to handle all at once. A suicide attempt landed him in the hospital, where he was forced to take a long, hard look at his mental health. 

It was difficult at the time, but "I'm so glad I went," he said.

He wasn't supposed to have any sharp objects, but a hospital employee snuck him in a pencil set. He began making cartoons of the staff, little "comical blurbs of whatever our relationship was."

"That's when drawing really started to be it for me," he said. "I was like, 'This is going to be my anchor.'"

'It's just a butt'

For many years, even after graduating from the University of North Carolina Wilmington with a degree in Communications in the early 2000s, music was Haji P's main focus. Still, he'd always done art to some degree, and now he reconnected with the artists who first inspired him, including Keith Haring, Charles Schulz and Jim Henson. ("I can probably quote the entire 'Muppet Movie' from start to finish.")

The music he made in the 2000s and 2010s was often goofy and fun while simultaneously speaking to more serious topics, an aesthetic that often, but not always, shows up in his art. 

Not long after he started posting pictures of his work on Instagram about six years ago, Davis got a couple of offers to illustrate children's books. One, "But Daddy, I Don't Like That," by Terrence Lovett, about a kid who didn't want to eat his veggies, proved moderately successful. It also inspired him to change his Instagram handle to HP Fangs from its original and less family-friendly name, Butt Biters, a name he chose because "it made me laugh."

Sometimes, though, a butt just needs to be a butt, even if he's showing his work to the curator of a nationally known museum. When he submitted a painting to the CAM's "State of the Art/Art of the State" exhibit, Haji P found himself in front of Dr. Maia Nuku of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, one of three curators of the show.

When deciding which work he wanted to submit — each artist got just one — he thought, "This might be the only opportunity I ever have to have my work in a museum. What if I just draw a butt?"

And so, Davis submitted a painting of a cartoonish derriere passing a big green cloud of gas. It made him laugh, so he drew it. Nuku loved it, and even posed smiling for a picture next to Davis with the work. 

"She asked me, 'Is this some kind of comment on COVID-19?' Nah, it's just a butt. Then she was like, 'Oh, thank God.'"

Then, she said "the illest thing that anyone's ever said about my work. She goes, '22 lines.' She had counted my strokes. 'You did more with those 22 lines than most people could.' I was so hyped up."

If there is often a light-heartedness to Davis' work, he said, it's partly because "I have to remind myself to smile."

He worries, though, about crossing the line from positive to Pollyanna.

"I wonder where that line is," he said. "I get where it can be wild irritating" when someone is relentlessly, mindless positive.

Perhaps one reason Davis' work comes across as carefree and cool rather than cheesy is because it's ultimately rooted in a darkness he's always fighting against. His work is at once serious and not, which he says is a "complete manifestation of being bipolar."

Then there's the work that could be considered Davis' magnum opus to date, the "Black Lives Do Matter" installation. Located on city-owned property, the installation was approved by the Wilmington City Council in 2020 after encountering a fair amount of opposition. Originally intended as a "Black Lives Matter" installation, the council only approved the project after the word "do" was added, something that drew the ire of BLM activists, who saw it as watering down the message.

Looking back, Davis recalls the whole saga as something of "a yikes event." It still pains him to talk about it to some degree, even though he has largely made peace with it. 

"At first, I hated it. I fully understand and agree with why (the activists) were mad," he said. "I felt like a race traitor. I was getting hate mail from both sides" — those who didn't want the installation at all, and those who didn't want it with what they saw as an "extra," diluting word. 

Ultimately, Davis said, he decided to do it, mainly because "it felt arrogant not to do," he said. "It still means Black Lives Matter."

More pictures of dumb things

It's not like he hasn't faced racism in his life, like every other Black person. His old hip-hop duo, Brown Co., which he formed with a friend from high school, got its name after they decided to take ownership of a racist taunt they encountered at a party.

Even as he's become known as a visual artist, Haji P still has music in the back of his mind. 

"I am craving doing one more album," he said. "I love writing and I still write."

In fact, he's currently working with Wilmington label Fort Lowell Records on releasing new music, although the details aren't quite ready to publicize.

"Haji is super talented," said Fort Lowell's James Tritten. "His music is amazing. I had no idea (he made music) all this time, just knowing him as an illustrator."

Likewise, Tritten said, when he brought up Haji P's artwork to the Wilmington rappers in MindsOne, who did shows with Davis back in the 2000s, they had no idea that he also did visual art.

Moving forward, it could be that Davis does work in both genres. For now, you can see his art adorning new labels from Wilmington's New Anthem Beer Project, and he'll be at Memory Lanwith his work for Free Comic Book Day on May 7. 

One of his dreams is to create a student art gallery where kids can sell their work, a spot where he can teach, work, play, learn and help kids.

Davis said he's often asked, "'What's your end goal?' I dunno, draw more pictures of dumb things."

But as a kid who grew up reading the funny papers and admiring the work he saw, "I feel like I want to give 8-year-old me a high five," Davis said. "'We did it!'"

Wilmington artist HP Fangs/Haji Pajamas/Greyson Davis at Memory Lane Comics, in downtown Wilmington, N.C. April 27, 2022. Davis is a regular and has displayed his work there for years.

"Black Lives Do Matter" installation by Wilmington artist Greyson Davis/Haji P/HP Fangs, along North Third Street by the Isabel Holmes Bridge.

A billboard featuring the work of Wilmington artist HP Fangs, aka Haji P, aka Greyson Davis.

Wilmington artist HP Fangs/Haji Pajamas/Greyson Davis at Memory Lane Comics, in downtown Wilmington, N.C. April 27, 2022. Davis is a regular and has displayed his work there for years.

Caricature of Calvin and Hobbes by Wilmington artist Greyson Davis/Haji P/HP Fangs, who's a big fan of '80 and '90s pop culture.

Painting by Wilmington artist Greyson Davis/Haji P/HP Fangs.

Tracy Shedd ft. James Sardone: Going Somewhere

[Repost from Blood Makes Noise; by Sam Lowry, April 29, 2022]

After reviewing Fort Lowell Records band Lauds I was caught somewhat off guard by this track because it way more Americana and folk inspired. Fort Lowell does a great job of keeping a diverse roster that still has this common thread behind their bands. This has a Phoebe Bridgers vibe but with hints of bands like Lush or The Sundays. The vocal reminds me a little bit of Liz Phair as it’s a lower register and has this smoky quality to it. If you told me this was a new folky Liz Phair track I’d believe you because it does have some quality that harkens back to the 90’s but as well is very in line with what is going on in the dream pop / indie pop world right now. Great track, looking forward to a full record.

Fort Lowell Records · Tracy Shedd "Going Somewhere"

Let's Dance, again!

Did you know that Fort Lowell Records has our very own DJ Dance Night here in Wilmington, North Carolina? Well, we do!  It's called Let's Dance, and we host it at various venues throughout the Port City, but mainly at The Opera Room or Satellite Bar & Lounge; spinning Indie, Alternative, and Underground music on vinyl record... and only vinyl, of course! 🤠

There are Instagram and Twitter accounts to follow where we post songs that we spin at Let's Dance to promote our dance nights.  In addition, there is a Spotify Playlist which compiles those same songs posted or social media into a playlist you can enjoy at home.  The best part is, our Let's Dance Spotify Playlist now exceeds 24-hours of total music, and we will keeping adding more music to the playlist as we continue to promote more events. 📻

Now, regarding you gettin' on' the dance floor, join us tonight -- Friday, April 29th -- for Let's Dance at Satellite Bar & Lounge as we celebrate International Dance Day! 💃🕺

UNC students and alumni play in local indie rock band

[Repost from The Daily Tar Heel; by Holly Adams, April 26, 2022]

Members of Lauds, an indie-rock band from Wilmington, share a love of music, their hometown and UNC basketball.

When the release show for their  EP "II" was scheduled for the same night as the men's basketball Final Four game between UNC and Duke, lead singer, guitarist and UNC Class of 2011 alumnus McKay Glasgow, said the band was too anxious to watch the game. 

“So, we played the show and immediately sprinted across the street to this shack oyster bar to watch the last 10 minutes of the second half,” lead guitarist and UNC Class of 2021 alumnus of the graduate school Holt Evans III said. “The guys in the band are already some of my best friends and to have that moment with them and watch the game was so much fun– high-fiving each other, screaming.”

With the beat of the drums and the strum of a guitar, the band released their first single in 2019 and plans to return to their Chapel Hill roots. 

Holt Evan III's younger brother, UNC senior Boyce Evans, plays keyboard and third guitar. Bassist Gavin Campbell and drummer Ross Page are also members of the band. 

While subgenres like “dream pop”, “shoegaze post-punk” and “jangle pop” have been used to describe Lauds’ music, they call themselves simply “guitar music,” Holt Evans III said.

Inspired by late 1980s and early 1990s rock from the United Kingdom, as well as Krautrock from the 1970s, Holt Evans III said Laud's sound is similar to bands like My Bloody Valentine and The Cure. 

“(Our sound) is catchy — it doesn’t rock too hard but it finds a nice middle ground in between rock and pop,” Boyce Evans said. 

The band, who released two EPs in the last year, is currently in the works of writing and producing their first studio album. They work with Fort Lowell Records, a Wilmington-based indie-rock record label. 

James Tritten, who owns Fort Lowell records with his wife Tracy, said he started working with Lauds after their song “Don’t Mind” featured on the Fort Lowell produced album called “Grow: A Compilation in Solidarity with Black Lives Matter,” which was released as a 2020 fundraiser. The band has continued to elevate its talent and skills following each release.  

“Everything they ever do – I just think it's been absolutely amazing, just stellar,” he said. “And it just gets better. Every release they put out I'm always taken aback by how wonderful it is.”

The band said they feel connected to Wilmington through music.

“It being a really beautiful place by the ocean really factors into a feeling we put into a lot of our music,” Holt Evans III said. “McKay and I surf a lot. We spend a lot of time on the water, so that’s a really nice place to contemplate life, a lot of our songs are similarly contemplative.”

Glasgow wrote the song “Sandpiper” from their debut EP inspired by walks on his dock in the area where he grew up, and the sounds of sandpiper birds that are native to Wilmington.  

“That song’s sort of about remembering and coming back to a place that you know really well,” Glasgow said. “There's even kind of ambient noise of the dock.”

Outside of music, being current and former UNC students and watching Tar Heel basketball have brought the band even closer. 

“It’s definitely something that unites all of us outside of the music,” Holt Evans III said. “I think that it’s so important for bands to have relationships outside of music and I think that it factors into a sense of kinship and brotherhood.”

Holt Evans III said his dad — Holt Evans II — serves like the band’s dad as well, helping them record in his house with his collection of old-school recording technology.

“My role is just trying to get the best-recorded versions of their songs and occasionally have some input into their arrangements,” Holt II said. “Obviously I'm prejudiced, but I haven't heard anybody around here doing what they're doing.”

Lauds hopes to continue to grow and be able to play at larger venues across the state. 

“I mean, it's an obvious brotherhood between them,” Tritten said. “It's a beautiful thing to watch.”

Lauds is a Wilmington-based indie rock band featuring UNC students and alums. Photo courtesy of Mary Hannah.

Luz de Vida Record Release Party // Fort Lowell Records Showcase

Tucson, Arizona -- Saturday, May 21st -- iHeartRadio and Zia Records presents Luz de Vida: A Benefit Concert for Survivors of Trauma at Hotel Congress; the second official Record Release Party for Luz de Vida II: A Compilation to Benefit Homicide Survivors, featuring a Fort Lowell Records Showcase.

Luz de Vida – Spanish for Light of Life – is an expression of community, love, healing, grace and hope, a positive response from Tucson musicians and national artists. The original Luz de Vida project began in the days after the Jan. 8, 2011 shooting that took the lives of six people and injured 19 others, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, and shook the Tucson community and nation.

For the 10th anniversary of the tragedy, members of the original Luz de Vida production team partnered with Homicide Survivors, Inc. to release a second compilation record, featuring Tucson and national artists and released on Fort Lowell Records.

Join us Saturday, May 21, 2022 to celebrate the official album release of Luz de Vida II along with Homicide Survivors, Inc. and Fort Lowell Records. The concert will include featured artists from Luz de Vida II – Tracy Shedd, Soda Sun, and Gabriel Naïm Amor – along with other Fort Lowell Records recording artists such as La Cerca, Young Mothers, and newcomers from Phoenix AZ: KITIMOTO and JPW.

PURCHASE CONCERT TICKETS HERE

Tracy Shedd; Photo by Scott Madgett

Soda Sun

Gabriel Naïm Amor

La Cerca; Photo by Andrew Berg

KITIMOTO

Young Mothers

JPW; Photo by Trevor Novatin

Thank you, Wilmington NC

Friday night’s Record Release Party for This Water is Life, Vol. I with MindsOne and James Sardone was simply amazing! The record is seriously almost SOLD OUT already, so be sure stop by your local record store today here in Wilmington NC to pick up a copy, or CLICK HERE now to have one shipped to you directly; that is if we have any left. 

Thanks again to everyone involved, WE LOVE YOU!

'This Water Is Life' music event, plus 17 things to do for Wilmington's Earth Day weekend

[Repost from StarNews Online; by John Staton, April 21, 2022]

It seems like the weekends in Wilmington are only getting busier, and with so many worthwhile events, the only bad thing is having to make some tough choices. It's a good problem to have, because the 18 events listed here are only a fraction of what's going on. 

Speaking of tough choices, recently I've been starting off this list each week with a featured event. This week it's an album release show that combines local music, photography and advocacy for the environment. 

'This Water Is Life'

Wilmington's arts community, and its natural beauty, are two of the area's defining qualities, and big reasons why everyone keeps moving here. 

But rarely has a project connected the things that makes Wilmington special, and done it in such a meaningful way, as "This Water Is Life." The new double EP from locally based Fort Lowell Records comes out Friday and is timed to Earth Day. It will be the first in a series of releases that not only highlight Wilmington indie rock and hip-hop musicians, but also provide a platform for two groups fighting to protect Wilmington's environment, specifically its threatened waters: Cape Fear River Watch and Coastal Plain Conservation Group.

On Friday, a release concert for "This Water is Life, Vol. 1" will be held at local hotspot Satellite Bar and Lounge on Greenfield Street. The show will feature longtime Wilmington rock songwriter James Sardone and local hip-hop mainstays MindsOne. Sardone has three songs and MindsOne four on "This Water Is Life," which will be released on vinyl and digitally. 

The project is the brainchild of James Tritten, who runs Fort Lowell and is one of the Wilmington music scene's biggest boosters. He said he got the idea after seeing the photographs of Josh Putnam, one of which Tritten used for the album's cover. The photos capture water within the urban Wilmington landscape while also literally reflecting that landscape.

That duality, or mirroring quality, gave Tritten the idea for a "split" EP that would get new work by area musicians into the world while reminding people of the very real challenges facing local waters, including pollution by PFAS chemicals released into the Cape Fear River by the Chemours company near Fayetteville. 

"In a perfect world there would be four to six of these albums a year," Tritten said, almost like a subscription service people could sign up for. 

Fort Lowell, which Tritten started in Arizona, is an indie rock label with a national roster, so Tritten knew that indie rock, in all its many forms, would be part of the equation. But he also wanted to spotlight the strength and depth of Wilmington's hip-hop scene. 

To kick off the series, Tritten went with two acts who've been sustaining Wilmington music lovers for decades.

MindsOne, which includes lyricists and rappers KON Sci and Tronic and beats by Belgian producer DJ Iron, has been around since the early 2000s. They've released multiple albums that have helped define the sound of Wilmington hip-hop while influencing the current generation of artists. 

Their old-school, "boom-bap" style with conscious lyrics is exemplified by the song "Footprints" from "This Water Is Life," which Joe Latterner, who writes and performs under the name KON Sci, said they wrote specifically for the album. The lyrics dwell on footprints both environmental and metaphorical, and especially the legacy that's left for future generations. 

"Environmental concerns, social concerns, that's always been in our wheelhouse," Latterner said, adding that new songs "Phantasy" and "Why So Serious?" show another side of the group that's more playful. 

They'll be performing all three songs from the new release on Friday (the album also includes a remix of "Footprints") and MindsOne has a full-length album coming out later this year. 

Sharing Friday's bill will be a new band from James Sardone, who was a mainstay of the Wilmington scene in the '90s. His punk band Brickbat toured nationally, opening for acts like Jawbox and The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, and his country rock outfit The Burnley Brothers were local favorites as well. 

A move to New York in the late '90s had Sardone hitting the big city right when a rockabilly revival was sweeping the nation, and his Jimmy Nations Combo turned heads in the Big Apple, even earning a write up in the Village Voice. 

Returning to Wilmington a decade ago, Sardone started a new band, Loose Jets, whose edgy glam-rock vibe was a regular presence at local clubs.

"I've always kind of like to change my hat" in terms of the music he plays, Sardone said, and the songs on "This Water Is Life" mark new territory for him: tuneful, deceptively simple pop rockers like "Do This Thing" that sound like they were pulled from some forgotten '80s radio playlist. 

"They're straightforward love songs pretty much," Sardone said, that he wrote for his wife, Stella. He said he's got enough material for a full album he hopes to put out soon.

Tritten said one goal of the "This Water Is Life" series — he's got a few more indie rock/hip-hop pairs lined up but doesn't want to say who just yet — is to get artists' work "on vinyl. So many artists stop at the world of digital, and vinyl is a special thing I know I can offer."

Another goal is for the project to be self-sustaining, where one release pays for the next one until there's a whole bunch more Wilmington music out there, not to mention increased awareness of environmental issues that need addressing.

A perhaps unintended benefit? On Friday, Sardone and the artists of MindsOne, who've done so much for their respective scenes, will meet each other and play on the same bill for the first time. 

Details: 7 p.m. Friday, April 22, at Satellite Bar & Lounge, 120 Greenfield St., Wilmington. Free.