Hi friends! I am so excited to start blogging for KCR Radio. Every Wednesday I will blog about either bands that have their roots planted in San Diego, or about bands that are making their way through San Diego on their tour – it’s my neighborhood jams! If you have any suggestions for local bands, let me know! Also, listen for me every Sunday afternoon at 2:00p.m. on KCR College Radio where I will be playing classic rock and highlighting my featured band of the week.

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In this week’s Neighborhood Jams, I am featuring the San Diegan band – Ocelot! They are a group of five groovy cats whose sound is a mash-up of psych rock, blues rock, and garage rock – it definitely brought me to the 60’s hanging out with friends in a garage on a Friday night. My feeling comes from the fact that their songs strongly spotlight long instrumental breaks that never seem too long. Bassist, Kyre Wilcox, and drummer, Andrew Ware, seem to have a strong connection, especially in their song, The Gardens right before guitarist, James Upton, shreds. Ocelot has been known to rock out at the Belly Up in Solana Beach, and The Office Bar in North Park. Stephanie Brown is the vocalist, and she writes all the lyrics – something I truly treasure and admire in the music world. Brown’s lyrics are not only hauntingly beautiful but deeply melancholic, and she also plays the harmonica which is featured in the beginning of Ocelot’s song, Jokes Like These. Another really cool thing about this band is that they have a keyboardist – Evan Wenskay. Some of his best work, personally, was featured in the song 9 Lives. Together these five musicians make up Ocelot, and their songs come together perfectly.

Ocelot has a great sound – a sound that is not very common in today’s day and age. They truly know how to captivate their audience with their psychedelic songs showing off just how truly great musicians they each are. The band is working on their EP and have high hopes of finishing it up at the end of the year – just in time for a tour that’ll expand to Los Angeles, Seattle, and maybe even Portland.

I wish you the best of luck, Ocelot, and I can’t wait to hear your upcoming EP. Look for me in the front row at your next show, because you just gained a big, big fan!

 

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Photo Credit: http://diofest.com/ocelot/and Stephanie Brown.

Apologies for using an old photo, Ocelot.