Hotel Cafe | Music Junkie Press

CONCERT REVIEW: Static and Surrender ‘Electrifies’ @ Hollywood’s Hotel Café

July 17, 2018

Written by Jessica Klausing Bay area rockers Static and Surrender are on tour throughout California in honor of their debut album release. Their energetic riffs and rhythms are on par with the alternative superstar acts such as Lifehouse and Matchbox Twenty. Jeff Campbell (lead vocals, guitar) backed by John Schuman (drums), Adam Schuman (guitar, vocals), and Lauren Stockner (bass player) delivered a passionate performance at Hollywood’s Hotel Café. Jeff Campbell puts his heart into each song and it certainly shows. He kept the set running smoothly and without interruption for the majority of the night. Opening up with “Killing The Vibe” Campbell belts a powerful vocal delivery that commands the attention in a room while his band mates exerted lighting-in-a-bottle energy around the small stage with ease. With such a strong reaction from the crowd, the level of energy and intensity only grew with each song. The next song, “If Only We Could Sleep” was no exception. John Schuman pounded the drums as if his very life depended on it! His intensity was so great, [Read More]

Athena returns to her American beginning, Hotel Café, a star.

February 6, 2017

Patrick O’Heffernan (Hollywood) Just about two and half years ago I wandered into Hollywood’s Hotel Café and joined a sparse early audience. A young woman in torn shorts, old t-shirt and flip flops came on stage, obviously nervous but occasionally able to flash an impressive high wattage smile as she introduced herself as part Greek, part British and newly arrived from London. Then she sang, and I knew this was no ordinary talent. This woman –Athena, after the Greek virgin Goddess of the arts – was far more than the underdressed waif grasping the micstand in front of me. Athena was a star in the making. This week she was back at the Hotel Café. The high powered smile was still there, but in place of the shorts and t-shirt and flip flops was a silver lamé sheath and knee-touching high-heeled fashion-forward boots. However, more than the costume change, it was the musical change that was most impressive. Athena rolled out the songs on her debut USA album, Ready for the Sun, [Read More]

Maggie Szabo ups her game at the Hotel Cafe by Patrick O’Heffernan

November 9, 2014

With her brilliant smile, athletic body and mischievous eyes, the diminutive Maggie Szabo put on a show Friday night at LA’s premier showcase club this Friday that topped even her high-energy performance record. Nobody sat still as she rocked through 11 songs – mostly new material including the new, soon-to-be-a-hit “Paralyze”, along with favorites like “Sweetest Heartache” and the solid pop-anthem, “Slow Fire”. Having seen her live four times, I could tell that there has been both a creative burst and a lot of hard work in her career since I started following her about a year ago. New songs blended smoothly with her audience’s established favorites, making the evening seem like a party with old friends; there were no dissonant notes, no “where is Maggie going?”, questions. It just all worked. Even when she took to the old upright piano in far stage left and shifted mood for “Touch the Ground” and “Take Your Time”, she was on target both as a singer and as a performer. Plus she gave a preview of [Read More]

An audience-pleasing Jack Kovacs debuts “The State Line” at Hotel Café by Patrick O’Heffernan

October 23, 2014

Hollywood. You come to a live show to get something extra you don’t get by listening to an album. Jack Kovacs gave that something extra to us Saturday night at the Hotel Café, he gave us himself, in words, music and conversation. Billed as an EP release party, Kovac’s appearance Saturday night was less of a party and more of a gathering of friends as he debuted his new EP, “The State Line”. The crowd was tight and intimate at the storied venue, relishing his music and his just darn plain friendliness. In a world in which many performers are uncomfortable talking and seem at times to hide behind their music, Kovacs was not only comfortable conversing but in his wheelhouse. He obviously loves people and we loved him. Kovacs and his six person band took us on a melodic and introspective look into the mind of a young songwriter just beginning to discover his power. He has learned to inhabit the in-between spaces that separate public musical expression from internal contemplation. The result on [Read More]

Juliette Ashby at the Hotel Café. The beginning of a love affair with America by Patrick O’Heffernan

August 24, 2014

Hollywood. Patrick O’Heffernan. Juliette Ashby was in constant motion. Her hands, her arms, her body all swayed and circled and pointed and touched as she sang, hypnotizing us, drawing us in, capturing us in the heart inside her bare chest. Tall, beautiful and confident, yet down-to-earth, Ashby took the stage Friday night at the Hotel Café in Hollywood and looked over the packed room with a smile of satisfaction and greeting. Statuesque in skin tight black toreador pants and a lime green silk sleeveless blouse open down to her silver belt buckle, seemingly without make up, she radiated not so much sensuality as openness and honesty. The songs she gave us were exactly that – open and honest, and they proved beyond a doubt that she is one of the most talented entertainers on either side of the Atlantic. Ashby is known as a neo-soul, R&B singer-songwriter, but she is so much more. With a high-pitched, almost Jamaican voice that ranges from reggae to soul and R&B, she is simply in a universe by herself. [Read More]

Lena Fayre hushes the Hotel Café with an ethereal, mesmerizing performance by Patrick O’Heffernan

August 3, 2014

Wednesday night in Hollywood at the venerable Hotel Café, usually a slow night with no problem getting a table. Not this Wednesday night. Tables were gone early and the floor was packed as the warmup act, Justin Furstenfeld, wrapped up. The crowd sang with him and applauded enthusiastically, but they were really waiting for a brunet slip if a young woman with an old/young chiseled face and a sensual voice that perfectly matches her undulating body, Lena Fayre. There is a reason Rolling Stone tapped Fayre as one of the “10 new artists you need to know” in its February edition. Although she is only 17, the maturity of her command of lyrics, sound and audiences is that of a woman with a decade of stardom. That maturity was in full display at the Hotel Café, hushing an adorning audience. Onstage in a black sleeveless top, open midriff and muted electric blue tufted pants, Fayre’s voice and body writhed and swayed like a demonic serpent pushing the drugs of emotional, ethereal pop. And we happily [Read More]

Matt Jaffe and the Distractions expand their LA audience at The Federal Bar in NoHo.

July 10, 2014

By Patrick O’Heffernan, Host, Music FridayLive! Matt Jaffe brought his high energy rock band The Distractions to North Hollywood’s Federal last night, energizing a respectable audience and demonstrating that he can play in larger venues in Los Angeles, the nation’s music capital. This was a return trip for the young new wave band, having previously opened for bands at The Central in Santa Monica and the venerable, if smaller, The Mint. The young (he just finished his first year at Yale) northern California-raised guitarist and his band mates drummer Alex Coltharp and bassist Sammie Fischer have mastered the high-spirited sound that he shifted to when he exchanged the acoustic music of his high school days for an electric guitar. With songwriting that shimmers with the best of the hard rock groups in the Southland clubs these days, Matt led his bandmates in nine new songs that showed how he has moved far beyond the slick blend-into-the-background pop music that surrounds us. And his lyrics always give us something to think about. I suspect the audience would [Read More]