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Nalani & Sarina Spice Up The Bitter End

By Danny Coleman

originally published: 03/25/2015 We play there as often as we can," stated Nalani and Sarina about their musical home "The Bitter End" in New York City. "We had a residency there last year and we try and get back there as much as possible."

Tonight they'll be making good on that statement as they rock the popular Bleeker Street venue yet again with a full band that features "Late Night with David Letterman" bassist Will Lee, Jim Hines, Tom Mandel and "A Great Big World" guitarist Oscar Rodriguez. "We are so excited to play this show! We've got a great band backing us up, we love to play at The Bitter End and we are working on a new EP which we are going to be previewing a little on Wednesday. We are going to be playing a lot of new stuff that nobody has heard yet."

Twin sisters from a central New Jersey town, the ladies bring their "A Game" to every performance; wowing audiences with their talent and unabashed enthusiasm from their opening chords to the final note. Taking a quote from their Facebook page ( https://www.facebook.com/nalanisarinamusic/info?tab=page_info), Nalani sums up their philosophy on performing for an audience well when she says, "We didn't take all those lessons and spend all those hours practicing so we could lip-sync to pre-recorded tracks.”

With that infectious energy comes a guarantee to win over any crowd but these young ladies attribute much of this success to their band mates as well. "Our band is so incredible," they both gushed at once. "We have Will Lee, c'mon! We have Jimmy on drums; we recruited him from Brian Wilson and we have a great working relationship with him. Oscar from A Great Big World and Leni on guitar; great talent and a Leni is a great African pop guitarist!"

"Scattered World" is the new six song EP currently under production and not expected out until the late spring or early summer months. They say that the decision to go the EP route versus a full length disc like their debut "Lessons Learned" was an easy one. "We weren't planning on another album. We just kind of started writing again after seeing a series of live shows; it inspired us. We really didn't want to make another album but as we started getting into it more and writing, we found ourselves going in a new direction."

That direction was a vast departure from not only their first effort but their style as well. "We grabbed the title from a song on our first disc, "Scattered Girl" because these songs are just that; scattered. They are all different yet they work together. They are still pop rock and funk but the difference is more from a lyrical standpoint."

Claiming that they needed to try something different; the duo pulled from unlikely sources and a bit of their own imaginations as they penned the tunes. "The music is definitely our style but the words; well, they are a departure from the usual stuff we write. On this EP we are relying on other people's stories and not writing about our own personal experiences. We even write in the third person; it is a lot different than what we have always done. We have really went out of our comfort zone with this one. We have made things up, changed and embellished some of the stories and yet we find it so freeing. We really enjoyed the process this time and we see it as the sky really is the limit!"

After their show this evening they will maintain a busy performance schedule, work on the EP and continue to be creative as they show no signs of slowing down. "We need to finish the EP," they said with a laugh. "Once that is done, we will play as much as possible to support it. We may release a single and we have a video we are prepping for a June release but we intend to just constantly keep writing too."

 

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Admission is $10 to the 8 p.m. show this evening at the Bitter End which is located at 147 Bleeker Street in NYC. To discover more about Nalani and Sarina please log onto their web site at www.nalanisarina.com .

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Danny Coleman is a veteran musician and writer from central New Jersey. He hosts a weekly radio program entitled “Rock On Radio” airing Sunday evenings at 7:000pm EST on multiple internet radio outlets where he features indie/original bands and solo artists.

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Advertise with New Jersey Stage for $50-$100 per month, click here for info

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