Listings are valuable for discovering what's happening around the city, and Philadelphia has no shortage of them. In fact, there might be too many—most sharing similar information, some contradicting each other. Many are also limited by what concert promoters actually want to share, especially when they're trying to keep DIY events under the radar.

Then there's the internet and all its complexity. Social media algorithms, tags, and discovery tools can help or hinder efforts to share information, all while competing for people's shrinking attention spans.

It's easy to miss something cool when you're squinting at an illegible show poster on your phone screen, or to tune out entirely when there's basically no real information about the bands. And let's be honest, anyone booking a show has a vested interest in overselling it.

This is where we come in. We're here to help you cut through the noise and figure out what's actually fun. We believe that writing about music matters, especially what's happening locally, because that's essential to our creative survival. It's also something that's been decimated over the past 20 years most notably by the closure of our city's alternative weekly circuit.

While we're not a music alternative weekly (not yet—a girl can dream), the best part of that era was running to the newspaper box on Thursday mornings for a fresh copy to see what was highlighted. We'd like to think Sound Advice fills the gap between scanning listings and checking flyers on coffee shop walls.

(The name comes from the previews section of the now-defunct Philadelphia City Paper, where I was a contributor in the early 2000s. If you have a problem with this repurposing, we can settle it the appropriate way: a knife fight under the Gray's Ferry Bridge.)

Ultimately the goal here is that we want you to get out and see some music. And if you can't make it out to a show, we hope this newsletter turns you on to some new music, or at the barest of minimums, make you feel like you're still tapped into what's going on these days.

Publishing Schedule

When the stars are aligned with the seventh house, Sound Advice is published on a weekly basis. Otherwise it's every other week or whatever timeframe we want. The email's subject will reflect the timespan of what we're covering. We also take regularly scheduled breaks as follows:

• December 15–January 15: Your band will never be better than the Wanamaker Light Show.
• August 1–August 30: We are painfully Italian and believe it should be a crime to do anything except sit in a lounge chair al mare with an Estathé in hand during this month.

We also take unscheduled breaks because sometimes that's needed too. We are not here to grind (except maybe an ax when it comes to bands who play too many shows too often).

Your Cruise Ship Director

Maria T (she/her) has been an active participant/annoying presence in the Philadelphia's music community for 20 years as a musician, photographer, booker, on-air radio host at WPRB, and aforementioned City Paper contributor while somehow managing to hold down a day job at the same time. You can visit her online at herjazz.org, which also happens to be Philadelphia's oldest music blog (even if she isn't updating on the reg). She plays music under the wildly creative name Maria T and released her first record, Afternoon Destroyer, in 2022.

Contact Info

Send tips, hot goss, and soup recipes to hi@soundadvicephl.com. We enjoy reader mail immensely.

Now, here's where it gets awkward: We really don't want unsolicited pitches or to be added to your promo list. Mostly because we don't want them clogging up the inbox, but also because we're not that interested in that aspect of "the biz."

That said, we do want to know about shows. Sound Advice reviews ~40 sources, including venue/promoter calendars, listing sites, aggregators, social media and more but things fall through the cracks. If you've got something with an obvious music focus (event, reading, film screening, talk, workshop, etc.) that you'd like on our radar, please use the form below.

Submissions are due Tuesdays by 5 PM ET. Submitting an event does not guarantee inclusion in the newsletter, but it puts it where we can see it.

If you're a venue or promoter looking to send us listings all at once, reach out by email to discuss getting set up with our bulk .csv template (or if you're nasty, a REST API).