Hotel Mira at the Raccoon Motel -- November 7.
Thursday, November 7, 6 p.m.
Raccoon Motel, 315 East Second Street, Davenport IA
Touring in support of their 2024 EP I Am Not Much Help that Music Arena GH deemed "a beautifully chaotic masterpiece" that "a blend of garage rock, glam-bop ballads, and heartfelt lyrics," the indie talents of Hotel Mira headline a November concert at Davenport's Raccoon Motel, the group also praised by The Pentatonic for "the band’s incredible ability to write alt-pop hits infused with raw, introspective lyricism."
Currently composed of Charlie Kerr on vocals, Mike Noble on bass, Clark Grieve on guitar and keyboards, and Cole George on drums, Hotel Mira's band members were all originally from the Greater Vancouver area. Kerr and co-founding lead guitarist Oliver Mann formed a core project in 2007 while still in high school, with Christopher McClelland joining in 2009 and Graham Serl rounding out the lineup for JPNSGRLS in 2010. JPNSGRLS was nominated for the Sirius XM Canada Independent Music Award for Emerging Artist of the Year (English) in 2015, but the following year, after the recording of their second full-length album Divorce was completed, Mann announced via Facebook that he was leaving the band for other pursuits. A mere two years later, however, Kerr announced via several social media platforms and the band website that the group was simply retiring the name JPNSGRLS and rebranding as Hotel Mira. He also announced a new iteration of the band lineup.
Released in 2018, the eponymous Hotel Mira EP charted largely as a full work. It reached as high as number three in some local market radio via !earshot charts. But it also hit the North American College and Community Chart, debuting at number 92 the week of August 28, 2018, hitting its highest spot the following week at number 56, and staying on that chart for a total of nine weeks. Two years later, Hotel Mira's album Perfectionism debuted. Its song "This Could Be It for Me" stayed on both Mediabase's Alternative and Rock charts and Billboard Canada Rock and Modern Rock airplay charts for 13 weeks – with the initial highest chart position on Billboard at number 22 and on Mediabase at number 17, as of February 23, 2020. The mental-health-struggle themes in the song then seemed to catch the zeitgeist during the COVID-19 pandemic – hitting the top spot of number five on the Billboard Modern Rock chart and number four on the Mediabase chart the week of April 6, 2020 – but then continuing on the charts overall for more than a year after its release. Starting the week of July 13, 2020, both "This Could Be It for Me" and Perfectionism's "Better on Your Own" were on the Billboard Modern Rock charts at the same time – at numbers 20 and 40, respectively – and when 2020 end-of-year Billboard BDS Chart reports came in, "This Could Be It for Me" was the sixth-most-played CanCon Modern Rock Song and the 15th-most-played Overall Rock Song.
Hotel Mira brings their tour to Davenport on November 7 with an additional set by Father Sunn, admission to the 6 p.m. concert is $15.88, and tickets are available by visiting TheRaccoonMotel.com.
