{"id":278596,"date":"2026-09-04T02:02:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T02:02:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/278596\/"},"modified":"2026-09-04T02:02:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T02:02:13","slug":"in-philly-armbite-has-room-to-get-weird","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/278596\/","title":{"rendered":"In Philly, armbite Has Room to Get Weird"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s summer in Clark Park, where the open grass is filled with West Philly residents playing chess and relishing in some pleasant weather. Sitting across from me is Harrison Lennertz, lead vocalist and guitarist to the Philly\u2013born, \u201cdawg rock\u201d band armbite<\/a>. In just three years, the group has developed a unique presence in the local music scene\u2014and an equally particular sound. Lennertz, who grew up in the suburbs of Los Angeles before truly engaging in musical collaboration in Haverford, founded the band after discovering Philly\u2019s Do\u2013It\u2013Yourself music scene<\/a>\u2014this exposure, he says, opened up a new world.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t chance and circumstance that brought the three together, says Lennertz, but a shared enthusiasm for the unconventional. While running Haverford\u2019s Federation United Concert Series club, he met eager applicant Marin Duff, now the group\u2019s bassist, and was swept by their passion for the scene. \u201cYou love DIY, you love music, you\u2019re on,\u201d he says. The two were already writing armbite\u2019s first songs when Duff thought to introduce Lennertz to the band\u2019s eventual drummer, their good friend Matt Guardiola, who is next to show face in sunny Clark Park. Guardiola has always had a healthy musical life, from jazz bands to high school choir. Currently, he drums for armbite and four other bands, and runs a concert booking business.\u00a0<\/p>\n

You could say the trio\u2019s meeting was statistically destined; after comparing shockingly similar Spotify Blends, Duff knew an introduction was in order.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMarin introduced me to Harrison because me and Marin did that Spotify blend thing,\u201d recalls Guardiola. \u201cAnd they were like, I only have this close of a match with one other person, and it was Harrison.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

After a quick Remo Drive cover to break the ice, the trio soon realized their musical chemistry.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHarrison was able to communicate what he wanted out of my drum parts, rhythmically, or like, I was able to pull out what I think he wanted,\u201d Guardiola explains. The group soon found something beyond musical chemistry; they found efficiency and process, allowing them the room to experiment.<\/p>\n

Together, Guardiola and Lennertz detail this process from conception to performance, which begins with Lennertz\u2019s appreciation for music theory. Their starting point is often his rhythmically complex, theory\u2013heavy guitar riffs, which are then built upon by Duff\u2019s bass and Guardiola\u2019s drums. As Harrison puts it, \u201cIt\u2019s mostly Matt extrapolating what I want. \u2026 Very few times do I have to specify.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mid\u2013sentence, Lennertz and Guardiola pause to wave at another locally based band, Lahnah<\/a>, putting up posters. What are the chances we would run into another band at a park in the middle of the week? Pretty high in a city like Philly, according to the musicians. \u201cThere\u2019s so much music in Philadelphia, in every aspect and genre you could think of,\u201d says Guardiola. With an abundance of universities, conservatories, and liberal arts colleges, Philadelphia is rampant with musically driven and passionate young people. Guardiola knows this especially well; running a concert\u2013booking company has allowed him to encounter hundreds of eager musicians. \u201cThere\u2019s so much different music and so many people sharing ideas,\u201d he says. \u201cThis place is like a hotbed for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s not just the people who have made Philly the vibrant scene it is; its the cost of living, housing stock, and a relative lack of industry pressure that creates the conditions for bands like armbite to exist in the first place. As LA\u2013native Lennertz can attest, the barrier to entry for DIY music is far higher in cities like LA and New York, where \u201ceveryone who moves there wants to make it big.\u201d Philly has escaped some of that pressure, remaining comparatively affordable and retaining the kind of dense, unpolished residential infrastructure that lends itself well to the scene. Even the city\u2019s abundance of row homes and basements makes someone\u2019s living space the perfect rehearsal space. As Guardiola shares, \u201cAll you need is some shitty equipment and a shitty cement room. That\u2019s what my practice spaces always were: some dingy basement and a $100 drum set.\u201d<\/p>\n

Going forward, the band is moving towards a more experimental sound they describe as\u00a0\u201cless structured\u201d and \u201cmath\u2013adjacent.\u201d While they aren\u2019t diving completely into the genre\u2019s alternative, irregular, and arrhythmic style, they are drawn to its structural freedom. Their earlier sounds drew from the more melodic elements of emo and math rock bands such as Origami Angels<\/a>, Sweet Pill<\/a>, and Remo Drive<\/a>. Lennertz cites the grind\u2013pop of Now, More Charm and More Tender<\/a> by P.E.E<\/a> as significant inspiration and one of his favorite albums.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have a lot of very math themes, a lot of guitar work, dual vocalists, a lot of just non\u2013four\u2013four meters; they just go a lot of places within the sonic palette.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Still, he hopes to maintain the balancing act between a thoroughly composed piece and the catchy, \u201cpoppy\u201d style. \u201cEvery single verse should be a hook\u201d is a writing philosophy Lennertz hopes to embody.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A full U.S. tour is a hope for the band in the distant future; as for the near future, they have set their sights on more live performances in the Northeast. But for now, the band is taking advantage of the vibrant Philly scene and performing in its array of venues. They started playing for passion, and in this city, that\u2019s all you need to keep going.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s summer in Clark Park, where the open grass is filled with West Philly residents playing chess and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":278597,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[69,71,70],"class_list":["post-278596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}