This is Versailles

Chicago post-punkers This is Versailles have released a new video for their track "Robot Beach." The song comes from the band's debut self-titled EP and is vibrant and melodic. Bassist Caitlin Garibaldi takes on lead vocals as Jaisen Ehas gives his hardcore screams a rest, but the song maintains its raucous energy. Also, you just gotta love the disorganized, xylophone-fueled coda at the end. - LOUDLOOPPRESS.COM

Any fan of noisy, Chicago-brewed rock and roll will want to check out the brand new, debut video from This is Versailles. The song is called "Robot Beach" and it's a perfect introduction to the driving post-punk whirlwind that is the band's sound, featuring the instantly ear-grabbing, aggressive yet melodically-appealing vocals of front-woman/bassist Caitlin Garibaldi. - WINDYCITYROCK.NET

Any fan of noisy, Chicago-brewed rock and roll will want to check out the brand new, debut video from This is Versailles. The song is called "Robot Beach" and it's a perfect introduction to the driving post-punk whirlwind that is the band's sound, featuring the instantly ear-grabbing, aggressive yet melodically-appealing vocals of front-woman/bassist Caitlin Garibaldi. - WINDYCITYROCK.NET

Local quartet This is Versailles specializes in a slightly unusual blend of raw, hard-charging rock taking slight cues from alternative nation shoegaze on their eponymous debut. The vocals are urgent and delivered on the cusps of screams mingling between the male and female throats of bassist Caitlin Garibaldi and guitarist Jaisen Ehas. The guitar leads of Neil Yodnane and Ehas are at times roughly scraped out of the guts of their instruments, and at other times they're coaxed out in lines of reverbed adrenaline driven ahead of the force of John Rungger's drumming. As the EP goes on, later songs allow the band to display a bit of their grasp of conventional melody; but, honestly, it's when they're reaching into the malestrom that their sound is best. - CHICAGOIST.COM

Also on tonight's bill are locals This is Versailles. Their brand of urgent post-punk is especially delicious as the shrieks often give way to the melodic vocals of bassist Caitlin Garibaldi. This combo makes for some sweet sounds, and I'm sure we'll be hearing more about this band sooner than later. - LOUDLOOPPRESS.COM

Tonight it's raining and I'm sloshing through puddles on the way to Beat Kitchen in Chicago to check out This Is Versailles. I sit in my car outside of the venue and wait until a "cool time" to arrive, which I clock at being about fifteen minutes later than it is now. I'm never late. I'm nerd-early because I'm a journalist, and as veteran rock critic Lester Bangs tells young William Miller in the film Almost Famous, journalists are "uncool."

Even the hot lesbian ones.

I sneak inside and lean against the grimy wall in a way that I hope makes me look thin. Onstage and running through a pretty intense soundcheck are three dudes and Caitlin Garibaldi. "That's the kind of band that I wanted to be in," she maintains. "A band with people who don't let gender get in the way of the way a band should be." The fact that she looks like the biologically engineered progeny of Angelina Jolie (Hackers era) and Keira Knightley, is just beside the point. It's all about the music, which in this case is a loud, raucous, occasionally melodic brand of nu-gaze punctuated by grandiose guitar noise and infectious beats.

"Hi," calls Garibaldi from someplace on high. The band uses their own signature fluorescent stage lights which blind the audience. I cannot see her, but I know that she can see me.

"Just lurking," I answer, taking full advantage of an awkward moment.

She giggles. "Everyone does that sometimes."

They jump down from the stage for a smoke break. Outside, the band's other lead singer and guitarist, Jaisen Ehas drapes a large and protective arm around Garibaldi. He calls everyone buddy and delights in David Lee Roth impersonations and reenactments of video from Funny or Die. The two other members, drummer John Rungger and guitarist Neil Yodnane are subdued, declining to compete with the bluster of Ehas or the beauty of Garibaldi.

"One of the complicated things about being in a band is the issue of gender and the sexual tension thing and I'm queer so I guess I didn't expect that to be a part of it," confides Garibaldi in a rare candid moment. "I guess I thought that, you know, you're one of the boys, but then you fall for someone and that's kind of out of your control."

As a bass player, she has become used to going against the grain. "I really like the whole idea of a counter-melody. Something that, really, if there's a push-pull in the music, it's always the pull. Kind of a little bit against what the main rhythmic and melody strain of the song is. That's what I believe."

And belief is what it takes to pick up a four-string, drink a PBR or five and rock a club on a weeknight. These are the bands that work their asses off to earn every bit of the five bucks it costs to see them. Only time will tell if Caitlin Garibaldi and the boys of This Is Versailles convert the masses or hang up their shoes for good. The world is waiting.

- M WB - CURVE Magazine

On This Is Versailles’ MySpace page, the local quartet boasts that “the lovely lacquer hides the deep rot.” But judging from tracks like “Risk Taker” and “I Say Judas,” it’s all dry rot. “I Say Judas” finds dual singer/shouters Caitlin Garibaldi (bass) and Jaisen Ehas (guitar) snarling, screaming and barking their words as the music rumbles through like a metallic twister. The gloriously unvarnished “Gold Pills” continues the havoc, the crew locking into an angular, post-punk throwdown that’s liable to start a small riot on the dance floor. Grab some scuzzy shoes (and earplugs) and be ready to join the fray.

- AD - CHICAGO TRIBUNE

Combining baroque beats, insistent bass lines and layers of confident and apocalyptic guitar tones, This is Versailles is a constantly fluctuating curtain of angular noise, lush reverberation and swerving echoes. They emerge with a seething menace that’s both alluring and infectious.

- MS - stateofman.org

Chicago indie that takes the art of yelping to intense new levels. - REDEYE/metromix.com

This is dancey. This is screamy. This is noisey. This is nicey. This is Versailles. Party with it - mpshows.com

Local quartet THIS IS VERSAILLES brings their combination of post-punk and contemporary dance-rock to the Empty Bottle tonight. Wielding pop songs with a scream and a snarl over loudly atmospheric guitars creating a prickly curtain of noise. With a raw, unhinged and ardent energy, their dueling vocals growl over maniacally lurid guitars creating apocalyptic post-punk with a killer light show to boot. - emptybottle.com