Wrapping up May’s calendar of live music at Penuche’s Ale House, People Skills will take the floor Saturday night.
“Penuche’s is probably one of our favorite places to play,” said guitarist and songwriter Chelsea Paolini, who founded People Skills in 2011.
Paolini added that people seem to go to Penuche’s in search of live music, which leads to a more responsive audience.
“Concord, in general, has a really cool music and arts scene,” Paolini said.
Paolini will be joined by her brother, Andrew Paolini, on drums and Eric Reingold on bass.
In August, People Skills released its third album, Distractions after three years of working on it.
“It was a long time coming,” Paolini said.
The group recorded the album, scrapped it and recorded it again.
Paolini said it’s about the little things in life, necessary and unnecessary, that keep people from what they want to be doing. Those things could be romantic and social relationships, mental illness, addiction, money and working keeping them from say, music, in Paolini’s case.
She explained that she ordered the songs on the album to seem like it was a relationship starting out strong then crumbling.
Chris Hislop of SeacoastOnline.com included the album in his best Seacoast music of 2017 list, with song “Waiting for Life” as a favorite.
People Skill’s next project is to create a music video using a track from Distractions. The group has a Patreon page to crowdsource money for its endeavor; members who donate will have access to exclusive content and gifts.
The trio plays rock with a lot of hyphens in the subgenre. Paolini said sometimes people say they are kind of ’90s rock and ’70s rock. It’s melodic, somewhat psychedelic rock.
She said her guitar-playing was influenced by Phish’s guitarist. After the band reunited when she was 19, she followed them on tour.
“You never know what you’re going to see,” Paolini said of their shows, explaining they never played the same set in a row.
From watching them, she began practicing more and adding more improvisation to her work.
From that aspect, playing with her brother as a bandmate is a benefit.
“I have an advantage because we know each other well and it works out for us,” Paolini said. They have been playing together most of their lives so they are good at improvising.
Plus: “We don’t fight,” she said.
If you miss People Skills on Saturday at Penuche’s, you can also see them perform at the Spotlight Awards in Portsmouth on Tuesday and June 29 in Somersworth at the Teetotaller.