It’s always a bummer to see a crucial member of a great band move on. This weekend, local fuzz-rockers Radar Eyes will say farewell to drummer and founding member Shelley Zawadzki. The split comes on good terms—Zawadzki is a brand-new mom, and it turns out that juggling parenting and punk rock isn’t the easiest thing in the world. Zawadzki and singer/guitarists Anthony Cozzi and Nathan Lueking formed Radar Eyes in late 2007, and their melodic blend of shoegaze, psych, and garage immediately caught the city’s attention, with their first official full-length eventually coming out on HoZac Records in early 2012. After six years of drumming in the band, which is like an eon in punk years, Zawadzki will be playing her final show with Radar Eyes on Sat 9/14 at 8 PM (I can’t post the DIY venue’s info here, but the event is easily Googleable). San Francisco’s Wrong Words (Trouble in Mind Records) will be headlining the show.
What does the future hold for Radar Eyes? Cozzi tells me that the drum throne will be taken over by Nithin Kalvakota, who plays bass in Marnie Stern‘s band. He filled in for Zawadzki on a handful of shows while she was pregnant. The new lineup of the band, which at this point also includes guitarist Russ Calderwood and bassist Lucas Sikorski, has a new record in the works, which is slated to drop on HoZac in March of next year.