Unlike soccer and vuvuzelas, guitars and baseball don’t necessarily go together. But when you’re talking about two institutions as American as the Fender Stratocaster and Major League Baseball, the alignment seems a little more warranted. Such is the case with the new MLB-approved line of Fender Strats that the company…

The Technicolors, Kitten, Pinback and The Neighbourhood Viva PHX’s Central Avenue Stage at Cityscape 3/8/14 While it was expected to be one of the most diverse lineups of any stage at Friday night’s Viva Phoenix Festival, the CityScape main stage offered up rock performance after rock performance. Local darlings The…

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Like a good watch, beautiful machines require intricate movements and many parts to work right. Kan Wakan, the grandiose and dark pop act that’s fronted by vocalist Kristianne Bautista with composer Gueorgui Linev and guitarist Peter Potyondy at its production core, is such a finely tuned act. With a sound…

Time can be unkind to indie’s progenitors. Bands either burn out or fade away, eclipsed by the newest trend with careers measured in years rather than decades. Pinback, the Southern California forerunner of both indie rock and the home recording movement, is an exception to such aging, keeping true to…

Some of the best things in life are misunderstood by most, and even better things are often worth waiting for. Such is the case for Los Angeles’ In the Valley Below, a duo consisting of vocalists/instrumentalists Jeffrey Jacob and Angela Gail, whose success with their thumping, melodic hit “Peaches” last…

Being labeled as a genre’s pioneer can be an exhausting role, sometimes allowing these once forward-thinking musicians an opportunity to rest on their laurels. For Blake Miller, the frontman and lynchpin to Los Angeles’ dance-punk act Moving Units, rest isn’t an option. Not just content with working under Moving Units’…

Music journalism is rife with writers quick to say that a band “defies all conventions” or “breaks the mold.” It’s rarely the case, but sometimes an act comes along that’s worthy of the sensational labels. YACHT, a dance-pop duo from Los Angeles via Portland, is the act in question, having…

Sometimes tension is a necessary tool in the creative process, and other routes must be taken reach a goal. Such is the case for Painted Palms, the San Francisco-based electro-pop act composed of cousins Reese Donohue and Christopher Prudhomme, whose late-night emailings of clips and samples has yielding something much…

Ramona Gonzalez is simply a musical paradox. Operating under the moniker Nite Jewel, the Echo Park-based musician weaves synth-driven pop that’s as much a product of the Casiotone era as it is ’90s R&B. Where one might expect instrumentation to be lo-fi, Gonzalez shines such production to a polish, layering…