By Brendan Joel Kelley A while back I wrote a column about Violet Wild, the band fronted by former Mink Rebellion singer Bobby Scott and Black Moods guitarist Josh Kennedy, along with drummer Joey Schwegler and bassist Phil Fenix. At the time they’d just completed the band’s first full length…
Apologies for my absence from the blogosphere; prior to the weekend I went on a camping/hiking/swimming trip to Fossil Creek in the Mogollon Rim, and there was no wireless internet up there. Before I left though I went on Thursday night to see my cowboy crony Andy Hersey play his…
I’ve got a friend who showed up at the bar recently with his arm in a sling and stitches on his chin from an ass-whippin’. I asked him if he’d deserved it, and he said he didn’t think so. But some dude bigger than him was talking bad about his…
“I really don’t like looking at the back of a record and seeing the word featuring a million times,” says Brooklyn rapper/producer/label overlord El-P. Incidentally, his new album, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead, features cameos from members of the Mars Volta, TV on the Radio, and Yo La Tengo, not…
The difference between a cover band and a tribute band is the difference between a slut and a prostitute — one just plays with all sorts of people’s stuff because it’s fun and they like it. The other plays with particular people’s stuff only because it’s a profession with a…
You wouldn’t think a guy who dusted off Artie Shaw’s arrangement of Cole Porter’s classic “Begin the Beguine” — on pedal steel, no less — would say his third release for Bloodshot Records was inspired by the advent of the iPod age. But that’s exactly how Phoenix native Jon Rauhouse…
I don’t ordinarily go in for romantic movies, but I made an exception last night to see Once, the Irish film starring the Frames’ frontman Glen Hansard. The film, which is a musical of sorts, with Hansard writing and performing songs with Czech pianist Marketa Irglova, won the World Cinema…
I never went to the Real Bar a whole lot because, well, the service sucked and the setup for their all ages shows left the drinkers (i.e. the ones spending real money) at a sight line disadvantage when the bands were playing. It’s nice to still have venues around that…
Fun Bobby and his wife Lisa with Tammy Faye Bakker A little more than a year ago, I wrote here about Hollywood Alley-based promoter Fun Bobby Birmingham leaving town with his family for the greener pastures of rural Oregon where he’s been working at the infamous Dante’s bar/venue up there…
About a year ago, a former girlfriend asked me why this town seemed so culture-less. She’s from Los Angeles and is the sort of girl who likes to dress up and go to the ballet. “In L.A., people our age get dressed up and go to the symphony; you’ll see…
The music opens with flowery acoustic guitars double-tracked for a 12-string feel and shimmying with opulent drama, reminiscent of records made in the ’60s by acid-hungry British rockers prowling green country lanes in faux-druidic rituals. After a drawn-out introduction, drum hits recorded backward make way for a chorus of singers…
“I haven’t seen a band with that much intensity in a long time.” That’s what Korn frontman Jonathan Davis had to say last summer about his Family Values tourmates Dir en grey, a versatile quasi-metal Japanese band that has met with baffling success in Europe and, more recently, the United…
In the suburbs outside Detroit during 1994 and 1995 — the years I followed horror-rap duo Insane Clown Posse’s rise to local infamy — there was, I now realize, nothing more uncool than an ICP fan. In any parking lot, in any neighborhood that wasn’t actually in Detroit, you could…
Yesterday was yours truly’s birthday, so it almost seems like a late present that one of my favorite bands, Bright Eyes, is playing tonight at the Marquee. I’ll be there to rock; meanwhile, this is one of their dopest videos (and birthday related)…..
I mentioned earlier today that I at first suspected What Laura Says Thinks and Feels was an emo band because of the name (I was wrong on that one). Then I was working on a column that references North Side Kings, and I remembered this video from a while back…
In case you haven’t heard already, we’ve abandoned the New Times Music Festival of the past in favor of a summer-long series of shows featuring the nominated bands in each category all playing together at one venue on one night with a national headliner for each. We’re calling it Summer…
Perhaps it’s unfair to pick on bands for choosing silly names (like I did with the boys in An Aesthetic here a while back), but sometimes the words just beg for it. Like with What Laura Says Thinks and Feels, which I assumed was an emo band (because of the…
By now, you’d think Silversun Pickups frontman Brian Aubert would be ready to slap the next critic he catches comparing the shimmering splendor of Silversun Pickups’ fuzz-a-delic breakthrough Carnavas to Smashing Pumpkins. There’s clearly more to Carnavas than a recurring Siamese Dream. And you’ll find none of Billy Corgan’s more…
Introducing tonight’s bachelors in no particular order: One is a don in the Puerto Rican Costa Nostra. The second is a rap star who likes to call himself The Snowman. Our final bachelor is proud of his resemblance to his daddy and always rolls with cash money. Why should I…
Since this Saturday is Cinco de Mayo, a totally cracker-ass holiday which happens to cause bands to play in excess all in the same day, I’m pimping some of this weekend’s shows early. Friday night, if I’m not at the Ghostlife show, then I’ll be checking out the Earps’ CD…
It’s pretty goddamn rare that when I get a random local CD with only my name printed on a white slip-sleeve and a flyer for an upcoming show in it that the band’s any good. Actually, sometimes it’s rare that the disc will get more than thirty seconds of playing…
I hadn’t heard from my old pal Marshall “Fucking” Beck in a while, so I was pleasantly surprised to find a comment on my Myspace page from him today. Apparently his old band Rebirth is releasing a CD soon (he’s got a band called Reign of Vengeance these days). Here’s…
