Had relations been warmer between him and Warner Bros., we might still be on a first-name basis with the Artist Formerly Known As Prince. He’s made no secret of his disdain for the terms of his recording contract, to the point of shaving his facial hair so it spelled out…
Neil Young & Crazy Horse Broken Arrow (Reprise) Among the phrases you least want to hear from a musician, “Hey, let’s jam” ranks down there with “So, she’s your sister, huh?” and “Don’t worry, it’s not loaded.” But at least ol’ Neil isn’t shooting blanks in the gee-tar department for…
One summer day A.D. 525, a Buddhist monk from India named Ta Mo arrived at the base of Mount Shaoshi in what would later become the Henan province of central China. He took in the scenery, thought or said something to the effect of “This is the place,” and promptly…
It is a Midsummer Night’s Eve in a wooded glen somewhere in the wilds of Finland. The chill blue sky is full of cumulus clouds, the air is ringing with the music of Bad Religion, and I am surrounded by thousands of comatose Finnish kids in an alcoholic stupor. Today–18…
Who would have thought Elwood Blues would bring us the premier hip-hop tour of the summer and, so far, the decade? Dan Aykroyd’s House of Blues–the juke-joint-themed chain-restaurant-and-music venue he established in 1992 with Hard Rock Cafe founder Isaac Tigrett–is the sponsor behind the 33-city, multiact Smokin’ Grooves Tour. The…
Soul Coughing Irresistible Bliss (Slash/Warner Bros.) An East Coast slang term for vomiting, Soul Coughing serves well as a name for this 3-year-old NYC quartet that ingests, digests, then regurgitates a stylistic stew of rock, jazz, ambient and spoken word. That all the chunks so often coagulate into a satisfying…
godheadSilo is a highly subversive experimental noise-punk duo whose base of operations is Olympia, Washington. Known audio terrorist activities include use of unnaturally low bass frequencies rendered at brutal volume. S.O.S. field operative reports indicate this group is a clear and present danger to high-fidelity stereophonic equipment (or lo-fi, for…
Here’s what you’ve already been told about the H.O.R.D.E. festival: That it’s the hippie Lollapalooza. That it’s something for Deadheads to follow around this summer now that Jerry’s gone. That it’s an acronym for “Horizons of Rock Developing Everywhere” (though “Hippies on Recreational Drugs Everywhere” might be more accurate). That…
Skinheads in a mosh pit are like barracudas in a swimming pool–they ruin all the fun, and if you see them coming, the wise move is to hop your ass out of there pronto. I knew better than to stick around when I saw a pack of skins pop from…
The Grifters Ain’t My Lookout (Sub Pop) Too often I’ll forget a CD in my portable player until I go to put in another disc miles from home. Without the proper jewel on hand, I stash the stray disc in another case for safekeeping. Because of this unsavory practice, it…
“I think the alternative scene is disgusting,” says Pantera drummer Vinnie Paul on the eve of his band’s new world tour. “I don’t know how these bands can feel good about robbing a dead man’s grave. To me, every one of them sounds like fucking Nirvana.” Like its music, Pantera’s…
Beck Odelay (DGC) What happens when a white guy from downtown L.A. starts hanging with kitschy Caucasians in Silver Lake? Does he lose his sense of hippity-hop? Does his swagger turn to slack? Does he even know who he is at the end of the day? When the white guy…
Patti Smith Gone Again (Arista) When Patti Smith sang “Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine” to open the first song on her first album, 1975’s Horses, she was an emerging icon, a rail-thin protopunk thumbing her nose at the heavens, daring the nearest deity to leave her alone…
Suicide Kings’ two front men look like the kind of guys your daddy warned you not to play poker with. Clad in timeworn cowboy shirts, scuffed, pointy boots and skinny-legged jeans, Bruce Cannole and Dick Taylor stick lit cigarettes in the necks of their guitars and get down to business…
“I’m stripping it down,” says Laurie Anderson from her Manhattan studio. “I’m going to be the avant-garde of the technological backlash.” Anderson speaks of her new live performance piece, “The Speed of Darkness,” a program of songs and storytelling she is about to take on a minitour of Western cities…
I didn’t have a very patriotic Fourth of July. I burned most of the morning on a quest for a smut video and the rest of the day flaying my ears with punk rock and dodging skateboards. Let me explain. About a month ago, publicists in L.A. started asking if…
The Kelley Deal 6000 Go to the Sugar Altar (Nice Records) There are roughly two kinds of identical twins in the world: Those content to live life as a unit (and perhaps star in Doublemint commercials), and those who separate to carve out their own spaces in the world–an often-painful…
This year of our Lord is just more than half gone, and what does American pop music have to show for it? The Fugees, a superb second effort from Porno for Pyros and the return of Patti Smith. Those are the only three standouts in my “pro” column. Under “so-so,”…
Imperial Drag Imperial Drag (Work/Sony) Yet another Jellyfish offshoot, Imperial Drag sounds like it was shipwrecked on a desert island starting in 1970, and the only things that washed ashore for the next five years were cheesy K-Tel albums. This self-titled debut offers a skewered view of Led Zeppelin and…
Revolver Goes to Court One clear thought goes through my head the night of April 30 as I watch three beef cakes in Gibson’s security shirts encircle a scared, scrawny kid pinned against a light pole. And that thought is This is a bunch of bullshit. Five minutes earlier, Chris…
The Entertainment Monitor covers the entire country, but so far only two Valley bands have made the grade. The Meat Puppets were awarded a measly “D” for references to amphetamines, but dig the special editor’s note about No Joke: “Many of the songs do not tell concrete stories and many…
In 1968, Johnny Cash’s Live At San Quentin cut “A Boy Named Sue” became the first song in Top 40 history to have a cuss word (bitch) bleeped out on the air. Fair enough–while bad words go over big with shackled audiences, no one expected the Man in Black to…
