While it might be tempting to overanalyze why this record is released under the given name of Omaha’s favorite sad son instead of his customary Bright Eyes appellation, any such analysis misses the point — which is that Conor Oberst is a deftly written, beautifully performed collection that might finally…

When was the last time you saw a really great keytar-and-drums duo? If you answered “1983” or “never” to this question, it’s time you checked out Shy Child. While drummer Nate Smith pounds his kit with the muscle of John Bonham, the soul of James Brown and the precision of…

Rodrigo Sanchez really wants you to like heavy metal. “Sometimes people don’t even have a minute for metal,” the guitarist notes. “They think it’s too loud, or whatever stupid thing they think.” As one half of Rodrigo y Gabriela — the dynamic Mexican duo who became international world-music superstars with…

On his third album, Mugison has fully embraced his rock-and-roll demons. The award-winning Icelander (born Örn Elías Guðmundsson) sounds like he sold his soul to Robert Johnson, Jimmy Page and the devil on tracks like “The Pathetic Anthem” and “Jesus Is a Good Name to Moan.” Eschewing the glitchy laptop…

The Still City’s emo-inflected rock has taken a giant leap forward. On Light and the Machines, Ryan Murphy’s synth lines are front and center next to Brendan Gann’s percussive bass lines, adding a slight new-wave edge to the songs, while Brandon Roth’s supernaturally kinetic drumming roughens the edges and keeps…

It was the kind of morphine-laden experience where I didn’t realize how bad it was until afterward,” says Achille Lauro frontman Matt Close, relating the story of his 2007 brush with mortality. “I was being more aggressive than I was prepared to be on a bike. I tried to beat…

What do you get when your dad leaves the priesthood and your mom gives up on the nunnery? If you’re Martin Dosh, the answer is: piano lessons. And thank God for that. On his fourth proper album, Wolves and Wishes, the Minneapolis native gracefully transforms his love for ambient electronica,…

In these days of brand-conscious music marketing, it’s no mean feat for an artist to take a left turn and completely reinvent himself. Jamie Lidell, in one of the oddest artistic evolutions ever, took everyone by surprise by successfully transforming himself from IDM whiz kid to neo-soul funkster with 2005’s…

With only two of the eleven tracks on Tokyo Police Club’s brilliant full-length debut crossing the three-minute mark, the Canadian quartet offers the ideal soundtrack for our attention-impaired age. The twitchy dance rock of the group’s much-lauded EP, A Lesson in Crime, has given way to poignantly nervous future pop…

In the world of rap and hip-hop, aliases are de rigueur. When asked, however, most rappers will reveal their given names. Jay-Z is really Shawn Carter. Slick Rick’s mama called him Ricky Walters. It’s a different story for San Francisco underground hero TopR, who rolls into Denver this weekend to…

Dan Craig found time between commitments to medical school and indie-pop juggernauts Hearts of Palm to realize his third full-length album (due to be unveiled at the Oriental Theater this Friday, May 9). Craig makes mellow, innocuous acoustic music that moms just love, with nods to other sweet, sensitive types…

American Music Club should have self-destructed long ago. Formed in 1982, the band released its first album in 1985 and has since seen more than its share of personality conflicts and personnel changes, to say nothing of the very public and much-publicized alcohol-induced tantrums of frontman and songwriter Mark Eitzel…

It might not be the musical equivalent of an assassination, but Sirhan Sirhan brings plenty of violence and aggression to its beer-fueled proto-punk party. With maniacally purring vocals, viciously crunchy guitar, bloodthirsty bass, and drums as sloppy and belligerent as an aging, pot-bellied punker who’s had one too many PBRs,…

When you think of Athens, Georgia, it’s nearly impossible not to hear music. A college town with its own creative ecosystem, the unlikely Southern artistic outpost has churned out a truly remarkable number of great — or at least noteworthy — bands in various genres over the past few decades:…

In the metal world, it seems that everything old is new again. Hundreds of bands are mining the rich ore of melodic British icons like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden and combining it with the sludgy doom of Black Sabbath and Pentagram — with varying degrees of success. Austin’s the…

The wait has definitely been worthwhile for this debut. Widowers spent months painstakingly and passionately recording the eleven-track opus in its own Opponent Processor Studios, and the efforts have paid off. While most of the songs on this inaugural effort will be familiar to anyone who has caught the act’s…

Austin’s Ghostland Observatory is more than just another pair of sweaty dudes making party music. Aaron Behrens and Thomas Turner crank up the heat on this formula by combining filthy French electro with ’60s soul and plenty of ’80s synth pop. While Turner churns out beats that butts can’t resist,…