In the press release that accompanies Weapon of Choice, Dangerous Nonsense lists one influence: human rights. Accordingly, it’s clear the trio prizes social consciousness as highly as it does musical prowess. Many well-meaning bands, of course, have been hamstrung by giving their politics and their music equal billing; thankfully, Dangerous…

Last year we played this show at the Roxy,” remembers Taylor Kirgan, singer/guitarist of Ascaris. “We played with three hip-hop groups that night. We were the only band with amps; everyone else was up there with turntables and laptops. We opened up that show with full stacks. At the end…

Seriously, just punch me in the fucking head. Severe cranial trauma delivered with extreme malice would’ve been less painful for me than watching What We Do Is Secret. The 2008 film was, or at least marketed itself as, the story of the Germs — the legendary L.A. punk band that…

When the Church formed in Australia in 1980, its ringing, soaring post-punk should’ve made it as big as, say, Echo & the Bunnymen. Of course, the Church did reach that level of success in its home country on the back of early hits like “The Unguarded Moment,” which also happens…

Mutating faster than a flu virus, Seattle’s the Dead Science has grown from a mildly arty indie-rock combo into a full-on deconstruction crew since the release of its rich and challenging 2003 debut, Submariner. Lest you miss the title’s reference to one of Marvel Comics’ B-list superheroes, frontman Sam Mickens…

Power pop, by its nature, is a regressive genre, and Hot Robots is no different. The only thing that’s in doubt is exactly which decade the band has so gleefully embraced. Built to Tilt, the Robots’ full-length debut, re-creates every hook ever beaten to death by Cheap Trick, the Plimsouls…

I had my big thirtieth-birthday party the other night,” says Josh Wambeke, singer/guitarist and leader of Fell. “I just bought a new home in Arvada, and we’re surrounded by older people, so we had to make sure they were going to be okay with it.” Respecting your neighbors isn’t exactly…

When one of Denver’s underground mainstays, the Dinnermints, dissolved a couple years back, bassist Doo Crowder fell in with a ramshackle band of players who wound up dubbing their collective Pee Pee. What began as a pastime, however, has evolved into a shifting ensemble that incorporates everything from acoustic guitar…

Ska! Say it. Sounds funny, huh? And not just because the genre has become one of the most beloved-turned-maligned styles in history since disco. Ska, at its core, is unpretentious, buoyant and just plain goofy. But it has deep soul and jazz attached to its calypso roots, a fact that…

Thumps, creaks, giggles, clicks — these are the first sounds you hear when listening to a recording by Joseph Childress. The California-born, Colorado-bred songwriter doesn’t make CDs, per se, but rather lo-fi snapshots taken during his many travels across the continent. Perpetually on the move, Childress packs his lush acoustic…

There used to be a shed in Greeley where indie bands would play. Yes, a fucking shed. I’m not sure how much the town has changed lately — when’s the last time you were there? — but if Vitamins’ eponymous EP is any indication, the manure and monotony have really…

Witches have their familiars. Jolie Holland has whole hosts of critters dwelling within the dipping fleurs-de-lis and Rococo ruffles of her music. Most of them are winged, but as Holland reminds us with the title of her third full-length, Springtime Can Kill You, airborne beasts such as ghosts, mockingbirds and…

Rocking a laundromat with shitty jam bands? Playing a benefit show for Rwandan refugees while dressed as Chippendales dancers? It’s all par for the course for Fort Collins’s Guns N’ Rosa Parks. Formed in 2004, the band has spent the past couple of years living as irreverently as its name,…

Considering indie rock’s post-ironic weltanschauung, it’s about fucking time a new band came up with a name that actually sounds like its music. New York City’s Psychic Ills resembles a head full of chaos in which chemical imbalances clash with hallucinogenic bliss, where OCD-looped drones overlap with closed circuits of…

At one point in hardcore’s past, Detroit’s legendarily nihilistic Negative Approach was one of the scene’s big influences. Today it’s been eclipsed by Professional Approach. Pro Approach, however, isn’t a band; it’s an attitude, a mindset that makes young groups pay more attention to “promotion techniques” and “potential fan bases”…

When George W. Bush’s domestic-wiretapping program went into effect, you can bet that Boots Riley of the Coup was at the top of the surveillance list. But a lot has happened since Tuesday, September 11, 2001 — the day the Coup’s Party Music was released, bearing a cover that portrayed…

Featuring current and recent members of the Dalhart Imperials, the Honky Tonk Hangovers, Eddie Clendening & the Blue Ribbon Boys and Local 33, Ethyl and the Regulars might appear to be spreading themselves a little thin. Yet there’s nothing diluted or impure about the quintet’s music. For the past couple…

West Indian Girl is so fresh out of the package, it still smells like Styrofoam and bubble wrap. But what the Los Angeles group lacks in experience — the core duo of Robert James and Francis Ten was signed to Astralwerks before playing a single show — it makes up…

Amid the tugging drones and ragged feedback of the new Minmae album, Le Grand Essor de la Maison du Monstre, singer/guitarist Sean Brooks gulps the phrase “lopsided reminders” — a pretty canny description of Minmae’s music itself. Like a fuzzy-lensed camera atop a wobbly tripod, the Portland trio takes snapshots…

Jazz is something most artists get better at as they grow older, accumulate experiences and learn to translate their souls into sound. At the tender age of 23, Joshua Trinidad already has an incredible head start. Invention, his debut as a leader, is an adventurous disc that filters melody and…

The two men of Erasure trading in their patented synthesizers for twangy, cowboy-country guitars? We’ll pass on the obligatory Brokeback Mountain jokes. Sadly, however, a joke is about the most complimentary thing you could call Union Street. Vince Clarke and Andy Bell have recast nine of their sleek techno-pop gems…

Kansas’s Split Lip Rayfield plays in Denver so much, it almost feels like it’s a local band. It’s no wonder, then, that when Kirk Rundstrom, the guitarist of the mutant bluegrass act, was recently diagnosed with cancer, a bunch of Split Lip’s Colorado comrades quickly organized two Kirk Rundstrom Benefit…