San Francisco’s the Fresh & Onlys got started ten years ago, before the most recent wave of garage psych. And while that aesthetic certainly informed the group’s music early on, there’s more to its sound than that. Sweeping through its center is a Smiths-like, incandescent guitar jangle, along with gentle…
Originally hailing from Cincinnati, the Afghan Wigs were an early, non-Pacific Northwest signing to Sub Pop. Probably because of their raw sound — which was akin to that of the early Replacements and had a soulful vibe in line with what the label was cultivating in underground music at the…
Rumor has it that the members of Conjugal Visits live in a place called Wiener Demon Castle. Maybe that’s the garage-rock equivalent of saying one’s Uzi weighs a ton. Either way, there is definitely a wiseacre, self-deprecating sense of humor underlying the band’s garage-rock anthems, which are clearly informed by…
CRIME AND THE CITY SOLUTION @ ORIENTAL THEATER | 10/18/12 From the beginning of its set, Crime and the City Solution created an intimate, sensory immersive environment with a flood of atmospheric sounds built from what seemed like Persian music. The instruments interacted with each other as though emulating waves…
Flying Lotus is one of the most innovative electronic producers out right now. Born Steven Ellison but better known these days by his stage handle, the L.A.-based artist began making beats at the age of fourteen, and with his omnivorous taste in music, he’s gone on to create lush, detailed…
Crime and the City Solution started out in the late ’70s in Sydney, Australia, but its members went on an extended adventure in relocation, following its creative opportunities where they lay. First they went to Melbourne, where the group befriended the Boys Next Door, who, in part, went on to…
The immediate reference points for the latest Wind Does release are films like Monsters, The Mist and Begotten — something that evokes the sound of the clash between the everyday world and some other realm, mythological or otherwise extraterrestrial, where the two vibe off each other on some level below…
Formed in Sydney, Australia, in 1977, Crime and the City Solution was one of the seminal post-punk bands of the era. Upon moving to Melbourne in 1978, the band and its leader, Simon Bonney, befriended like-minded souls the Boys Next Door (later called the Birthday Party) and had an impact…
Although considered by many to be a hip-hop producer, Steven Ellison has displayed musical and artistic ambitions that are clearly not confined to a narrow range of classification. Drawing inspiration from the late hip-hop genius J Dilla, Ellison, under the moniker Flying Lotus, has likewise brought considerable imagination and a…
If writing only one kind of song were a crime, Eldren (due this Friday, October 19, at the hi-dive) would be innocent of all charges. By design and inclination, these guys have a broad palette of instrumentation and sounds to use in the songs they write and the shows they…
It was one of my first days working at Wax Trax, and I was talking to Duane Davis,” recalls Jimmi Nasi. “It was a slow moment, and I just said something about liking Journey, and he pretty much fell off his stool laughing. Then he said, ‘That is the first…
HEALTH came out of the circuit of underground bands that played DIY spaces in southern California like Ché Café, Il Corral and the Smell. It was that last place with which the band has become most closely associated. Combining avant-garde electronic music with noise and a frantic post-punk fury, HEALTH…
The xx is an electronic pop group from London, England, whose music is informed by soul and post-punk as well as hip-hop and modern electronica. The act’s critically acclaimed, self-titled debut album from 2009 garnered the outfit widespread popularity. And while a lot of bands would have stopped developing there…
NEIL HALSTEAD / TENNIS @ eTown Hall | 10/16/12 For the end of the Tennis and Neil Halstead eTown show, host Nick Forster and co-host Helen Forster came on stage with both acts. Forster told us they had all learned a song that seemed appropriate for the occasion, and with…
Neil Halstead was one of the guitarists and singers in pioneering shoegaze and ambient band Slowdive in the late ’80s and early ’90s. Taking guitar sounds and often blurring the sonic signature with synths through creative use of delay pedals and loops, Slowdive was more of a dream-pop band through…
DINOSAUR JR @ BLUEBIRD THEATER | 10/15/12 In a show full of strong performances, one of the biggest surprises came when, toward the end of the set, Lou Barlow said that he and J Mascis had been in a band called Deep Wound. “We played the Ramones at triple speed,”…
Dinosaur Jr was the product of three guys from Massachusetts who had played in the hardcore bands Deep Wound and All White Jury. But when J Mascis, Lou Barlow and Murph got together, the music they produced sounded like it had all but shed that background in favor of melody,…
Sic Alps is the long-running project of Mike Donovan and whatever group of people become part of the band at any given time. It would be a bit of a reduction to call his songwriting “garage rock.” This is more than just people with a lot of energy playing stripped…
Lords of Fuzz thundered into being from a tough time in Oscar Ross’ life. He’d recently gotten divorced and moved to Denver from Texas and decided to pursue music as an outlet. After numerous line-up changes, and three albums, Lords of Fuzz are releasing their most fully-realized record to date,…
NEW ORDER @ 1STBANK CENTER |10/10/12 If you’ve been a New Order fan for long enough, you’ve heard the song hundreds of times or more. Just the same, that repetition did nothing to dull the haunting yet soothing majesty of “Your Silent Face” when New Order played it pretty much…
Using a syncopated motorik beat as a baseline, Dyad makes the kind of electronic music with a seeming leg in ’90s house that could well fill the synth-pop album that Aphex Twin never made. “Hyper Cube” is reminiscent of the more playful work of IDM artists like Boards of Canada…
“Crooked Finger” begins this album with a heavy tom strike ahead of a flood of guitar rock that sounds like it could easily have been the source of the band’s name. But rather than fill the space with noise, these guys let the songs breathe with a swinging cadence. It’s…
