Scrubs star Zach Braff’s directorial debut, Garden State, was more than just an art-house hit about twenty-something depression. When it was released in 2004, its melancholic soundtrack was like a nursery for up-and-coming dream-pop bands and acoustic-minded artists. Braff, the album’s executive producer, won a Grammy for his efforts. Acts…
Even before Gym Class Heroes frontman Travis McCoy joined a band, women were lining up to show him body parts they usually keep under cover. McCoy served as a tattoo artist in upstate New York for several years, and during that time, he inked designs and illustrations on or near…
TV on the Radio’s latest effort is a tad overwhelming at first. But after taking the time to fully absorb the layers and layers of incredibly dense textures woven by guitarist/producer David Andrew Sitek, it’s clear that the baby justifies the labor. Wading through the fractured, shape-shifting aesthetic is made…
Stacy “Fergie” Ferguson is a hot, eager and totally empty vessel. On The Dutchess, she displays an affinity for the sort of mainstream pop that would put most Black Eyed Peas fans to sleep faster than a Blizzard with Tylenol PM sprinkles — but if acting like a hip-hop ho…
Big-budget bands, on average, take anywhere from two to five years to produce a full-length album. Wolf Eyes takes about a week. The act is a record collector’s nightmare, with an extensive discography that stretches far into the annals of self-produced cassette tapes, CD-Rs and the occasional etched vinyl record…
The Faceless Werewolves should — if the gods of good taste have their way — be the next Austin band whose hot, raw licks will get down the pants of America. Singer Baldomero Valdez has a certain Thurston Moore mumble in the way he has to fight for air underneath…
It’s kind of refreshing to hear a Denver hip-hop act not trying to emulate the latest trends. On Living on the Jib, Death Before Dishonor mates hostile, head-banging breakbeats with strings and piano interludes that recall everyone from DJ Shadow to EL-P (of Company Flow). Tracks like “Somebody Stop Me”…
Nothing to be afraid of here. Open Mouth isn’t just Fear Before the March of Flames’ best album to date; it’s also evidence that this band is only now beginning to tap its potential. Artistically speaking, the Flamers are growing like a brush fire during a drought. “Drowning the Old…
Club d’Elf, Now I Understand (Accurate). The brainchild of Boston bassist Mike Rivard, Club d’Elf is a genre-shattering collective that merges jazz, hip-hop, electronic music, worldbeat and more with the help of collaborators ranging from DJ Logic to onetime David Bowie associate Reeves Gabrels. Now I Understand is both instrumentally…
There’s a decrepit old building on St. Peter Street, in the heart of the French Quarter, with little in the way of amenities; drinks aren’t even served there. Regardless, tourists line up hours before showtime because they know that Preservation Hall is one of the few pillars of old-school New…
How to make a KMFDM album: Pair sexy-girl vocals with a frog-throated male lead spitting angry, Euro-style slow-paced raps (à la Trent Reznor on “Down in It”), synthesize every beat to the max and then cover it all up with iconic Brute! artwork. Stick the group’s acronym in a chorus…
Although thinking-man’s metal band Queensrche has a respectable catalogue of albums under its belt — including classics such as Empire and Rage for Order — its legacy was cemented by 1988’s Operation: Mindcrime, one of the greatest and most successful rock operas ever made. Mindcrime wove a tale of a…
Eric Bachmann is one of the newest and most valuable additions to the Denver music scene. A longtime North Carolinian, he first came to indie-rock prominence in the Archers of Loaf, an act capable of cranking up a righteous racket, and subsequently formed Barry Black, an instrumental outfit that paired…
If Jenny Lewis has learned anything from her high-profile friends and semi-frequent collaborators Conor Oberst and Ben Gibbard, it’s this: The bigger you get, the more people hate on you, so let the authenticity of the music be the final word. Nowhere is this lesson more obvious than on Lewis’s…
One of the quickest ways to break into the biz or revitalize a stagnant career is to modernize someone else’s hit song a decade or so after its release with a clever cover version. It worked wonders for Marilyn Manson and Alien Ant Farm — even Johnny Cash cashed in…
Vinnie Paz, Stoupe and DJ Kwestion have to be some of the hardest-working cats in indie/underground hip-hop. Although their group, Jedi Mind Tricks, has released only four albums in its ten-year existence, the three are the brains behind lauded projects from Outerspace and Army of the Pharaohs and had a…
It was inevitable that crunk would spawn its own subgenres, and you can go ahead and pencil in Atlanta’s Dem Franchize Boyz atop the nascent “snap music” movement. Their main competition is D4L, which proved that less really can be less on the ridiculously minimal hit “Laffy Taffy,” which taints…
In August 1883, Krakatau, south of Java, violently erupted, producing a cataclysmic sound — the loudest ever recorded by humans. Earlier this year, Shannon Saling, bass player and vocalist for punk-rock provocateurs the Swindlers, formed Krakatau with Bailey Cecil of Core of the Earth and former members of Black Lamb…
New York City beat bastards James Murphy and Tim Goldsworthy just love wiping their french-fry greasy DFA fingers all over other people’s records. Their latest remix collection — with geeked-out takes on Tiga, N.E.R.D., Nine Inch Nails and many more — is a surprisingly chilled-out, completely addictive treat that should…
Blue Ice is like the well-groomed black sheep of the Baker neighborhood. Located at 22 Broadway, the nightclub borders the hipsterland territory of hi-dive/Sputnik and is just a block up from the rocker haven of 3 Kings Tavern. It’s also just a hop, skip and handcuffed jump from the Crypt,…
The techtonic plates continue to shift along Denver’s increasingly competitive concert scene. Although no official statement has been released, Chuck Morris will be vacating his current post at Live Nation to join his proteges, Don Strasburg and Brent Fedrizzi, at the new Denver outpost of Anschutz Entertainment Group. Morris, one…
The video for Band of Horses’ “Funeral” features scratchy black-and-white footage of a lonely, broken old man slowly drinking himself to death in a smoky beer-and-a-shot bar, his only friends the bottom of his mug, a jukebox and memories of a dead dog. Framing morose lyrics such as “I’m coming…
