Given that Ray of Light, Madonna’s last studio release, was both a big seller and the best-reviewed album of her career (its quality briefly forced all but the most obtuse critics to consider her as an artist first and a cultural icon second, rather than the other way around), it’s…
It’s always fashionable in music circles to lament the plight of reggae’s gods: They were exploited, misunderstood, ahead of their time. But Peter Tosh has only himself to blame. Aside from the 1998 boxed set Honorary Citizen, there’s a scarcity of recorded material with which to canonize him. This is…
For the better parts of rock history, a variety of jokers have gone to great lengths to prove just how deranged they are, whether they bit the heads off of doves, waved their penises around on stage or murdered a junkie girlfriend. Maybe that’s why the Sick Bees’ understated imbalance…
So far, it’s been a busy, not to mention fruitful, year for America’s entertainment lawyers, a group that is probably alone in its enjoyment of the current climate of squabbling — and litigation — over music-ownership issues (cocaine dealers the world over are probably already scrambling to fill orders in…
Bettie Serveert, Thursday, October 5, at Fiddlers Green Amphitheatre, with Counting Crows and Live, has spent the last couple of years outside of the indie spotlight cast upon it following a series of well-received outings for Matador; after being dropped from the label, the Dutch band has finally released Private…
How blue is your grass? Niwots own Pete and Joan Wernick, who perform in free concerts on Saturday, October 7, and Sunday, October 8, at the Denver Performing Arts Complex, combine masterful acoustic pickin with heartfelt vocal harmonies; its a one-two punch that has earned the pair the honorary distinction…
Good news for University of Colorado students–and all other Coloradans –looking for something slightly more refined than the bar/rioting scene: The Boulder Museum of Contemporary Arts summer After Hours series was so popular that the museum has decided to continue it through the fall. Every Thursday from 5 p.m. to…
There are several versions of exactly what happened inside the Cricket on the Hill on Saturday, September 8, at 12:30 a.m., but the popular version goes like this: The guy from the Volts got on stage, threw beer bottles at people and then got beat up outside. The Pin Downs,…
Each year, the annual Country Music Association awards broadcast holds a few surprises, little drama and zero controversy. Unlike the Grammys or the Academy Awards, where viewers can expect at least a little bit of from-the-podium pontificating on current events or artistic issues, the CMA’s are typically safe, self-congratulatory shmoozefests…
In the liner notes of Faith, Hess, who’s been among the saving graces of Colorado jazz for a generation or so, makes an unexpected admission. “While we’re not quite ready for a leisured retired life on the golf course,” he allows, “the music does speak our age. Maybe that’s what…
The monster in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein spoke French, ate nuts ‘n’ berries and became the Victorian era’s most romantic fugitive-on-a-dogsled. New Jersey’s walking dead should be so lucky. Brothers Sal and Dan Canzonieri recently discovered some old demos under their bunkbeds that they wanted the world to hear: seventeen “rarities”…
This heartfelt tribute to the man known as the father of bluegrass is at its best when the performers involved manage to infuse Monroe’s material with new vitality without trampling the compositions’ stark and subtle charms. The best example of this balancing act is Dwight Yoakam’s rendition of “Rocky Road…
More than any other city, Chicago is ground zero for the alternative-country movement. It’s home to Wilco, Bloodshot Records and a vibrant music scene that regularly produces talent like Chris Mills, who is among the finest of the second generation of alt-country singers. Just 25 years old, Mills grew up…
Now that Keanu Reeves has inked a deal to make two more Matrix movies, the chances of getting another fix of Bill and Ted’s Wyld Stallyns looks pretty slim. Though Reeves shelved his stoner alter ego for more serious work, he hasn’t kissed off the rock-and-roll fantasy just yet –…
Good people of Denver, Backwash would like to reintroduce you to Mike Colin, the former leader of proto-punk/funk locals Phantazmorgasm (later Phantasmorgasm), who respectfully bowed out of the local scene roughly two years ago. Before doing so, the multi-instrumentalist and producer oversaw some of the area’s more original and definition-defying…
Mingus Big Band, Saturday, September 30, at the Boulder Theater, is an ideal jazz band for the new millennium. It swings with the class of the Duke Ellington-era crews without sounding quaint. It blisters through the avant garde without going off the deep end. It melds sophisticated ensemble work with…
Though Kristina Ingham, Friday, September 29, at the Soiled Dove, has got the crunchy good looks of many a Boulder-based female folkie, she’s hardly content to stand at the edge of the stage and strum away on ballads all night. Ingham got her singing start on the evangelist circuit in…
Hot, medium or mild – how do you like your salsa? For those of you with cajones, get out and dance with the Bacardi Salsa Congress, Tuesday, October 3, through Saturday, October 7, at Sevilla at the Icehouse. Long before many people realized that salsa meant more than tomatoes, the…
Not so long ago, the ghosts of Denver’s past were threatening to become this city’s only future. On any given night, an earnest drone could be heard emanating from various downtown clubs; hymnlike songs summoned spirits of a boomtown from days gone by. With themes ranging from black lung to…
God only knows what anyone loafing around Arlington, Virginia-based Inner Ear Studios thought upon hearing playbacks of Jets to Brazil’s just-released second album, Four Cornered Night. This space has been the recording home to bands such as Fugazi, Bluetip, the defunct Jawbox (whose former frontman, J. Robbins, has produced both…
Despite rock music’s errant attempts to broaden itself with the branching — and stemming, and twigging — of different variations of sound, its evolution is pretty regressive. Particularly with the hybrid music of today, whereupon hip-hop meets metal, metal greets classical, and classical introduces melancholia to improvisational jazz and roots…
The main difference between these discs is that one doesn’t suck nearly as badly as it ought to, while the other does — and then some. In the mondo-suckage category, Bon Jovi’s latest proves nothing other than that the purveyor of some of the most delectable ear candy of the…
