Concerts

SIGUR ROS @ 1STBANK CENTER | 4/6/13 Sigur Rós could have ended the night on any of the expected high points from its various albums, but it opted to go out with “Popplagið,” the finale of its 2002 album ( ). That song could almost be a show in itself…

Update, 3 p.m. 4/5/13: We’ve received a statement from Swallow Hill CEO Tom Scharf and also spoke with Hilarie Portell, Public Relations & Marketing Director for Lowry Redevelopment Authority, who both gave us more insight into the situation regarding Swallow Hill’s planned expansion into Lowry. Between the two of them,…

He’s back! After being unceremoniously let go at KBPI this past December by Clear Channel, Greg Stone, aka Uncle Nasty, is back on the air in Denver. The popular DJ and longtime local music supporter, who was a radio staple in the Mile High City for the better part of…

SIGUR ROS @ 1STBANK CENTER | SAT, 4/6/13 The Sugarcubes and Bjork garnered tremendous exposure for Iceland as a source of significant and innovative pop music, but it was Sigur Ros that gave the island nation’s music a bit of mystery. It is too simplistic to call this music post-rock,…

SUB.MISSION ANNIVERSARY @ BOPPO! | SAT, 4/6/13 Sub.mission knows dubstep, and to mark another year of its devotion to the true sound, Nicole Cacciavillano and her crew are hosting a real U.K. underground-style throwdown with V.I.V.E.K., who performed at last year’s party. He’s set to perform alongside the entire roster…

SPIRITUALIZED @ BLUEBIRD THEATER | 4/4/13 With little more than the lights dimming to indicate the band was about to take stage, Spiritualized walked on stage and went right into “Here It Comes (The Road, Let’s Go),” which began an evening of music with no breaks or banter to break…

Last week, Rolling Stone kicked off its new Venues That Rock series with a list of the twenty best rock clubs in America. Three Colorado venues were ranked in the top twenty: Belly Up in Aspen, which checked in at number sixteen, the Bluebird Theater, which earned a nod at…

NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS @ OGDEN THEATRE | 4/3/13 The most mythical moment of Nick Cave’s set last night at the Ogden Theatre came at the end when the band performed “Stagger Lee,” a re-casting of the Mississippi John Hurt classic “The Ballad of Stagger Lee.” With lurid…

As a teenager, Matt Skellenger was a fan of Twin Peaks, David Lynch’s short-lived television series. He loved the contrast of darkness and light in the show, as well as the conflict and resolution. From a textural standpoint, both of those elements play a part in Skellenger’s new album, The…

Based on its name alone, you might expect Dead Orchids (due at the hi-dive this Thursday, April 4) to be some heavy, dark, eyeliner-sporting band. Instead, the outfit plays a blend of blues rock, hard rock and smoky psychedelia. The music is familiar from years past, but the act has…

Shady Elders started as a two-piece fronted by Britt Rodemich in 2011. Rodemich found a kindred spirit in guitarist Miles Eichner; the former Tulip Wars guitarist shared her love of dreamy, pop-oriented post-punk, as well as blues and jazz singers. When the Don’ts and Be Carefuls started winding down, Casey…

DJ Heather grew up in a household in which eclectic music abounded, and as she got older, fate threw mixing opportunities her way, from a gig at a college radio station to a stint programming weekend music at a neighborhood pub. Those experiences led her to explore the ways that…

The Sugarcubes and Björk garnered tremendous exposure for Iceland as a source of significant and innovative pop music, but it was Sigur Rós that gave the island nation’s music a bit of mystery. It is too simplistic to call this music post-rock, because it’s also ambient, symphonic and accessibly avant-garde…

Once good friends with the A$AP crew, SpaceGhostPurrp is frequently credited with engineering the moody, atmospheric aesthetic that the group has capitalized on. Purrp relishes the darkness, and he manages to tell a lot about himself by revealing very little. His music is deeply introspective and bleakly isolationist, which further…

Jason Pierce formed Spiritualized after the split of his previous band, the influential and fuzzily psychedelic Spacemen 3. In the move, Pierce shed most of the jagged, cutting guitar tones of his old group and went much further into dreamy atmospherics. Spiritualized’s full-length debut, 1992’s Lazer Guided Melodies, served as…

“This ain’t hookah. You hit this shit a few times, you might see the future,” Ab-Soul says of DMT in “Pineal Gland,” his dark, mystic ode to the drug. The same thing can be said of the MC’s rhymes; moments like this one induce chills as Ab-Soul seems to crack…

Allowing each member to pursue solo and side projects has clearly improved the aesthetic of the Paper Bird sound. Employing the Stones-esque organ and ’60s dream-pop guitar from Eye and the Arrow and the dark beauty of Esme Patterson’s solo recording, the band has strengthened its songwriting while retaining the…

On Hazard of the Die, the followup to his 2011 debut, Sometime Around, Andy Palmer shows continued growth as a songwriter. The beginning of “The Monk,” the eight-song disc’s opener, is fairly tame, but strings, arranged here by Kailin Yong, gradually swell, making the song seem damn near epic at…

Early on, P-Nuckle — which frequently shared stages with the likes of Slightly Stoopid and the Expendables when those acts were still making their way up – earned a reputation for being a party band. And while that rep was well deserved then and is still accurate today, especially in…

On Hope, the Twilight Garden’s Todd Loomis makes no bones about the stylistic and sonic debt he owes to the Cure and other acts. Opening track “Falling Rain” has a Disintegration-like lush grandeur; “Falling in Circles” bears a jubilant yet emotionally raw quality akin to the Sound’s Shock of Daylight…

The Metal Alliance Tour featuring Anthrax, Exodus, High on Fire, Municipal Waste and Holy Grail made its way to Denver on Tuesday night. A crushing throng of maniacal metal fans — our resident metalhead Brandon Marshall among them — gathered at Summit Music Hall last night, where, united by their…