The twenty best scenes from Rockbar’s last call

After last call this past Saturday, Rockbar went dark for good. From the looks of it, the beloved Colfax bar didn’t go gently into that good night, but rather went out with a bang — ladies on tables and babies boozing. Oh what a night, as the Four Seasons once…

Beats Antique at the Fillmore, 10/27/12

BEATS ANTIQUE @ FILLMORE AUDITORIUM | 10/27/12 As the lights rose for the encore, multi-instrumentalist David Satori made sure to inform everyone at the Fillmore the importance of voting, and then went on to note that if you weren’t planning on taking part in the process then in the very…

The ten best concerts this weekend: Oct. 26-28

Welcome to the weekend, amigos! Ah, yes, we finally made it. Is it just us, or has this seemed like the longest week ever? Ah, maybe it’s just the weather. Whatever the case, it’s in the rearview now, and it’s time to blow off some steam. Drinks are on the…

Raekwon Rocks the Vote at Auraria, 10/25/12

RAEKWON @ ROCK THE VOTE ROAD TRIP / AURARIA | 10/25/12 “Whether there’s twenty people or 2,000,” said Raekwon, painfully aware of which side of that spectrum this small gathering was on, “I’m always gonna give it 200 percent.” And he did, with grace. He spoke directly to the front…

Waka Flocka at Ogden Theatre, 10/25/12

WAKA FLOCKA @ OGDEN THEATRE | 10/25/12 In order for Waka Flocka and his crew to keep pace with his past appearance in the Mile High City, all they would have had to do at this is walk out on stage and perform a few hit singles. Instead, the Brick…

Wallflowers at the Ogden, 10/24/12

WALLFLOWERS @ OGDEN THEATRE | 10/24/12 Jakob Dylan must be a hell of a poker player. Last night’s show at the Ogden proved that, as the Wallflowers frontman crooned through a couple dozen songs with a stony glare on his face. Clad in black and looking every bit as youthful…

Meet Human Agency, one of Denver’s fastest-rising electronic acts

Pop music,” declares Seamus Moore, “has proven that musical talent means shit as far as being accepted by a musical fan base goes.” Moore and his group, Human Agency, aren’t necessarily anti-pop, but neither are they ones to adhere to modern pop conventions to make their mark, relying solely on…

Conjugal Visits will channel 1950s teen rebellion at the hi-dive

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…

The Afghan Whigs

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…

The Fresh & Onlys

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…

Gwar

With the pageantry of their presentation and the overwhelming ostentatiousness of their personas, it’s easy to forget that the members of Gwar are actual people — not mere caricatures, but beings made of flesh and blood, with feelings and emotions like the rest of us. And that’s kind of the…

Agnostic Front

Agnostic Front is a bellwether of New York hardcore. The band’s seminal 1984 full-length debut, Victim in Pain, assailed injustice, conformity and society’s norms, raging through eleven paeans to alienation in fifteen minutes. Celebrating three decades on this tour, the band has gone through numerous members and weathered myriad ups…

Bob Dylan is a man out of time

Bob Dylan doesn’t belong here. Not here, but here — as in 2012. And he’d admit as much. Throughout his career, Dylan has always had sentimentality for a world before his time, romanticizing the lives of Robert Johnson and Hank Williams. “I was born very far from where I was…

Esme Patterson

Rarely do you find as much emotional range on an album as you do on Esme Patterson’s new release. From the pop-love warmth of “My Young Man” to the mournful “All the Days,” All Princes, I travels an arc from juvenile romance to painful wisdom, with Patterson crooning the apt…

The Dale Bruning Trio

Twelve years ago, Dale Bruning released Reunion, a two-disc live album with one of his more famous students, Denver native Bill Frisell, who studied with Bruning for close to five years in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Just Between Us, recorded live during two nights at Dazzle last March,…

The Wonderful Evils/Last Eyes

“Thus Pat Garrett on the Battlefield,” which appears on the Wonderful Evils side of this split cassette, combines the shimmering vibrancy of the late-afternoon air in summer with a sense of motion. The intricate guitar work is reminiscent of John Fahey, or Jorma Kaukonen’s instrumental “Embryonic Journey.” There’s an organic,…

RainbowDragonEyes

If you find those roads that diverge in the wood and end up taking the road less traveled, what kind of music do you expect to hear on your journey? Maybe some kind of really weird genre mashup, like “extreme chiptune dance metal”? (Hey, we said this road was less…

Pete Bones’s house jams can convert even devoted technophiles

Pete Bones (aka the Shaker) has more than earned his nickname; this DJ/producer has been upheaving dance floors since he turned his residency at the Hand & Spear in Surrey, England, into a legendary party night back in 1990. Since that time, he’s gained worldwide acclaim with his own releases,…