Hello Kavita checks in from the studio

Photo: Sarah Cass The exceptional gentlemen pictured above, otherwise known collectively as Hello Kavita, are currently holed up in the studio recording a brand-new album with Ian Hlatky, who’s previously overseen recordings by the Last Seen, Born in the Flood and the Swayback, among others. The band recently offered a…

Apples in Stereo energize Pepsi’s new ad campaign

Photo: Joshua Kessler So, have you caught Pepsi’s latest commercial? Notice anything remarkable about it? Besides, of course, the inexplicable, reworked-for-what-seems-like-the-umpteenth-time, futuristic-looking logo? You know that gorgeous, sun-kissed, audible goodness you hear playing in the background? Uh-huh, that’s the Apples in Stereo. Pretty keen, eh? We caught the commercial over…

Mezcal cabaret license hearing tonight

Mezcal (3230 East Colfax Avenue) restaurant celebrated its fifth anniversary a few weeks ago and brought in a mariachi band as part of the festivities. Owner Jesse Morreale has been bringing live entertainment to the club for the past few years, mainly on special occasions, as the city allows him…

Ideal Fathers seek ideal drummer

The Ideal Fathers have a fresh, danceable, well-crafted take on post-punk. They have a freshly recorded, yet-to-released EP that’s damn good. What they don’t have is a drummer, and that’s holding them back from capitalizing on those first two things, which is a shame. Their longtime drummer recently succumbed to…

Girl Talk shows us how it’s done

Girl Talk (aka Greg Gillis) gets a fair amount of love here at Westword for his ace mashup skills and incendiary live performances, and with good reason: the man is an artist at what he does. And if you’ve ever wondered exactly how he does what he does, today is…

The Worst Lyrics of 2008

And now it’s time for the”I love you like a fat kid loves cake” memorial Worst Lyrics of 2008, March Madness-style tournament, this year a terrifying melange of appalling oral-sex requests, bargain-bin philosophies, grammatical atrocities, and cringe-inducing pillow talk. To elevate the drama, I provided a trusted colleague with the…

Hitsville, by the numbers

You don’t need a half-wit music critic to tell you it’s been a remarkable year for America, one historians will be discussing and researching for centuries to come. War, financial collapse, politics, technology: All have been dinner-table topics for many Americans. Racial barriers in 2008 were demolished by a Midwestern…

Rap-Up: Top 5 2008 Colorado Hip-Hop YouTube videos

Along with having a MySpace page, some photos and MP3s, it’s become a necessity for Colorado hip-hop artists to have a YouTube account and a camcorder nearby.Many artists are now taking the responsibility of recording their own videos and events in order to promote their latest projects, as well as…

The best Christmas gift. Ever!

All right, so you know how this time of year everybody asks you if you’ve received anything cool for Christmas? Generally, I’m all, like, you know, socks, shirts, gift certificates, yada, yada — and that’s usually the extent of the conversation. Not that I’m ungrateful — it’s just, how much…

Going with the, um, Flo?

Poor sketchy man outside the Gothic Theatre last night, yours was a complication born of marquee ineptitude. For you see, the Gothic lists several shows at a time there, a column of upcoming shows on the left, and a column as well on the right. Last night, the top line…

Reverend Peyton spins at Larimer Lounge tonight

Reverend Peyton will be a guest DJ tonight at Larimer Lounge as part of Matt Fecher’s New Music Mondays. We’re guessing that the Rev might be spinning some of his favorite bluesmen who inspired the singer/guitarist like Charley Patton, Bukka White, Mississippi John Hurt, Son House and Big Bill Broonzy…

You got your video games in my music

This weekend I stumbled across this story about the convergence of video games and music in our sister paper the Phoenix New Times, and really enjoyed it. I’m quite pleased that two of my great loves — video games and music — are coming together in so many ways, both underground…

Rap-Up: ESPN Magazine disses DJ Bedz

DJ Bedz has been the official DJ for the Denver Nuggets for five seasons now, and if you’ve been to a game at the Pepsi Center, you know he keeps the place rockin’. But apparently the folks at ESPN magazine suggested that the Nuggets “trade up” to get DJ Clue…

Casa Del Soul reunion party tomorrow night

On Saturday, December 27, you can catch up on Denver house-music history when the Denver House Authority brings back the entire Casa Del Soul group — Sense, Foxx, Catt, Ty Tek, Little Mike and Wyatt Earp — for a party at Below Bar (1422 Larimer Street). These guys promoted and played…

Westword‘s favorite national albums of the year

As I compiled this year’s edition of Nationalistic, I was struck by how diverse our Backbeat scribes’ tastes were in 2008. Unlike with Moovers & Shakers, the roundup of our favorite local albums of the year that ran in last week’s issue, there was hardly any crossover. Not even with…

Live music holds the reins at Appaloosa Grill

Whenever I get near Appaloosa Grill (535 16th Street), I think about the time my cousin and I tried to go there on New Year’s Eve. It was about an hour before midnight, and the place was packed. We waited in line for a few minutes, and then the bouncer…

The only Christmas song you’ll ever need

On this fine Christmas Eve, I gift all of you with a link to the finest Christmas song ever recorded, and the only one anyone ever truly needed. It’s a song about the brutal, cold reality behind all of our romantic pretension, and about love that still manages to hang…

Rap-Up: The Pirate Signal compared to… will.i.am?

The Pirate Signal recently got off a national tour with 3OH!3 and most of the feedback the duo is getting from their live set include everything from “passionate” to “hyper”. That’s the great thing about Colorado hip-hop going on tour, seeing how other cities react to the music. But in…

KUVO losing two longtime jazz DJs next month

KUVO/89.3 FM has faced its share of financial challenges over the past few years, which Michael Roberts pointed out in “Changes in the Air at KUVO.” The station’s CEO, Gene Craven, sent out an e-mail today stating that longtime jazz DJs Ed Danielson and Rodney Franks will lose their daytime…