Mavis Staples may be on the cusp of her 68th birthday, but the righteous fire that distinguished so many of her rich, bottomless vocals during an extraordinary fifty-year-plus career continues to burn brightly. When asked why the songs of struggle that make up We’ll Never Turn Back, her moving new…
Jonathan Meiburg is up early. Not because it’s the first day of a tour and his band, Shearwater, still needs to practice before leaving — though that’s part of it. Mostly it’s because he wants to make sure all the talking he’ll have to do for this interview won’t drain…
In case you’ve ever wondered how “American” you really are, here’s a quiz to help find the answer. 1. Given the chance to actually wear the American flag, you would… a) Turn it into a sexy leather halter top to accentuate your barely legal curves, like Britney Spears did on…
Ryan Adams was needled throughout 2005 for releasing three CDs’ worth of songs without seeming to consider whether all of the tunes met his standards. In interviews, Adams shrugged off such criticism, but lo and behold, he waited over eighteen months — an eternity for him — to release Easy…
Like a Beyoncé album, Queens of the Stone Age records typically have two awesome tracks and are otherwise filled out by mediocre ones. The act’s latest effort, Era Vulgaris, is no different. Lead single “Sick, Sick, Sick” is a simple power-guitar anthem that speeds along during the verses, then slows…
Opening with the bouncy, infectious “Ramona, Just the Other Day,” These Record Highs finds Breezy Porticos in the familiar mode of slipping smart, emotionally mature observations into finely crafted pop masterpieces. Pop music doesn’t need to be dumb or rife with cliches to be enjoyable, something Breezy Porticos proves in…
Listeners definitely shouldn’t judge this CD by its cover, or its surface sonics. Despite their fondness for ghoulish get-ups and extreme-metal accoutrements, the members of Relevent are old-school moralists; in Display’s liner notes, vocalist Angel begins by thanking “God and Jesus Christ.” It’s no surprise, then, that the material here…
Wild Billy Childish and the Musicians of the British Empire, Punk Rock at the British Legion Hall (Damaged Goods). Quintessential eccentric British musician, writer, painter and poet Billy Childish broke up his scintillating Buff Medways in favor of this outfit featuring his wife, Nurse Julie, on bass. Fact is, the…
Dan Deacon has amassed quite a reputation for his live shows, which often devolve into fits of reckless abandon, with the cuddly little man going bananas on stage, throwing punches and offering up belly waggles. His antics are surpassed only by his rich, elastic electronic compositions, which are made up…
Next to Einsturzende Neubauten, these Japanese noise-mongers hold the distinction of being one of the loudest bands on the planet. Like the mythic group Disaster Area, from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, listeners would be well advised to enjoy the show from outside the venue — or in a…
Kenny Chesney has performed some of the most unabashedly white-bread, defanged, middle-of-the-road pop music ever crafted. While his breakthrough album, 2004’s When the Sun Goes Down, may be soma for the undiscerning masses, the guy accomplished what he set out to do and never looked back. In a career more…
The music business is only glamorous for the chosen few — but even by the standards of this notoriously merciless industry, Bill Mallonee has had a tough row to hoe. He first earned notoriety circa the late ’80s with Vigilantes of Love, and after independently issuing several well-regarded recordings, the…
This past March, a car crash prematurely ended a Die Hunns tour. After the accident, the band’s leader, Duane Peters, a 45-year-old professional skater, and his wife, Corey Parks, formerly of Nashville Pussy, reportedly decided to take the rest of the year off. Idle hands must have inspired the pair…
With so much happening in town, it’s rare for me to get outside the Denver city limits these days, but on a recent Wednesday night, I happened to be near Park Meadows with a friend, and we decided to check out the Robusto Room (9535 Park Meadows Drive, Lone Tree)…
Blue Million Miles emerged after the split of Small Objects in the fall of 2006. It was the classic case of a promising young band breaking up and a much stronger, more focused entity coming together. Weaving together strands of gritty space rock with insistent, jittery post-punk rhythms, Blue Million…
Marnie Stern & Motheater Slide Show…
Hot IQs, Everything Absent or Distorted and Laylights Bluebird Theater Saturday, June 23 Slide Show…
Richard “Kush” Griffith, who died this week in Kentucky at age 58, leaves behind a legacy in Denver, where he’d lived for the previous decade — but more importantly, he put his mark on some of the best and most vital popular music made on this planet during the past…
“I’d just like to take a second to say ‘Fuck you’ to our sponsors. Fucking rock and roll doesn’t need fucking sponsors. You guys can go suck my dick.” I swear, I just about inhaled my juice box when I heard Aaron Collins from Machine Gun Blues unload that banana…
“Maybe I could be the first rapper-slash-doctor!” As he applies to medical schools for next year, Nathaniel Motte — beatmaker and one half of Boulder crunk-rock duo 3OH!3 — is getting psyched about the cred this will win him in the hip-hop game. “Let’s put this down in ink,” he…
For Cephalic Carnage guitarist Zac Joe, the process of making the group’s new CD, Xenosapien, was overwhelming at times. “You’re so focused in on the little details that it’s hard to pull out and tell whether what you’re doing is genius or crap,” he says. Fortunately, the results are a…
Musicians might not have a 401(k) to fall back on, but at least they can make a small fortune on eBay. A corset worn by Neko Case recently fetched $300 for charity, but don’t expect the alt-country goddess to open up her hamper to the highest bidder just yet. Her…
