“Are you ready for an action packed thrill ride?” the members of this group wonder in their brief “theme song” — but instead of belting out the inquiry in belligerent tones against a strident backdrop, they warble with inebriated brio over a straggling guitar strum. That’s called irony, my friends,…
Hard-ons, Most People Are a Waste of Time (Bad Taste Records). Like a Twinkie filled with dog poo, these seemingly innocuous pop confections serve as an odious delivery system for caustic messages. Sure, the Hard-ons sound like Jan & Dean, but try hassling one of their girlfriends and they’ll drown…
With his third and most recent album, Nightcrawler, Pete Yorn firmly established himself somewhere between Zach Braff and Bruce Springsteen on the New Jerseyan artistic continuum. A post-modern pop-rocker, Yorn makes songs that are accessible to the masses, even if they don’t directly speak on their behalf. His 2001 debut,…
Before Winger was the butt of many jokes, the Denver-bred Bon Jovi doppelgänger and his bandmates undoubtedly had busloads of Betties on standby in every zip code and were printing their own money, thanks to two consecutive albums that went platinum (a feat nearly unheard of in today’s digital age)…
It’s appropriate that Senses Fail is on the “Taste of Chaos” tour, since the New Jersey band’s music hints at anarchy without succumbing to it. Still Searching, released last year on the Vagrant imprint, features the usual emo ingredients: dark guitar textures, chugging tempos, lyrical dourness with monikers to match…
Thanks to a clip uploaded to YouTube late last year, Andy McKee has become something of a guitar hero. The video, which features McKee performing a song called “Drifting,” has generated over two million hits, making it one of the most watched music videos on the site. So what’s the…
American Idol’s 2006 hard-rock experiment has certainly paid off from a sales standpoint: Daughtry, the debut disc by Chris Daughtry, last season’s designated metal man, has already reached platinum status, and it continues to sell steadily (at least by current standards). Not that its success is surprising. Indeed, the disc…
Damieon Hines is taking peeps to school. The DJ and Future Jazz Project drummer launched Sound College a couple of weeks ago at La Rumba with that idea in mind. Every Wednesday, the theme focuses on a different style of music; the concept is to explore funk, hip-hop, soundtracks and…
There’s a trio of heavy hitters anchoring this year’s edition of JazzFest Denver (taking place on Friday, February 23, and Saturday, February 24, at the Sherman Events Center). Kevin Mahogany possesses one of the smoothest voices on the jazz scene and has a resounding baritone that recalls Joe Williams and…
I’m no Mark Pellington or David LaChapelle, so take this for what it’s worth: The new Laylights video looks like a million bucks. “I know,” marvels Laylights frontman Tyler Hayden. “That’s why we were so excited about it.” The Laylights paid the Lockerpartners (Emily and Mary Grace) less than you’d…
Anita and Kevin Robinson, the happily wedded couple behind Portland, Oregon’s Viva Voce, are partners in life, “but we’re also musical partners,” Anita says. “We have been since the moment we met. I just respect the hell out of him as an artist, and I think everything he does is…
James Wellensiek may be one of the scene’s elder statesmen, but you’d never know it. Granted, today he hardly resembles the lean, sneering punk heartthrob on the inside of Pinhead Circus’s Fall in Love All Over Again (he has, ahem, more facial hair now), but the guy’s got the vigor…
For all intents and purposes, Sparklehorse is Mark Linkous. And yet, despite a welcome move to a western North Carolina mountaintop and noteworthy assists from Tom Waits, Danger Mouse and the Flaming Lips’ Steven Drozd, his latest release, Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain (full of…
Although Fall Out Boy lyricist/dreamboat Pete Wentz is inveterately verbose, his words don’t mask profundity, and that’s a big reason for his band’s success. A lot of emo acts have a limited audience due to all that freakin’ emotion. But instead of turning songs into platforms for pain, Wentz eschews…
If Fergie required an artistic answer (aside from “Uh, no, thanks”), MC Romy Hoffman, aka Macromantics, would be the perfect nuclear-blast reply. Rather than dangle her pussy like car keys, Hoffman cuts verbal territory in back-flipped knots of Mad Hatter intellectualism. Moments in Movement builds its grooves off jagged edges…
Colder Than Fargo There’s no pretense in Dogs and Tumbleweeds, the third Colder Than Fargo recording. The group, which celebrates the disc’s release on Saturday, February 17, at the Larimer Lounge alongside deadbubbles, Januar, Killfix and Sonatine, favors straightahead playing and frills-free arrangements whose simplicity and sincerity more than compensate…
Constellations has pushed itself out of the shadow of danceable post-punk, thanks to the addition of experimental noise auteur (and second percussionist) Corey Brown, who’s taken on some of the songwriting duties. Necrogeister begins with the ominous yet lively title track, which initially sounds familiar, then takes a turn into…
Chimp Beams, Menina (Consent Productions). Almost mellow enough to get boring, Menina’s spaced-out dub instrumentals would benefit greatly from more guest vocals. The New York-based Japanese trio adds experimental jazz, hip-hop and house to its approach, resulting in a lighter flavor than that found on its 2004 debut, Vibrato. Operating…
The Shins’ third and newest album, Wincing the Night Away, was readily available on your favorite illegal file-sharing service early last November, a full three months before its official release. The fact that Wincing went on to debut at #2 on the Billboard album charts — with a whopping 35,000…
Texas-based Fair to Midland isn’t beginning its climb up the ladder of success on the bottom rung, and Serj Tankian is the reason. The System of a Down frontman has signed the combo to his Serjikal Strike imprint and is listed as the executive producer on The Drawn and Quartered…
Like Eskimo, the Zs have a quirky playfulness about them that is confounding and amazing in equal measure. Part rock band and part chamber ensemble, with a whole lot in between, the Brooklyn-based act displays a frenetic dexterity that evokes a sense of controlled chaos — like pistons pumping furiously,…
Music marketed to jam fans can seem interchangeable, but a wider variety of acts fit under the genre’s umbrella than most outsiders realize. Take Mike Dillon’s Go-Go Jungle, a band that touches upon a lot more than the two club styles referenced in its name. As implied by Dillon’s eclectic…
