Unless you’re a barfly or an Enzyte stockholder, “stiff” isn’t a very fetching adjective. At best, it connotes cold reserve and efficiency; at worst, it means corpse. And yet stiff will go down as the prevalent rock descriptor of the early ’00s, when the Strokes and Interpol appropriated plenty of…
Adolescence is a scam, a pigeonhole chiseled out by sneaky shrinks and marketing strategists. Any sane human knows firsthand that sexuality starts far before puberty and that the need to pound beers and pop zits lasts way past pre-adulthood. Likewise, it’d be asinine to dismiss music of the Milkshakes as…
In the 1990s, Junior Sanchez was one of America’s seminal house artists. Incorporating elements of disco, funk and soul, Sanchez’s sound was as smooth as it was infectious and funky. Through constant touring and the release of dozens of singles, the New York DJ became the face of that city’s…
The archetypal rock band has one golden rule: No girlfriends/boyfriends allowed. Few couples can survive the asphalted adventures of touring, and fewer still can endure the even more harrowing experience of actually being in a band with one another. It’s usually a contentious John Lennon/ Yoko Ono ordeal or an…
Todd Park Mohr is done making albums. Take it easy: That’s albums, not music. In fact, Cabeza Grande’s recent output has increased dramatically, as a visit to Big Head Todd and the Monsters’ website will attest. Back in November, Mohr and company — bassist Rob Squires, drummer Brian Nevin and…
INXS bassist Garry Beers admits that J.D. Fortune, a contestant on last year’s reality-TV series Rock Star: INXS, didn’t make a great initial impression on either the general public or the band, whose search for a new singer provided the premise for the show. “He was in the bottom three…
She Wants Revenge’s Justin Warfield and Adam Bravin have been on the music scene for more than a decade. The L.A. DJ/producers have crossed paths many times but only recently found a way to turn their love of American soul, break-dancing records and ’80s music into a tense, percolating amalgam…
The novelty song, be it “Monster Mash,” “Fish Heads” or “Eat It,” has always been a staple of the adolescent male. But sometimes the funniest songs are made by stone-faced men — and these men should not be congratulated. When Disco D (working with a collaborator whom we shall call…
Attending an Aimee Mann show is no different than flipping a coin. Some nights she’s on — clouds part, angels sing and souls are saved — and others, well, you’re left scratching your head as to why you didn’t just order Thai takeout instead. Let’s hope the recent release of…
I’ve seen the future of hippie music, and it’s called Sound Tribe Sector 9. Moreover, this phrase isn’t nearly as much of a backhanded insult as it initially appears. Sure, the Atlanta-based quintet is beloved by the I-swear-hemp-underwear-doesn’t-itch crowd, which helps explain why the group has seemingly performed in Colorado…
Every roots-reggae outfit has paid homage to R&B legend Curtis Mayfield — including the Meditations, a harmony trio that spun out of rocksteady act the Linkers. Formed in 1973 by Channel One Studio duo Ansel Cridland (a former racetrack jockey) and Danny Clarke, the Meditations likewise boast fellow Kingstonian and…
Duncan Sheik emerged in the mid-’90s as the hyper-sensitive balladeer responsible for the inescapable, saccharine-drenched lite-rock staple “Barely Breathing,” which contained the shmaltzy refrain “I only taste the saline when I kiss away your tears.” Sheik was Howie Day before Howie Day. After that, by all conventional wisdom, Sheik should…
It’d be a lot more fun to write this item if Aerosmith had flat-out gone to hell. Then there’d be no reason not to note that Steven Tyler is more of a fashion disaster than Paris Hilton these days. (Enough with the scarves, dude. They make people think you’re about…
Disturbed is underrated — it’s that simple. Five years ago, the band’s first album, The Sickness, mixed electronic beats and synth textures with crunching guitars. Abetted by a frontman who seemed to let his inner orangutan out at all the right moments, the act was more KMFDM than Korn, but…
Forty-something Illinois songwriter Ike Reilly owns a fascinating backstory. He kicked around the Chicago bar-band circuit in the ’80s and early ’90s before falling out of the music scene and working as a hotel doorman and a gravedigger. He was rediscovered in his late thirties, signed to (and then dropped…
Few musical acts receive universal praise for any aspect of their work, but Shinedown — generally not hailed as anything other than “good enough” — is rarely rivaled when it comes to its live shows, impassioned affairs that leave audiences chanting and swaying like drunken monks. The Florida-based crew is…
A good fight on film is a beautiful thing. It takes a precise cinematic scope with slow-motion camera sweeps and perfect corn syrup blood to really give that jab to the jaw just the right crunch. But, like real estate, it’s also all about location. Where would Tyler Durden be…
DJ Swamp’s showmanship sets him apart from his peers, to say the very least. Known as the Sid Vicious of hip-hop DJs, when the L.A.-based turntablist isn’t breathing fire or setting his hands ablaze while mixing, he’s breaking his own records and carving up his chest with the shards ’til…
“I must confess that over my career, I’ve actually downplayed the importance of DJs,” says Peter Hook. “It’s such a different art form. Then all of a sudden you try it, and you think, ‘Good God, these guys do work.’ I used to be very cynical and very blasé about…
When they’re making music together under the Tegan and Sara banner, identical twins Tegan and Sara Quin are halves of a whole. But they’re also individuals — and according to Tegan, plenty of people have difficulty reconciling this apparent contradiction. “A lot of times, they treat you as one entity,”…
Dave Wakeling speaks in a soft British accent. He uses words like “magpie” and compares getting compliments to scoring a goal in football (that’s soccer to us Yanks). Even in a tiff, the English Beat alum is as cordial as afternoon tea. Take, for example, the clash that currently divides…
“You know the rose girl that goes around selling roses in bars and restaurants?” asks French-born, Arizona-based songwriter Marianne Dissard. “That’s what I used to do in downtown Tucson. Tucson is not like Paris. There aren’t a lot of people on the sidewalk. You’re isolated. So that job was a…
