311, Don’t Tread on Me (Volcano). In the early ’90s, 311 was the harbinger of hybrid. Back then, the act was wide-eyed and innovative. Since that time, however, this Los-Angeles-by-way-of-Omaha quintet has steadily coasted into obsolescence. At this point, 311 sounds as laconic and dated as its treatment of the…
Dan Finnerty is living the dream. His old lady, Kathy Najimy, is a semi-famous Hollywood starlet; he fronts a band named after himself and jets across the globe like a rock star. Thing is, he’s not a rock star. He does play one on TV, though — er, rather, the…
Rock stars take drugs: Like most stereotypes, this one exists because it’s often true. And ever since DJs became the new rock stars at the peak of the rave scene, many of them have fallen into similar behavior patterns. There’s an exception to every rule, though, and Minnesota’s DJ ESP,…
Part of the West Coast honor roll from the gangsta class of ’91, DJ Quik made a name for himself with “Born and Raised in Compton” and “Tonight,” a pair of top-twenty hits from his debut album, Quik Is the Name. More renowned for his skills behind the soundboard than…
I’m not a morning person. Quite frankly, I’m homicidal before noon. As much as I love Slayer and the Geto Boys, their music is the last thing I reach for as I’m wiping the sleep from my eyes. On most days, prior to firing up that first pot of coffee,…
Purity, simplicity, integrity — three things that aren’t so chic in the realms of punk and indie rock right now. But amid a flood of packaged, plastic pretension, Michigan’s the Trembling isn’t afraid to shoot straight from the brain and heart. With all the head-rush riffs of Superchunk and tart…
Let’s just get this out of the way right now: The Redwalls are derivative. What’s more, the bands they derive from are not hiply obscure. So don’t expect to look like an authority when you play Spot the Influence with the tunes on De Nova, their major-label debut. To wit,…
Who knows what kind of chromosome damage the black-lunged ancestors of Lou Poster passed down to him? The singer/guitarist of Ohio’s Grafton is a native son of West Virginia, in whose hills dwelled four generations of coal-mining Posters. And his band’s racket — a tonsil-shot punk mired in brews and…
How have rock fads shifted during recent years? The career turns of Puddle of Mudd and its original benefactor, Limp Bizkit’s Fred Durst, are excellent barometers. Today Durst would probably leap at the chance to humiliate himself on some bottom-scraping reality show, but back in 2001, he was popular enough…
An intriguing side project that joins the laconic talents of Low’s Alan Sparhawk and Red House Painters’ Mark Kozelek, the Retribution Gospel Choir would seem to gravitate toward the grayer tones of the color spectrum. Then again, the band only recently formed and hasn’t released a single song together. Even…
From its sheepish little corner of the stable, Mutton kicks up enough noise to run with the bulls. But judging from both its debut disc, Organicism, and the follow-up EP, The Other Red Meat, the Denver-based trio seems just as happy to chew its cud in loving tribute to Minneapolis…
In a classic case of “If you want something done right, do it yourself,” Tyler Stadius began deejaying in Vancouver in 1991 after being consistently dissatisfied with the DJs he was hearing at warehouse parties around town — including some he threw himself. Already a veteran musician — he cut…
My intention is to play music full-time, not run a restaurant,” says Johnny James Qualley. “But I love this place so much that when the opportunity arose, I just couldn’t pass it up.” It’s a bright Monday afternoon between the lunch and dinner rush at Appaloosa Grill, an upscale but…
Since the ’70s, Devo has specialized in subversion, and the more twisted, the better. Early on, for instance, the band prompted unwitting fans to offer mock Hitler salutes during in-concert renditions of “Praying Hands” — a Triumph of the Will-like gag that demonstrated how easily groupthink can mutate into fascism…
Jack White’s new look and persona give us a few clues as to Who he’s trying to be these days. Take a look at these facts about the White Stripes frontman and see if you can figure it out: 1. He’s traded in his minimalist attire for that “bizarro dashing…
All hail the mighty compact disc! That piece of technology that let you listen to OK Computer without having to sit through “Fitter Happier.” While we know that no audio format lives forever — someday the CD will ascend to take its place next to hallowed eight-track cassettes — that…
From the moment my head hits the pillow until I drift off into the tranquil land of all-you-can-eat pizza served up by Kathy Sabine in a whipped-cream bikini, I spend countless hours staring at the glow-in-the-dark star pattern on my ceiling, wrestling with life’s nagging profundities. If I spend my…
Joel Peterson, aka Broken Spindles, logs plenty of miles as the full-time bassist for Beep Beep and retro-dance supergroup the Faint. As a minimal solo artist, the Omaha native also makes time before and after shows for what seems to be his favorite pastime: self-interrogation. In this third installment of…
As its moniker implies, Twin Cinema essentially doubles the theatricality of previous Pornographers efforts. While the title track constitutes hooky indie pop, the album as a whole conjures images of a Rent-like musical, with most numbers custom-made for cast members to belt toward the balcony. The shifting ensemble assembled by…
Pieced together by an all-star team of producers (RZA, Raekwon, Mark Ronson) and bolstered by guest vocalists like Missy Elliott, Macy Gray and fellow Wu-Tang alumni Ghostface and Method Man, A Son Unique feels more like a posthumous tribute to the late Russell Jones than an actual ODB album. Even…
With MPs and blogs disseminating and then commenting on new music at a nearly instantaneous rate, young bands can find themselves thrust into the spotlight before the ink on their discs is even dry. The self-released debut by Brooklyn’s Clap Your Hands Say Yeah — with no label or publicist…
Fate can be a sick fucker. As a founding member of Immortal Dominion, former bassist Stephen Sherwood helped forge some of the most brutal and unflinching metal Colorado has ever seen. On August 3, he shot his wife and then himself, killing them both, after returning from service in Iraq…
