Metallica’s latest mostly live disc, Some Kind of Monster, an eight-song EP which coincides with a just-released documentary by the same name, is the band’s weakest release to date. Considering that playing live helped the act earn its iconic status, Monster should have been a slam dunk, yet it falls…
Picture some weird teen-romance flick in which a lonely kid goes on an oceanside vacation with his family and winds up falling in love with the girl of his dreams against a soft-focus backdrop of rain showers, pounding surf and long, scenic drives up the coast. Now slice up the…
Although North Carolina’s Merge Records has accomplished a lot during its existence, the packaging of this irresistible three-CD anniversary celebration doesn’t betray any delusions of grandeur. Whereas many overviews might feature a pretentious essay about the imprint’s importance, Old Enough sports a satirical letter attributed to critic Ronald Thomas Clontle…
Reverend Horton Heat (appearing Friday, July 23, at the Ogden Theatre) was once the James Brown of psycho-billy. But with Revival, his eighth full-length, he’s in danger of becoming the genre’s George Thorogood. His warmed-over Elvis riffs and sleazy double entendres have never been exactly what you’d call penetrating, but…
Most metal aficionados would agree that the Scorpions ceased to be relevant after the release of At First Sting in 1984. Each subsequent effort — with the exception of 1985’s World Wide Live, a disc that adeptly captured the shining moments in the first half of the outfit’s lengthy career…
Greatest hits collections can swoop in to satisfy old fans who have lost their old albums. For 311 this means a fatally scratched copy of Music lost too long ago to recall, a faded-pale copy of 311 left on the floor of a friend’s car and the copy of Transistor…
Colorado has had a decent track record over the last few years when it comes to bands led by fierce, forceful women. Still, that might not be enough to prepare your average Denver rock slob for Stoli and the Beers. In the Alley is the trio’s debut, and it lays…
The inimitable Recone Helmut, who put his stamp on Denver music via his current combo and its predecessor, LD-50, is planning at least a temporary return to these climes following an extended stretch in New York City. He and new partner SyBO expect to arrive in early 2005 and stay…
After months of stumping up and down the Front Range, it’s finally over. The fine folks of Mootown got out and rocked the vote — and despite some recent hostile and unfounded chatter on a local message board, Dubya once again emerged victorious. Relax, Michael Moore sympathizers and put the…
As this summer approached, indie music was roaring into a new world of popularity and possible selloutdom. Lollapalooza had been overrun by indie acts: Morrissey, the Flaming Lips, Wilco, the Pixies and Modest Mouse (below). Modest Mouse’s first new album since 2000 had left fans tapping their feet to the…
When Sparta (above) was hastily convened in 2001 before the corpse of its predecessor, Texas’s would-be punk messiah At the Drive-In, had even been hauled down off the cross, the whole thing smelled a little suspicious. But any charges of necrophilia or opportunism have been conclusively laid to rest with…
Imitation is generally a stone drag — unless, that is, the impression allows observers to process something original but time-worn in a new and refreshing way. Such is the appeal of the Thrills, a quintet from Dublin, Ireland, whose work bears few obvious marks of the Emerald Isle. Instead, lead…
Hailing from Birmingham England by way of the West Indies, Steel Pulse is the first reggae band to perform at this (or any) American president’s inaugural celebration. As trivial as Steel Pulse’s rank is among ultra-roots purists who kneel before the holy trinity of Bob Marley, Culture and Burning Spear,…
The question “Who Do You Dance For?” that Sahara Hotnights poses on Kiss & Tell is a far less threatening anthem than the femme-gem “Alright Alright (Here’s My Fist Where’s the Fight)” of its Jennie Bomb days. And though the tougher stance that the Hotnights had in 2002 is deeply…
For the third time this year, a Mötley Crüe member is Crüe-less in Colorado. Vince Neil is the band’s latest bad boy to venture out on his own when he hits Hawgfest, the seventh annual classic-rock rally from 103.5 The Fox, on Saturday, July 24. The Fox’s two-day event of…
When guitarist Mike Buckley first became known around town in the mid-’90s as a player in the popular teen-punk band Vivid Imagination, it would have been impossible to predict where he’d wind up circa 2004. Now a seasoned, if low-key, veteran of the Denver scene, he’s carved out a much…
Over the course of the past ten years, Washington D.C.’s Palash Ahmed (left), along with his partner, Saeed Younan, have accomplished what every aspiring house jock daydreams about: They’re among an exclusive group of stateside house DJs who have attained international headliner status, playing frequently in club Meccas such as…
“What the fuck do I have to do? I’m not paying you unless someone in the band does this interview.” The man speaking is named David. He’s the tour manager of Hollywood’s latest savior of rock and roll, the Icarus Line. His frustration cuts through his cell phone’s ear-splitting static:…
We’re young, we’re black, and we got some gangsta-ass music,” asserts Prodigy, one half of the New York-based crew Mobb Deep, telling why America should still fear this Mobb. “And we got fans.” Prodigy and his cohort Havoc, poets from the Queensbridge Projects, earned those fans by chronicling the grimy…
Though the album was released last year as a lo-fi debut from a band that surprised critics with its maturity, Sub Pop is re-releasing Rogue Wave’s Out of the Shadow. The cleaner sound serves its songs well, considering that on acoustic-driven folk tunes like “Be Kind & Remind” you can…
If memory serves, Aaliyah is dead — killed in what appears to have been one of the most preventable plane crashes ever. So it’s something of a shock when a new tune called “Who Is She 2 U” kicks off with an intro by Timbaland, Aaliyah’s favorite producer, that’s remarkably…
A while back, Pearl Jam issued a slew of cheap, generically packaged live CDs, supposedly as a treat for its fans. Of course, Vedder and crew, who haven’t exactly been raking it in lately, were just trying to beat the bootleggers at their own game. What’s great about Fugazi’s similar…
