Concerts

THUNDERCAT at LARIMER LOUNGE | 11/19/13 Standing in the middle of a pulsating crowd of people dancing their asses off last night at the Larimer Lounge, I noticed the scene was tastefully decorated with diverse pockets of older gentlemen, hippie chicks, approachable beardos and cool guys. Somehow, Stephen “Thundercat” Bruner…

MICHAL MENERT at FILLMORE AUDITORIUM | 11/16/13 Taking the stage waving a Colorado state flag bearing his own name, Michal Menert humbly thanked the crowd for coming out and supporting him and then opened up the throttle of samples. With a new custom light stage, AC Lao on the drums,…

THURS | JOHN LEGEND at ELLIE CAULKINS OPERA HOUSE | 11/21/13 A child prodigy who’s been playing the piano since age five and attended college at sixteen, John Legend played with Lauryn Hill, Alicia Keys and Janet Jackson, among others, before Kanye West noticed his talent and took him under…

SAT | MICHAL MENERT at FILLMORE AUDITORIUM | 11/16/13 Since his debut solo album Dreaming of a Bigger Life, Michal Menert has been steadily touring the country building a grassroots following in the same way Derek Vincent Smith of Pretty Lights did when he first hit the scene. Menert has…

FRI & SAT | THE BLACK CROWES at OGDEN THEATRE|11/15-11/16 In the late ’80s, many young musicians were embracing the myth of the ’60s. In 1989, the Black Crowes (due at the Ogden Theatre on Friday, November 15, and Saturday, November 16) emerged from that cultural backdrop with a bluesy,…

THE BLACK CROWES at THE OGDEN THEATRE 11/13/13 While the crowd on Wednesday night seemed completely receptive to first of the Black Crowes’ three nights at the Ogden Theatre, the place pretty much exploded with energy once the band launched into “Remedy” about an hour and a half into its…

Over the past decade or so, Broadways Sports Tavern, a pool and dart bar at 3978 South Broadway, was open one day a week for a pool league. But in September, Danielle Jurnisky, who was an owner of the Aussie Pub down the street, and Chel Johnson, who was a…

NINE INCH NAILS at 1STBANK CENTER | 11/13/13 From the very beginning, a Nine Inch Nails show creates a different kind of space, a heightened reality, accompanied by an unsurpassed light show. A pulsing low end preceded the band taking the stage, and the six distinctive lighting rigs above each…

“I didn’t know what to say with a gun in my face,” Michal Menert recalls, “but I figured if they were going to kill me, I’d better make my move.” In December 2006, Menert’s means of generating income had brought him face to face with the barrel of a shotgun…

Kristina Murray’s honeyed vocals and bright guitar style can be deceiving on Unravelin,’ especially as conduits for angry tirades and tales of all-night benders. But her vocal artistry tempers words that can feel like parodies of old-fashioned country-and-Western lyrics: “You’re a cheater and a bastard, and I can’t tell you…

If the ThreadBarons’ moniker is a play on the word “threadbare,” it fits the weathered Americana made by the Denver quartet. On this self-titled disc, the act takes a well-worn, no-bullshit approach, injecting a mid-tempo country shuffle on tunes like “Window in the Winter” and “West Virginia” — the latter…

On Welcome to the Future, Prime Element is a finely tuned old-school hip-hop machine, equal parts lyricism, musicality and swaggering flair. As the only MC, A.V.I.U.S. may be the assumed face of the group, but Prime Element believes that each member speaks through his medium, and Welcome to the Future…

Starting off with the big beat of “Phase 5,” Blackcell’s In the Key of Black is a hybrid of modern and classic EBM, but there’s a darkness and density of sound here that seem to have eluded most modern purveyors of the genre. “Creatures of Habit” has a subtle and…

JESSIE WARE at LARIMER LOUNGE | 11/12/13 Not five minutes into her performance at the Larimer Lounge last night, soul singer Jessie Ware slipped out of her album cut “No to Love” and seamlessly into “I Want You,” by Marvin Gaye. It was a simple trick with a big payoff…

STEVE AOKI at OGDEN THEATRE | 11/12/13 Before Steve Aoki took the stage, as the lights dropped and the crowd chanted the headliner’s name, two human pillars of symmetrical hexagons took the stage on each side, and a digitized voice slowly intoned “A-O-KI.” As soon as the Aoki took his…

MAZZY STAR at OGDEN THEATRE | 11/10/13 At about the halfway through Mazzy Star’s show last night at the Ogden Theatre, the stage went dark, and most of the band had left the stage. When the low lights came back on, they illuminated the forms of Hope Sandoval and David…

STIR FRIED at DONKEY O.T. | 11/8/13 Deadhead bars and Denver go hand in hand, and Jay Bianchi’s new bar/venue, the Donkey O.T., near Mile High Stadium in the space of old club Atmosphere, is one of the swankier deadhead bars you’ll step foot in. It’s clean, big and connected…

KREATOR at GOTHIC THEATRE | 11/8/12 One of the most arresting moments of Kreator’s show at the Gothic Theatre came when the band performed “Phobia.” The way the melody seemed to swim inside the aggressive main riff gave the song a layer of atmosphere without compromising how hard the song…

GREGORY ALAN ISAKOV at BOETTCHER CONCERT HALL As he spoke to the massive crowd at Boettcher Concert Hall, you could tell that Gregory Alan Isakov was still getting used to the scope of the venue and the caliber of the musicians he was playing with. “I’ve been very, very nervous…