Jess Parsons and Steve Varney connected instantly before a songwriting class at the University of Colorado Denver. The initial draw was the fact that aside from being musicians, they were both songwriters, too. Over the course of a week they had off from school during the 2008 Democratic National Convention,…
Michal Menert is a busy man. From dropping multiple albums to playing show after show under the monikers he’s created with other Pretty Lights Music artists, he is always on the grind. Tonight at the Larimer Lounge, he’ll play a special set for the premier of the So-Gnar’s Shredded Beats…
On Wednesday, September 12, you’ll have a chance to become part of history and help the Melvins weasel their way into the Guinness World Records book, which they hope to do by playing shows in all fifty states plus one in the District of Columbia in just 51 days. One…
While it’s true that nearly every corner of folk-inspired music has been explored ad infinitum, Patrick Dethlefs (due at Swallow Hill on Friday, June 8) doesn’t sound like he’s trying to be Bob Dylan, Townes Van Zandt, Richard Thompson or Nick Drake.Maybe he worked his way through those influences early…
Rick Ross exploded onto the scene as a huge presence, both in stature and lyrics. His deep, gruff voice chronicled ghetto life in Miami with lurid details of the cocaine game and the ways of a hustler. Having amassed crazy amounts of success with hits like “Hustlin'” and collaborative joints…
Techno has always been influenced to varying degrees by the aggressive percussion and atonal noise of industrial, a connection readily apparent in the forward-thinking output of London’s Perc (aka Ali Wells). One of the leading producers in techno today, Perc released Wicker & Steel, his debut, last year on his…
Lemonade started in San Francisco and then moved to New York, but you’d never know it from listening to the band’s music. With its synthesis of ’80s club music, the trio recalls the sound of bands coming out of Miami — if those bands were clued into Afro-Cuban rhythms without…
In spite of his being just a wee tiny baby, my nine-month-old son has some surprisingly powerful pinchy-claws. In fact, combined with his baby fingernails, which are honed into needle-sharp points like tiny knives, it can hurt quite a bit when he grabs at you. Nevertheless, my girlfriend and I…
“Mirrored Minds,” the opening track on The Distance We’ve Created, the debut EP from Fire Season (due for release at a free all-ages show this Saturday, June 9, at Wax Trax), recalls that era of rock music in the ’90s when the lines were blurred between emo, indie rock and…
In a perfect world, one in which the Mountain Goats and the Hold Steady run in slow motion across fields and inhabit a pastoral bungalow in Denver, Instant Empire would share a literal and figurative home with them. Dripping with ambition and driven by personal history, the five local storytellers…
SuCh (aka Su Charles) uses her voice to stretch beyond the typical themes most songstresses explore. Tackling topics ranging from pregnancy to friendship to the earthquake in Haiti, SuCh comes across as deeply personal on Stretch Marks — almost distractingly so. The arrangements are melodic and become more succinct as…
Default Champion’s new EP is a contemplative post-rock soundtrack for wide open spaces. The tightly arranged album opens with “Egg,” an introduction mingling introspective layers of guitar with sustained rips of distortion. “Caterpillar” is like the stoned teenage son of Joe Meek and Broken Social Scene, where layers of spaghetti-Western…
Zuko Valencia (also known as Zuko or Zuk) is a musical jack-of-all-trades — and that’s true even when compared to his peers, many of whom are classically trained instrumentalists and producers as well as set-spinners. His influences range from jazz to spoken word (he’s performed with Miles’s son Greg Davis)…
The Say So does not stand on ceremony. Actually, right now, the four twenty-something dudes who make up the band aren’t “standing” at all. Tucked into the corners of mostly stable, occasionally footless chairs, the guys are sprawled across the living room of guitarist Noah Fisher’s Capitol Hill apartment, which…
Aside from fronting the Autumn Film, Latifah Phillips is also a member of a hymn project, Page CXVI, with her husband, Reid, and Dann Stockton. About a year ago, Phillips met Nashville-based singer-songwriter Derek Webb, who wanted to remix some of Page CXVI’s tracks for the album re:hymns, which hits…
The Denver Doom Fest, which was held last December at the Larimer Lounge, has expanded to two days this year and will take place on Friday, October 5 and Saturday, October 6 at 3 Kings Tavern. While the lineup features some returning acts from last year, such as Royal Talons,…
Local jazz and blues vocalist James Van Buren passed away yesterday from cancer. He was 77. Mark Diamond, Paul Romaine, Doug Roche, Mark Klagstad — who all played with Van Buren — and Freddy Rodriguez Sr. and others were scheduled to perform tonight at a benefit show tonight at Cervantes’…
Things might be slowing down a bit with the bigger concert announcements, but there was still a fair amount of activity during the last week, including Jane’s Addiction at the Pikes Peak Center in Colorado Springs, Swans and Xiu Xiu at the Gothic Theatre, and Aaron Freeman (aka Gene Ween)…
If you’re looking for the perfect soundtrack for that Miami Vice-themed party you’re planning, Destroyer’s newest release, Kaputt, should do the trick. Whereas main Destroyer (and wild-card New Pornographer) Dan Bejar’s back catalogue is full of ramshackle chamber pop and folky mopes, Kaputt could very well be an ushering moment…
The Colorado Music Hall of Fame has announced plans for its next induction event. On Saturday, September 8 at the Boulder Theater, the Astronuats, Sugarloaf, Flash Cadillac and KIMN Radio will join the Hall’s most recent inductees, Barry Fey and Harry Tuft, alongside the inaugural inductees John Denver and Red…
Flying Lotus swooped into Two AM Afterhours absolutely beaming after his set at Red Rocks on Saturday night and absolutely tore it down, setting a new precedence for incredible, wordlessly. He let the music do most of the talking without much toasting to the crowd from the microphone. In a…
Last night, Lorin Ashton (aka Bassnectar) brought his massive production to Red Rocks Amphitheatre for night one of the bass-infused mayhem. Backbeat’s own Britt Chester (who was also commissioned by the Bassnectar camp to document the evening) was on-hand for the festivities and brought back these photos from the night…
