Slap the folk label on a band is kind of a sweeping generalization — simplicity in instrumentation and a focus on vocals might be a better way to describe Portland’s Priory, who come through Denver tonight for the second time in the past few months. Reminiscent of Wolf Parade and…
A HAWK AND A HACKSAW With Radical Knitting Circle • The Tanukis 03.09.11 | hi-dive A Hawk and a Hacksaw is not, in any certain terms, the type of band you yearn to see live. The outfit plays Eastern-European infused music with hat-tips to Middle Eastern and klezmer-inflected music with…
Everybody knows Randy Newman — his comforting, sometimes scruffy and bubble-throated voice has been a recognizable movie soundtrack staple for years. The ragtime piano player has scored over two dozen films — like this year’s Oscar winner for original song, “We Belong Together” from Toy Story 3 — making him…
Ah, Christopher Wallace, aka the Notorious B.I.G. There hasn’t been — and as long as hip-hop is a genre, won’t be — a quiet passing of March 9. Similar to when Buddy Holly took the fateful flight that inspired a nation to observe the day the music died, the day…
Purple: Perhaps the least popular color in the Crayola box next to taupe and coral. Save for fans of Prince, the Minnesota Vikings, the Fluid and Grimace, it’s not exactly the most enticing color in the world. Amazingly, however, the Uncertain Sea has combined purple with a sort of sea…
Deep in the heart of Texas, about seventy bazillion bands and at least as many tastemakers are converging in Austin for the annual South by Southwest celebration. It’s a symbiotic relationship: The bands have high hopes of being fawned over (or at least remembered fondly) by the tastemakers, whose meager…
DJ Ktone’s birthday celebration is being hailed as “The Greatest Show on Turf,” and with it’s five days of celebrations featuring some of Denver’s most prominent hip-hop artists, it’s tough not to believe the hype. There are autograph signings, red carpets, Moolah Boyz and rap tactics galore…
This morning, while most of us in the working world were sound asleep, the dudes from Big Head Todd and the Monsters were at Mission Control in Houston serenading the astronauts aboard the Shuttle Discovery on their last day in space with Big Head’s song “Blue Sky.”…
Psst. What do you have planned for Saturday, April 23? Too far ahead? We know what we’re doing. We just circled that date on our calendar in bright-red ink. From what we hear, that’s the day the lovely and talented Ms. Lauryn Hill will finally make her way back to…
Yo Mama’s Big Fat Booty Band may hail from the East Coast, but the act’s sound is certainly at home in Colorado: Rubbery bass lines combined with an explosive horn section creates a dance-friendly atmosphere that jam fans have very much embraced. Just in time for a Fat Tuesday celebration,…
It’s no secret that smartphones have changed the way we experience music, but most of the apps we’ve seen thus far have been spotty, poorly realized cash grabs that have little or nothing to do with the artists in question…
As reported last week, the Avett Brothers will be at Red Rocks in July, while Warren Haynes and Cake are due at the Ogden in May and June respectively. Also, Arctic Monkeys, who have been working on their fourth album, make their way back to the Ogden again on Monday,…
THE BODY With MjolniirDXP 03.07.11 | Blast-O-Mat “That seemed quiet to me. I dunno, was that loud?” Body guitarist Chip King asked us this earnestly after his band’s set last night, worried that one of his bookcase-sized amps wasn’t quite pulling its weight, perhaps due to the cold temperature of…
Jim McTurnan does not seem like someone who would put out an album called Joie de Vivre. McTurnan is just not the type you usually find espousing the joy of living. Cat-A-Tac, his previous band, was a consciously dour affair, and McTurnan spent some formative years living in England, where…
Leigh Jones already owned Jonesy’s EatBar, the Horseshoe Lounge next door and Bar Car, which opened just last June in the former home of the Recovery Room, so she thought it might be too soon to open a fourth place. But after Steve Gelman closed the Boston Fish Shack (which…
In the crowded realm of bands purveying sunny garage-pop, it’s a little difficult to stand out, because the stuff seems to be coming out of the woodwork far and wide. Sauna (due at the hi-dive on Monday, March 14) has a youthful exuberance that most of those bands do not…
Both tremendously innovative bassists, Stanley Clarke and Victor Wooten have pushed the boundaries of bass playing since beginning their careers in their early twenties. Clarke got his start in the ’70s backing up jazz heavies like Horace Silver, Dexter Gordon, Stan Getz and Chick Corea’s legendary fusion group Return to…
A cursory glance at a list of the bands involved in the Elephant 6 collective is basically a who’s who of the most interesting, influential underground pop bands of the 1990s and beyond. Founded by future members of the Apples in Stereo, Olivia Tremor Control and Neutral Milk Hotel, Elephant…
One of the world’s most loved and respected DJs, Lee Burridge has stayed credible and relevant, despite the notoriously fickle nature of dance-music trends, over the course of a career that is now entering its fourth decade. From his early days playing in the nightclubs of Hong Kong and at…
It might be a bit of an exaggeration to call Jeff Angell the Jeffrey Lee Pierce of Seattle, but a quick listen to Diamonds in a Dead Sky, the Missionary Position’s latest full-length, reveals rich, sonically diverse songwriting coupled with emotionally raw performances in all the right places. Although a…
“Glowing Eyes” finds Flashlights in a mood of deep, late-night contemplation. And that’s fitting, because “New Hampshire” sounds like waking up just after dawn on a cloudy day before the fog has lifted. Along with the contemplative “Canoes,” Flashlights display a real talent here for making sublimely surreal, hazy, pleasantly…
Before releasing an EP last year, New Ben Franklins frontman Dave DeVoe said his ultimate goal was to sound like the Catherine Wheel playing Johnny Cash songs. He admitted it was impossible to do, but it was a great goal to have. While somehow fusing shoegaze and country is a…
