Hearts of Palm to reunite for a pair of proper farewell shows

Before unceremoniously calling it quits with after a Halloween show last year, Hearts of Palm was arguably one of the brightest acts to emerge from the Denver music scene in the past decade. An outfit with boundless potential, the group, which got its start as Nathan & Stephen, was known…

Toad Tavern celebrates its two-year anniversary this weekend

Okay, that headline may be a tad misleading. The Toad Tavern has actually been around for more than two decades. Two years ago, though, a stalwart of the scene, Brice Hancock, who plays guitar in Rubber Planet and has been involved in a number of other area clubs, including the…

Arcanium tapped as support for Megadeth tour

Speaking of metal bands from up north, Arcanium received some righteous news this week. The Loveland-based outfit, which just a new album titled The Architects, was just tapped as a supporting act on Megadeth’s upcoming Endgame tour with Machinehead and Suicide Silence, which kicks off at the Orbit Room in…

Immortal Dominion nearly finished recording new album. Again.

You know the notion that once you’ve recorded an album it’s forever? That’s not always the case, apparently. Witness Immortal Dominion. Remember back in April when the act released its new album, Primortal? Kind of a big deal for the group, which was stoked to have had the chance to…

This Just In: Railroad Earth to play a three-night stand in Boulder

Coming off a pretty impressive summer of high profile Colorado appearances, including a return to Telluride Bluegrass Festival, a packed tent at Mile High Music Festival and a stop at Red Rocks with the Allman Brothers, acoustic jam band Railroad Earth could almost call Colorado their second home. Add in…

Pick up a Live Nation passport and see a dozen Fillmore shows

Wow! Live Nation has outdid itself this time. All summer, the concert promoter has been offering up new ticket specials every week, from buy one get one deals to suspending service charges. Today, though, it unveiled its Live Nation Passport, which gains you admittance to a dozen Fillmore shows. Best…

3OH!3 becomes a game-show question

There are many measures of an artist’s success, but how do you know you’ve truly arrived? Riches? Groupies? Nah, you’ve really made it when you’re so well-known you get turned into the answer for a game show. That’s just what’s happened to 3OH!3, as captured in the filmed-from-the-TV-screen clip embedded…

The Fray’s manager fires back

In response to the lawsuit filed against him by the Fray this past Monday, Gregg Latterman is reportedly planning to “mount a vigorous defense,” an unnamed spokesperson told Pollstar yesterday, claiming the charges have no merit and that the band was well aware of Latterman’s association with EMI prior to…

Producer Boon Doc has beef with his MPC 1000

When producers have problems with their equipment, it’s usually solved quickly by checking out the index or troubleshooting page of an instruction manual. But in the case of Denver producer Boon Doc, aka Boonie Mayfield, who is currently preparing for the Red Bull Big Tune Finals in Atlanta next month,…

Have yourself a good ol’ time at Ristau’s Roadhouse

A woman cradling a little black dog like a baby, its head on her shoulder, danced alone at Ristau’s Roadhouse (2035 South Sheridan Boulevard), while another woman, a middle-aged blonde, sang a karaoke version of Patsy Cline’s “Crazy.” (Yeah, I know that Willie Nelson wrote the song early in his…

Cougar Legs at the hi-dive

Based on song titles alone, you’d think Cougar Legs (due at the hi-dive on Saturday, September 19) was some kind of wiseacre Marcel Duchamp-esque joke perpetrated by pretentious artists. The act’s music, however, is more like that beautifully post-apocalyptic dirge that somehow ended up in a horrible science-fiction movie like…

Oh My God

Post-grunge keyboard ballads don’t exactly fulfill the grunge-comeback prophecy whispered by music journalists over the past few years. And yet Chicago’s Oh My God is about the most viable revivalist of mid-’90s sturm und drang around today — due mostly to a vocal style that growls and thunders like a…

Autolux

The pedigree of Autolux reads a bit like the alternative-rock should-have-beens: Guitarist Greg Edwards was in the influential space-rock band Failure, and drummer Carla Azar was in the pop-rock outfit Ednaswap, whose song “Torn” became a hit when covered by Natalie Imbruglia. With Autolux, Edwards and Azar, along with bassist…

Mayer Hawthorne

Although now based in Los Angeles, Mayer Hawthorne (born Andrew Cohen) grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Instead of following the route of proto-punk rock bands like the Stooges or co-opting the latter-day bluesy garage rock of the Dirtbombs, Hawthorne embraced the soulful sounds and perfect melodies produced under Berry…

Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers

“You try and you try and you try again/But you can’t try enough,” Stephen Kellogg sings on “Shady Esperanto and the Young Hearts,” a key track from The Bear, his latest recording — and that pretty much sums up his worldview. Through much of the album, he comes across like…

The Airborne Toxic Event

There’s no denying just how derivative and calculating the music of the Airborne Toxic event is. And while it would be easy to loathe the band out of hand — as Pitchfork did with its infamous 1.6/10 review of the act’s self-titled debut — the fact remains that The Airborne…

Andy Ard

At the decade’s dawn, transplanted Georgians Andy Ard and Rachel Simring established themselves in these parts as an acoustic duo cleverly dubbed Rachel & Andy – but while the subhead of a 2001 Westword profile declared that they lived “in perfect harmony,” the truth was more complicated, as it usually…