I got this shit on lock! I got this shit on lock! Holler, holler at me if you’re on my block! Hours before the members of 3Oh!3 even rapped the opening lines from “Chokechain” on the Hurley Stage at the Warped Tour this past Sunday, it was clear: Sean Foreman…
During separate stints with Soundgarden and Audioslave, Chris Cornell was seen as the sort of brooding performer who had no time for glad-handing or show-business conventions. So why the holy hell did he agree to appear on Spike TV’s Guys Choice Awards, a June broadcast during which he bantered with…
Page McConnell is the first to admit that he’s better known as “the guy from Phish” than he is by his given name. Just the same, when Phish dissolved in 2004, McConnell wasn’t in a hurry to make a name for himself. Instead, he spent almost two years piecing together…
Before Umphrey’s McGee ever played a gig here, the Chicago-based act sent out 600 live CDs to be distributed throughout Denver, Boulder and Breckenridge. So when the band came through Colorado for a five-date stint in the spring of 2001, it sold out Quixote’s and the Trilogy Lounge in Boulder,…
The Dead Science writes pop music. Just ask guitarist/vocalist Sam Mickens. Despite any appearances to the contrary — the lo-fi recordings, the lilted, nervous-boy falsetto vocals or the elementary disregard for verse-chorus-verse structure — the act’s music is pure pop, Mickens insists. Sure, the Seattle-based trio’s sound is kindred to…
Groups that have put out excellent music in the past aren’t only competing with other current discs when they unleash a new album. They’re also going up against themselves — and by that measure, The Mix-Up falls way short. Admittedly, the Beasties didn’t set out to issue another Ill Communication…
Five years later, Spoon’s 2002 release, Kill the Moonlight, still feels new. In fact, it still has the acute ability to make listeners pace from room to room, clapping their hands, attempting bad imitations of Britt Daniel’s raspy croon, wishing there was a sweet party about to happen. It’s almost…
American Relay’s stripped-down, two-man approach to the blues isn’t particularly innovative. Nonetheless, the way the duo injects grit and earthy passion into the tired art form is refreshing. Nick Sullivan’s fiery vocal delivery is filled with the edgy danger that many have tried to approximate but few have attained. And…
Screaming? In general, thumbs up — but vocalists who roar too often risk sapping the technique of its power, much as comedians who constantly swear wind up making the word “fuck” seem about as shocking as the typical show on the ABC Family Channel. Death and the Lovers’ self-titled debut…
Buffalo Tom, Three Easy Pieces (New West). Buffalo Tom returns with its first album in seven years. Three Easy Pieces finds the act mixing pop rock and Americana values with hints of alternative jangle and grungy riffs. Trouble is, it’s seven years too late. The question here isn’t really who…
Weedeater: It’s hard to imagine a more appropriate handle for this North Carolina-based power trio, whose bass-heavy metal is marked by droning repetitive riffs and augmented by indecipherable monster-sized vocals. On its most recent effort, the Steve Albini-produced God Luck and Good Speed, the act burns through eight tracks of…
Noise as an art form has been embraced in basements, garages and warehouses ever since Russolo’s 1913 “Art of Noises” manifesto and Schoenberg’s “Emancipation of Dissonance” proclamation. Philadelphia-based artist Mark Price is helping secure the movement’s future with his homemade noise-generating devices. Price drives his current vehicle, appropriately named Cars…
There’s nothing better on a sweltering summer night than a set of steamy, sexed-up house music. The heat, the sweat and the sense of freedom summer inspires all work together to bring out the hedonist in everyone. And if house music isn’t about hedonism, what’s the point? House specialist Nick…
Tom Morello, the virtuoso guitarist from Rage Against the Machine, has taken to calling himself the Nightwatchman and has been stealthily slipping in and out of coffee-shop open-mike nights. But don’t get your hopes up. With his new project, Morello leaves all of his prescience and talent behind in favor…
All right — let’s just get this out of the way, right off the bat: There isn’t anybody named Jacob Fred in the Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey. But the whole jazz part, well, there’s some truth to that. Much like the Bad Plus, the Tulsa-based trio uses jazz as a…
Desperately in need of a nightcap, I pop in to the Satellite Bar (308 East Colfax Avenue), which has been open for about three weeks now. Things are a little slow, but hey, it’s around midnight the night after the Fourth. Instead of watching skaters on half-pipe ramps on the…
The Green Fuse is known for ardent DIY aesthetics — specifically, its handsome homemade record covers and its soon-to-be-impractical cassette tape releases. And such crafty projects are telling of the truly underground nature of the trio, which has yet to — and may never — establish a MySpace page. More…
Gravy Train!!!! July 10, 2007 hi-dive Better than: Watching drag queens lip-synch to Cher. The Gravy Train!!!! show at the hi-dive featured flamingly gay men dressed in tighty-whiteys, plenty of silver lamé and kitschy, juvenile sexuality resulting in the type of campy theatrics rarely seen outside of a drag-queen revue…
Coheed and Cambria Slide Show At certain times, a reviewer should completely tune out fans in search of total objectivity. At others, the people most into the music should drive the critical train — and for this look at the thirteenth annual Warped Tour, which stopped at Invesco Field at…
Slide Show The Tanukis, Ukulele Loki and Chairlift July 7, 2007 The Larimer Lounge Better Than: Eating dinner. Seriously, I skipped dinner to see this show. Sometimes the best shows are the ones that you go to on a whim, where you’ve never heard any of the bands before and…
Yerkish and Something Underground July 5, 2007 The Soiled Dove Better than: Whatever passes for “Must See TV” these days Slide Show 99.5 the Mountain’s Homegrown Showcase got underway with Yerkish burning through an invigorating set of heavy art rock as a bizarre video reel projected on either side of…
Remember in Almost Famous when Penny Lane recounts the advice she gives to fellow band-aids, that whole bit about not taking things too seriously to avoid getting hurt, and how if they ever get lonely they can always go to the record store and visit their friends? That scene always…
