Q&A With Geezer Butler of Heaven and Hell/Black Sabbath

Why stop at a Heaven and Hell concert preview item like the one in Westword’s September 20 issue when you’ve got a chance to chat with one of the architects of Black Sabbath? That’s what we asked ourselves — and the conclusion we drew accounts for the following conversation with…

The Lost Lily Allen Interview

As any regular concert-goer knows, shows get canceled all the time — and if notice of schedule changes reach newspapers like this one in time, articles about such gigs get the ax, too. During my years at Westword, such a turn of events has meant that three interviews I conducted…

Q&A With Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips

The Wayne Coyne profile that appears in the September 13 edition of Westword represents the SparkNotes version of a recent interview. Below, find the original text of our conversation with the Flaming Lips frontman, appearing unabridged and in its entirety. Coyne talks amusingly and at length about his band’s 2006…

Q&A With Jepha Howard of the Used

Space: When it comes to physical newspapers, there never seems to be enough of it. But on the web, there’s room aplenty – and that capacity allows us to expand a Now Hear This concert preview item about the Used that appears in the September 13 Westword to a full…

The Arcade Fire Burns With Energy

The Arcade Fire is one of the exciting and inventive acts to come out in the few years. Inventive instrumentation, and plugs from people like David Bowie, made their debut album Funeral a Cinderella success story and overnight they became the next it band. And they’ve capitalized on that success…

Rousing Conversation

Josh Rouse cannot make a dark-sounding record to save his life. His latest offering, Country Mouse, City House, was supposed to contain the musical equivalency of a New England winter day: overcast and cold with a high probability for snow. Instead, the disc sparkles with sunshine, smiling melodies and enough…

Welcome to the Tribe

Members of many bands big enough to be booked at Red Rocks aren’t interested in doing press — unless the show’s selling poorly, that is. But not only were some of the men in Sound Tribe Sector 9 eager to speak for the September 6 profile accessible here. All of…

Q&A: Zach Velmer of Sound Tribe Sector 9

Drummer Zach Velmer of Sound Tribe Sector 9, which gets the profile treatment in Westword’s September 6 issue, is an lively guy. He talks in the early portions of the interview below about how school instructors recommended that he take up drumming as a way to channel all of the…

Q&A: Jeffree Lerner of Sound Tribe Sector 9

Jeffree Lerner, the percussionist for Sound Tribe Sector 9, profiled in the September 6 edition of Westword, was the last member to join the band, and the most experienced going in, having previously served as a drum tech on extended tours by Colorado’s Leftover Salmon. In conversation, he comes across…

Q&A: David Phipps of Sound Tribe Sector 9

David Phipps plays keyboards for Sound Tribe Sector 9 (read more about them in this September 6 Westword article), but he’s also the group’s reigning tech guru — the musician as responsible as anyone for making the band sound forward-looking and adventurous. On top of that, he oversees STSP’s website,…

Q&A: David Murphy of Sound Tribe Sector 9

Bassist David Murphy, who helped launch Sound Tribe Sector 9 (the focus of this piece in the September 6 Westword), is among the group’s funniest and most voluble members. He paints vivid portraits of the times, places and personalities at the heart of the STS9 story. Murphy introduces readers to…

Q&A: Hunter Brown of Sound Tribe Sector 9

Guitarist Hunter Brown, who’s included in the September 6 Westword feature about Sound Tribe Sector 9, was a founding member of the band, and remains one of its most prominent creative forces. On this day, he seemed a bit difficult to draw out at first, but once he got onto…

Swift Response

There’s a lot more to Richard Swift than what’s in our August 30 issue. Swift himself said, “I think primarily people think of me as just some dude behind a piano singing, you know, like sad bastard songs.” Sure, his latest Dressed Up For the Underdog might be heavily steeped…

More Power

Although our August 23 interview with Tower of Power founding member Emilio Castillo mostly focused on the band’s new album, the sax player also talked about the early days of playing in Bay Area, coming in at the tail end of the psychedelic scene and having the group’s first record…

Munky from Korn Q&A

Korn guitarist Munky appeared to be more than a little befuddled during a conversation with Westword for an August 24 profile. A sizable percentage of questions during the interview (which took place on August 1, the day after the release of Korn’s eighth studio disc, Untitled) seemed to confuse him,…

Hilary Duff Tries to Maintain Her Dignity

Westword’s August 16 profile of Hilary Duff finds the junior pop star touching on a number of tabloid friendly topics, including her breakup with Good Charlotte’s Joel Madden, who got over his heartbreak by quickly impregnating Nicole Richie. Below, scope the entire interview, in which the nineteen-year old emphasizes her…

The String Cheese Incident Waves Bye-Bye… Kind of

The August 9 profile of the String Cheese Incident’s Kyle Hollingsworth, timed to mark the band’s final Red Rocks appearances prior to going on a hiatus that may or may not last forever, mines a few nuggets from his interview with Westword. This is the place to find the whole…

Ryan Adams Isn’t Taking it Easy

This August 2 profile of Ryan Adams provides a taste of the eccentric interview the singer-songwriter recently conducted with Westword. Below, find the whole meal – a sumptuous spread of conversation and contradictions, complete with a serving of metaphysical hippie-isms that concludes the chat in a suitably peculiar manner. Examples?…

The Lost Charlie Louvin Interview

Westword’s article about country music pioneer Charlie Louvin, of Louvin Brothers fame, appeared in our April 5 issue — but somehow, the interview that formed the foundation of that profile never wound up online. Allow us to correct this oversight by posting the entire dialogue here. A lot of fascinating…

Praise the Lordi

The July 26 Backbeat section contains a profile of Lordi, a ghoul-garbed Finnish group that’s one of the odder acts on this year’s Ozzfest bill — a proud achievement if there ever was one. The following Q&A with group leader Mr. Lordi covers more ground even more amusingly. Topics include…

How Playing the Guitar Saved Leo Kottke’s Life

It would be nice to say that our July 19 profile of acoustic guitar wizard Leo Kottke was filled with the endless, witty and off-kilter diatribes that act as between-song banter during his concerts. But that’s the trouble with email interviews; the interviewee is less compelled to ramble. Still, as…

Ice-T is Interviewed… By His Manager

In lieu of the usual Q&A connected to a Backbeat profile, here’s something different, and more than a little crazoid: an audio interview conducted with O.G. rapper Ice-T by his manager, Jorge Hinojosa. What the hell? As noted in this article, from Westword’s July 19 edition, Hinojosa initially told yours…