It’s been a busy month for the Department of Music at Metropolitan State University. Its accreditation was renewed by the National Association of Schools of Music, and it added a new Jazz and American Improvised Music Performance concentration (also accredited). We interviewed Peter Schimpf, associate professor and chair of the…
In the mid-2000s, guitarist Enrique Jimenez was playing outside the usual circuit of rock clubs and DIY spaces in town, on stages in northwest Aurora and southwest Denver. And that exploratory spirit has benefited his current band, Altas. Formerly known as Panal S.A. de C.V., Jimenez formed the band with…
“Everyone else in my family was an addict, and I was an addict of creativity, and that saved my life,” says rapper Jericho Son of None. He’s been active in the Denver hip-hop community for years, spending time in a group called Educated Figures. He now teaches history and geography…
Courtesy of ATO RecordsBy Roy Kasten Onstage — his hair whipping like a battlefield banner, his piano splintering, his gnarled voice bellowing and his band crushing out something like rock, something like the blues — J. Roddy Walston is surely a force, but not really a force of nature, as…
Iceage (due this Sunday, October 26, at the Hi-Dive) from Copenhagen, Denmark made a splash when it first started playing in the U.S.A. over three years ago. Synthesizing the raw energy of hardcore with the moodiness of post-punk, Iceage was and still is an electrifying live act. Even then, though,…
Oko Tygra is one of the Denver bands representing the Mile High City at this year’s CMJ in New York City. The group is slated to play at Niagra on Wednesday, October 22. For a group that started in March 2014, getting selected for CMJ is certainly an achievement. For…
Editor: Please see the Author’s note on this new photo-driven series at the end of this article. In this second part (read part one here) of the Underground Bands of Denver Music’s Dark Ages, we’re going to use a few bands of the era to spotlight some of the important…
In the late 1980s, it was nearly unheard of for Japanese underground rock bands to play in the United States. But Shonen Knife, appearing at the Oriental Theater this Thursday, October 16, played a show in Los Angeles in 1989. By then, the band’s music had already spent several years…
Josh Ritter (due Saturday, October 11, at the Paramount Theater as part of Swallow Hill’s 35th Anniversary) is a gifted songwriter who has earned a bit of an international following for his imaginatively literate lyrics and simple yet sophisticated observational wisdom. In 2001, Ritter got a big break when he…
Editor: Please see the Author’s note on this new photo-driven series at the end of this article. During the late 1990s and early 2000s, Denver music was in a time of transition. It was the local cultural equivalent of the Dark Ages. But like the more well-known Dark Ages, there…
You wouldn’t know, listening to the Felice Brothers’ latest LP, Favorite Waitress, that the record marks the first time they’ve recorded in a proper studio, abandoning the chicken coops and high-school auditoriums of their previous albums. Characteristically unhinged and scruffy without ever feeling unprofessional, the record has the warmth and…
Not many veteran bands make their best album more than a decade down the line. But the New Pornographers, who’ll appear Saturday, October 11, at the Gothic Theatre, have beaten the odds with the driving, melodic, pop-tastic Brill Bruisers despite an extremely high degree of difficulty. After all, the band’s…
Editor: Please see the Author’s note on this new photo-driven series at the end of this article. Ian MacKaye once said that the most relevant bands are those that exist right now, because they exist and you can go see them. I couldn’t agree more. One of the reasons I…
Tonight, the Savoy Events Center will once again be filled wall-to-wall with people from all walks of life who came for one reason: Rocking the mic. MCs from across Colorado will come together for the second Rap-A-Thon, which will feature art, fashion and hours of rhyming. See also: The “Controversy”…
Mark Turner is a dynamic and lucid jazz tenor saxophonist who’s been part of Billy Hart’s Quartet for a decade. He’s also been a member of Fly, the collaborative trio with the skilled bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jeff Ballard. But Turner, who will be at Dazzle on Saturday, September…
While the current connotation of the term DJ involves neon-clad teens, lasers and confetti cannons, artists like DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist rely on the hip-hop tradition of the genre. On past tours, Shadow and Cut toured with only a collection of hand-picked 45s (the Hard Sell Tour, from 2007…
DJCHAP is off to a good start. So far, he’s earned the respect of one of his biggest musical influences, grown an online following from around the world, and just dropped an EP of fresh footwork tunes that has earned praise from influencers like XLR8R and Potholes in My Blog,…
The night before Minutemen played in Denver for the first time in 1984, at the now-defunct Rainbow Music Hall with Black Flag, the punk progenitors made up of singer and guitarist D. Boon, bassist Mike Watt and drummer George Hurley endured what Watt called a “seventeen-hour hell ride” right after…
Shabazz Palaces is the adventurous hip-hop outlet of former Digable Planets MC Ishmael Butler and multi-instrumentalist Tendai Mariare. Based in Seattle, the group is signed to the historically rock-centric Sub Pop label. We talked to Butler before Shabazz Palaces’ show tonight at the Fox Theatre about consumerism, the innate power…
Riot Fest is bringing some loud bands along with the spirit (and hay) of May Farms to Sports Authority Field parking lot this weekend. It also comes with a carnival complete with games and rides. This could have been our only chance to ever ride a Ferris Wheel while a…
Failure is slated to perform at Riot Fest this Friday, September 19th. Though the band enjoyed a great deal of popularity during its first run before splitting in 1997, its influence has loomed large on a good deal of guitar rock that has come along since. If someone writes a…
While a lot of the focus during Riot Fest this weekend will be on the headliners playing the May Farms stage and the Byers General Store, the festival includes up and coming bands, local and otherwise, worthy of attention. These are generally not the bands riding in large tour buses…
