Comic: In defense of country music

[jump] Editor’s note: Each week, illustrator Noah Van Sciver shares his sunny outlook with the readers of Backbeat. You can see more of Van Sciver’s work and even buy it on his website. • BACKBEAT’S GREATEST HITS • – The fifty best rap lyrics of all time – The ten…

Why Pujol is the perfect voice for our time

Daniel Pujol is a rock-and-roll songwriter from Nashville playing tonight at the Larimer Lounge, and he would like to communicate with you. He’s at several disadvantages there, especially if he sticks to the methods we mostly rely on these days. He could send you a text message, but they are…

Seven mostly ill-advised pre-show rituals by Denver bands

Performers in all spheres often discuss the importance of ritual — but especially in music, where a pre-concert ordinance may be more significant to the band than we ever know as observers. One might think that rituals are reserved for witches and baseball players, but we have evidence that musicians…

The 14 best concerts in Denver this week: June 9 to June 12

It’s the kind of week where we’ve got fourteen recommendations below and we’ll be spending this introduction talking about the ones we had to leave off: Tech N9ne is in town again/still in town, playing in Colorado Springs. Greater Than Collective’s Social Club at Lannie’s Clocktower has its June installment…

The twelve best concerts in Denver this weekend

It’s a good one, folks: KS 107.5 FM’s Summer Jam brings hip-hop royalty to Englewood tonight, and most of the people there will probably be capping off their weekends with The Fray at Red Rocks on Sunday. There’s more: Dragondeer, subject of this week’s Backbeat feature, will release its long-awaited…

The ten best summer music festivals in Colorado

A Colorado summer can be short, but there are plenty of ways to make it sweet, especially if you pack it with as many festivals, road trips and patios as possible. We’ve picked out ten music festivals sure to give you the flavor of the state’s musical offerings — everything…

Six punk bands we don’t need to talk about anymore

I have an embarrassing tendency to bait people into conversations where I just talk about cool things I am doing. Surprise, right? While it likely stems from being bored with hearing of the mundane achievements of others (babies, crappy jobs, cars), there is a part of me that figures it…