These days, tons of bands try to be simultaneously sensitive and muscular — not to mention radio-friendly — with stirring guitar crunch, sweetly rendered vocal harmonies and heart-on-sleeve lyrics tackling the personal and the political. But few do it as well, or as genuinely, as Jimmy Eat World, which helped…
If there’s one artist who’s the least likely to release a Christmas album, it’s gotta be Aimee Mann, who’s built an entire career out of penning songs about heroin addiction and miscellaneous other forms of emotional agony. But that’s just what she did last year, and with the Aimee Mann…
“I kind of figured that we’d get bashed on this record some,” says VHS or Beta singer/guitarist Craig Pfunder about the band’s latest album, Bring on the Comets, which has garnered widely varied reviews. “But you’ve got to just go, ‘Fuck it.’ People hear what they want to hear in…
Chris Brown, Exclusive (Jive/Zomba). “Take Me Down” symbolizes Brown’s eagerness to transition from kiddie-soul heartthrob to young-adult megastar; at one point, he sings, “It ain’t my first time/But baby girl, we can pretend.” Luckily, Brown’s got the goods, effectively holding center stage despite noteworthy guests such as Kanye West and…
A few weeks ago, a cousin told me about The Pick-Up Artist, this reality show on VH1 where a dude who calls himself “Mystery” and a few of his buddies teach ordinary guys how to pick up girls. Although it’s hard to take anything seriously when it’s coming from a…
When the Emmas played their final show in June 2006, this town lost one of its longest-running, most entrepreneurial and prolific punk acts. Almost immediately, though, singer-guitarist Lisa Cook and bassist E-N Pumpernickel filled the void by forming Turbo Knife Fight. Building upon the Emmas’ raw, simple, elemental punk, Turbo…
Head to Sutra on Thursday, December 6, to catch the kickoff of Step Up, a monthly night celebrating the edgy sounds of dubstep, glitch and experimental breaks. The highlight of this inaugural edition is Denver’s own CacheFlowe, aka Justin Gitlin. Tackling his compositions and mixes with a sense of abandon…
OneRepublic’s Colorado connection is mighty tangential. Tulsa-born lead singer Ryan Tedder and guitarist Zach Filkins met while attending high school in Colorado Springs, and guitarist Drew Brown is from Boulder. But local fans had little to do with their rise to prominence. Indeed, the band’s been based in Los Angeles…
Wu-Tang Clan’s fifth album, 8 Diagrams, comes at a time of group strife. Raekwon has called Wu ringleader and beatmaker RZA a “hip-hop hippie” and says the beats on the new album are too cerebral. And it’s true: While the minimalist production and movie samples evoke Enter the Wu-Tang (36…
In the past year and a half, Flawless and Fo Chief — the rapping and production duo known collectively as On Point — have made a big push in Denver’s hip-hop scene, and their latest effort, D-Town Extravaganza, is a culmination of that hustle. The twosome’s rhymes and production on…
Some musicians draw upon so many genres that it’s tough to rank them in importance, while others focus on a single approach with a fealty that borders on obsession. Primasonic falls into the latter category; its members always seem to be asking themselves, “What would Iggy and Joey do?” Yet…
Descendents and All drummer Bill Stevenson, who’s also the proprietor of Fort Collins’s Blasting Room Studios, doesn’t consider himself a permanent part of the Lemonheads. “I think they’ve always had a sort of revolving lineup,” he says. But for the past year-plus, he and Descendents/All bassist Karl Alvarez have been…
Preeminent country pianist Phil Vassar has scored only a pair of number-one singles as an artist: “Just Another Day in Paradise” and “In a Real Love.” But the bleached-blond tunesmith — who favors T-shirts and faded jeans over traditional cowboy hats and boot-cut Wranglers and spent years perfecting his craft…
Roy Orbison once sang about falling in love with a Devil Doll. Old Roy’s gone now, but we have a sneaking suspicion that if he was still kicking, he’d flip head over heels for Miss Colleen Duffy, aka Devil Doll, a sultry pinup-girl-gone-bad ingenue who’s graced the covers of countless…
The video for “Oh My,” the first single from A Night at the Ritz, the latest CD by Chicago’s Office, toys with soft-core-porn scenarios — but instead of climaxing with a money shot, it ends with the bandmates jumping for joy. The conclusion serves as a corollary to the band’s…
Though birthed in the dysfunctional cradle of the Southern California hardcore scene, Agent Orange never stuck to convention. Although the group’s debut, Living in Darkness, contained the instant punk-rock classic “Bloodstains,” the outfit’s influential sound is equal parts hardcore, power pop and surf rock. At heart, though, as evidenced by…
“Music is My Hot, Hot Sex” by Cansei de Ser Sexy, better known as the song in the iPod Touch commercial, is the worst song in the world. This grating, repetitive burst of vapid noise is guaranteed to get stuck in your head for days after a single exposure. While…
Bill Stevenson, who’s readying for a December 7 gig with the Lemonheads at the Gothic Theatre (see this Now Hear This item for more details), isn’t a man who likes to sit around doing nothing. He’s the anchor of the Descendents, All and a third band, Only Crime, in addition…
Eyedea and Abilities with Sector 7G, Abzorbr, and Maneline December 3, 2007 Marquee Theatre Independent hip-hop, like all indie music, usually falls into one of two categories: Talented, boundary-pushing, cultishly adored stalwarts occupy one corner; wanky, pretentious, self-satisfied duesh bags claim the other. Unfortunately, both were on display last night…
The Cult, Action Action December 3, 2007, Fillmore Auditorium Better than: Seeing any band with “Guns,” “Revolver,” “Velvet,” “L.A.” or “Roses” in the name. The show was half-packed with strippers, heshers and goths, none visibly underage. Enough open space lay waiting for a basketball game. We missed opening act the…
Here’s a selection of the best of last week’s music blogging from around the Village Voice chain: This show review promises that Monotonix comes off like Mudhoney playing krautrock, which is high praise, indeed…
Kate McGarry & Art Lande December 2, 2007, Dazzle Better than: Icing on a cold cake. Art Lande is a funny guy, and his sense of humor often shines through in his piano playing. And it was amusing for Lande to open the first set by running his hands up…
