Just received word that Diane Reeves, a Denver native and four-time Grammy Award-winning jazz vocalist, is slated to open the Colorado Senate’s 67th general assembly. Tomorrow morning at 10 a.m., Reeves, a George Washington High School and University of Colorado alumna, will join Senate president Peter Groff and his colleagues…
When buddies A.V.I.U.S., Es-Nine and DJ Cysko Rokwel formed 3 the Hardway last year, fans knew that this hip-hop collective would be putting out some hot music. And for good reason: With A.V.I.U.S. on the mike, Es-Nine on the beats and Cysko on the wheels of steel, how could the…
Strange how that whole train-of-thought thing works, isn’t it? One minute you’re talking to your buddy on the horn and he brings up a certain Faith No More song, and the next thing you know, you’ve pissed away the better part of a half-hour watching old videos on YouTube. Although…
As we write this, DJ Sabotage is most likely on his way to Los Angeles, where he’ll compete in the finals of Scion’s Hypeman contest. What’s a hypeman, you ask? Flavor Flav may be the most famous hypeman, but you definitely can’t forget folks like Spliff Star (Busta Rhymes’s hypeman),…
Photo: Lucia De Giovanni Last night, I had the honor and privilege of guest deejaying at Matt Fecher’s New Music Mondays at the Larimer Lounge, playing music from my collection next to the incandescent DJ Ginger and firestarter DJ Hot to Death. Ginger played a couple of body-rocking sets, including some…
Photo: Madeline Cothren From the looks of her stunning new photos, and from the sounds of her most recent tracks (most notably “I Was Your Baby”), Aubrey Collins has successfully reinvented herself again. Well, perhaps “reinvented” isn’t the right word. “Matured” is probably a better way to put it. More…
Photo: Jon Solomon What was it Michael Corleone said in The Godfather? “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in”? That quote could certainly apply to the Fluid. The act, which had initially just intended to get back together for a few shows leading up to Sub…
Photo: Sarah Cass The exceptional gentlemen pictured above, otherwise known collectively as Hello Kavita, are currently holed up in the studio recording a brand-new album with Ian Hlatky, who’s previously overseen recordings by the Last Seen, Born in the Flood and the Swayback, among others. The band recently offered a…
Photo: Joshua Kessler So, have you caught Pepsi’s latest commercial? Notice anything remarkable about it? Besides, of course, the inexplicable, reworked-for-what-seems-like-the-umpteenth-time, futuristic-looking logo? You know that gorgeous, sun-kissed, audible goodness you hear playing in the background? Uh-huh, that’s the Apples in Stereo. Pretty keen, eh? We caught the commercial over…
Mezcal (3230 East Colfax Avenue) restaurant celebrated its fifth anniversary a few weeks ago and brought in a mariachi band as part of the festivities. Owner Jesse Morreale has been bringing live entertainment to the club for the past few years, mainly on special occasions, as the city allows him…
The Ideal Fathers have a fresh, danceable, well-crafted take on post-punk. They have a freshly recorded, yet-to-released EP that’s damn good. What they don’t have is a drummer, and that’s holding them back from capitalizing on those first two things, which is a shame. Their longtime drummer recently succumbed to…
Yes, I know a lot of people like to use a new year as an opportunity to get a fresh start. It might just mean that you clean the stains out of your toilet bowl finally, or you put clean sheets on your bed, or you floss. Some people even make New Year’s resolutions. Usually, these are pledges related to self-improvement – weight loss, fitness, smoking cessation, nose picking, public flatulation and angry driving are all common targets.
Girl Talk (aka Greg Gillis) gets a fair amount of love here at Westword for his ace mashup skills and incendiary live performances, and with good reason: the man is an artist at what he does. And if you’ve ever wondered exactly how he does what he does, today is…
Photo by Michael Alan GoldbergOver the next couple of weeks, Backbeat will feature some Top Ten lists from around the Village Voice Media chain. Click here for previous year-in-review coverage from Backbeat and VVM. Two young blondes with toothy smiles and hard-core work ethics, Taylor Swift and Carrie Underwood, helped…
Black Pegasus was booked to party up in Aspen on New Year’s Eve, but was turned away because of a bomb threat in downtown Aspen. We’re sure you heard the story by now. “The whole downtown area was evacuated last night,” Black P recounted on Thursday. “The Red Cross made…
And now it’s time for the”I love you like a fat kid loves cake” memorial Worst Lyrics of 2008, March Madness-style tournament, this year a terrifying melange of appalling oral-sex requests, bargain-bin philosophies, grammatical atrocities, and cringe-inducing pillow talk. To elevate the drama, I provided a trusted colleague with the…
You don’t need a half-wit music critic to tell you it’s been a remarkable year for America, one historians will be discussing and researching for centuries to come. War, financial collapse, politics, technology: All have been dinner-table topics for many Americans. Racial barriers in 2008 were demolished by a Midwestern…
Along with having a MySpace page, some photos and MP3s, it’s become a necessity for Colorado hip-hop artists to have a YouTube account and a camcorder nearby.Many artists are now taking the responsibility of recording their own videos and events in order to promote their latest projects, as well as…
It wouldn’t be New Year’s without a slew of ill-considered, soon-to-be-abandoned resolutions, would it? In the spirit of new beginnings, shedding bad habits and picking up a few new good ones, I offer you all this hastily constructed, poorly thought through and largely specious list of my musical resolutions for…
Over the next couple of weeks, Backbeat will feature some Top Ten lists from around the Village Voice Media chain. Click here for previous year-in-review coverage from Backbeat and VVM. A couple of weeks ago, an expert on the Harry Potter series told an audience of high school kids how…
After taking a week off to celebrate buying/receiving stuff for/from our loved ones, Andy Thomas and I returned to the airwaves last night (a day early in honor of drinking our faces off during Night of the Rookie Livers this evening) and played a bunch of great stuff — as…
If you’ve been hibernating, you haven’t heard about what happened outside of Vinyl last weekend. The one and only E-40 — one of my favorite rappers — played a set, after which five people were shot on Broadway. It is always sad and disturbing when violence erupts in the music…
