It’s not easy to track down Roger Gillies. His home is officially located in the tiny mountain community of Jamestown, Colorado, but in actuality, it’s far removed from the burg’s unpaved but passable streets. Simply finding his abode is a challenge–and even those visitors able to locate it must travel…
I. Purpose Radio, in Denver and most other American communities, is more segmented than ever before. Demographers and marketing gurus have a tremendous say over what music stations broadcast–so much so that the actual quality of the material that gets played usually is less important to media executives than the…
In a world of pierced navels and rainbow-coiffed power forwards, no-nonsense performers like Stephen Lee tend to get shunted into the background. But the twenty-something singer-songwriter behind the solid new CD No Turnin’ Back (on Denver’s GMR Entertainment label) somehow managed to avoid that fate. “I just remember being asked…
It’s been a couple of weeks since we’ve spoken. We have some catching up to do. June 21 was the last day on the Denver airwaves for KBPI’s Dean Myers and Roger Beaty, aka Dean and Rog; they’ve been transferred to KSLX-FM/100.7 in Phoenix, an outlet recently purchased by Jacor…
“Can you hang on for a minute?” asks Todd Lewis, singer, guitarist and principal songwriter for the Toadies, in response to a click on his phone line. When he returns, he says, “That was MCI. They wanted me to pay my bill.” He adds, with a mixture of amusement and…
To the easy rhythm a person assumes when striding through an open-air market, Cornershop’s Tjinder Singh intones, “First I was a foreigner/Then suddenly everything was cool forever/This Western Oriental’s going full circle.” These lyrics–from “Wog,” on the 1995 CD Woman’s Gotta Have It–are the most concise way to sum up…
Jazz pianist/vocalist Shirley Horn is a cult classic. A restrained and reticent woman, Horn loathes interviews and seldom appears anywhere other than her hometown, Washington, D.C. “I was born here,” she says from the nation’s capital. “I’ve lived here all my life. And I’ll be here all my life.” As…
Although it pains me deeply on a personal level, I must admit at the outset that the hero of this next item is Sting. Angela Long is a local substitute teacher who’s legally blind, 20/200, even when corrected. Her husband, Kent, a certified attorney who works as a contract administrator…
So you thought that after coming through heroin addiction, imprisonment and virtual banishment from the country-music industry, Steve Earle would be suitably apologetic and recalcitrant? Think again. As Earle puts it, “There are some people in this world that I really quite frankly don’t give a fuck what they think.”…
The message flashed at viewers during the introduction of The Last Klezmer–a 1994 documentary film made by Yale Strom, leader of the klezmer/jazz act known as KLAZZJ–underlines the important role the style has played in Jewish culture throughout Eastern Europe. “A wedding without a klezmer,” the saying goes, “was worse…
“I think we need radical change in politics,” says Wayne Kramer, “and that can only come from young people with revolutionary ideas. Right now we’re getting business as usual.” If that sounds like the brand of verbal throwdown most frequently associated with the protest movements of the late Sixties and…
The Cranberries To the Faithful Departed (Island) There’s a fine line between a distinctive voice and an annoying voice, and Dolores O’Riordan is on the wrong side of that line. Following in the footsteps of prime-time Stevie Nicks, whose singing recalls the bleating of a herd of sheep in an…
“A lot of people been saying that I’m not consistent,” reports Michael Rose. “And they say this is why no one hears of me.” On the surface, these rebukes seem warranted. After all, Rose left Black Uhuru, the group for which he’s best known, in 1983–and over the course of…
When bassist Kelly Dermody first joined Denver’s Fatwater, the group members claimed to be a rowdy fraternity of extreme kayak enthusiasts given to shouting “Fatwater!” as they approached frothing rapids. That Dermody was fooled is understandable. One is inclined to believe anything vocalist Judson Harper says. Even when Harper is…
Since its inception, 16 Horsepower has been the product of three people: multi-instrumentalist David Eugene Edwards, drummer Jean-yves Tola and bassist Keven Soll. While Edwards was clearly the frontman for the band, the other players were key contributors who added an important visual component to live shows most observers saw…
Drummer Dan Haugh and bassist Mike Kunka, collectively known as godheadSilo, would like to join Motsrhead and the Who on a roster of the loudest acts in the history of rock and roll. But one thing stands in their way: space. “We’d like to take twice as much equipment on…
It’s a Tuesday night in downtown Denver, and Chuck Shockney, music instructor, organ salesman and part-time musician, is preparing for another gig. He sits down at his keyboard, turns on his rig and slides into a tune for the usual audience of…50,000 people. Shockney, the 51-year-old organist for Coors Field…
They’ve got the local music in them. Flesh Blanket, by Zoon Politikon, is not a punk album in the contemporary, major-label sense–meaning that it sounds nothing like Green Day. Instead, the act, as captured by producer Tim Beckman, gives you an idea of what early Eighties X might have sounded…
“Have you noticed how a majority of the musicians around here are about a generation behind in the way that they play?” asks Sam Coffman, a composer/pianist who leads the Denver jazz act Cat Unit. “And hey, it’s not just around here; I think it’s a common problem everywhere. But…
Madonna’s baby-to-be (reportedly a girl to be named Lola, after the Marlene Dietrich character in 1930’s The Blue Angel) is a star even before sticking her head out of her mom’s well-publicized womb. But will she stay one? It’s not easy, as the offspring of the famous performers below can…
“In a way, it’s almost a privilege not to be played on the radio,” singer-songwriter Tish Hinojosa says with a laugh. “Sure, I’d love to have radio success–I’d be lying if I didn’t say that. But the quality and content of the music are just as important to me as…
Thus far, videotape shot during the aftermath of the punk-rock-show-turned-riot at a Denver VFW hall on May 18 (Feedback, May 23) hasn’t caused the stir many attendees were hoping, in part because of its highly variable quality. Dave Paco, bassist for the band Four, says much of the footage he…
