Christopher Golub is not a Radiohead hater. Golub’s Brooklyn-based company Studio Orca curates the music played in Chipotle Mexican Grill, which has over 1,400 locations. In honor of the Colorado-based restaurant chain’s twentieth anniversary this weekend, we profiled Golub (“Black Beans, White Stripes”) in this week’s issue, and when the…
The X-Factor recently held open auditions in Denver. One of my neighbors tried out, and he did okay, I guess, good enough to make it to the third round. Everything was going swimmingly, his sister told me, until he started singing, apparently. Nerves got the best of him when he…
I think we can all agree that battles of the bands are often tedious. With some notable exceptions, obviously, generally what you get treated to is a parade of mediocre acts that test the thresholds of your tolerance. This one, however, that the Lefthand Brewing Company is hosting next month…
In metal, stage flair is pulled from every corner and then piled high on stage, or in this case brushed, rolled, picked and gelled to such great heights. Most metal musicians are so busy perfecting their metal madness through instruments, they don’t have time to be bothered with such trivial…
DAVID BYRNE & ST VINCENT @ BOTANIC GARDENS CHATFIELD | 7/13 David Byrne and Annie Clark (aka St. Vincent) initially met at an AIDS/HIV benefit in 2009. But after they ran into each other at a collaborative performance between Björk and Dirty Projectors, it was suggested to Byrne that he…
DJ TENNIS @ NORAD | SAT, 7/13/13 Like much of the electronic world’s cream of the crop these days, DJ Tennis lives in Berlin, but he grew up in New Jersey and moved to Italy to play semi-professional tennis (hence the moniker), where he threw parties at his tennis club…
Welcome to Ask Willie D, where the Geto Boys MC answers reader questions about matters, in his own words, “funny, serious or unpredictable.” Something on your mind? Ask Willie D! Dear Willie D, I would like to advise your readers of something. I used to be a waitress at a…
Unless you’re in the midst of a three-day bender, beer and leftover fish hardly sounds appetizing, much less like a good idea this early in the morning. That is, of course, unless the beer you’re talking about is from Breckenridge Brewery and the fish in question is Leftover Salmon. In…
Weird is not a bad thing. It sets you apart. So, in rap, where so often so much music sounds so much like the same thing, weird can be a part of something really, really good. It’s not surprising, then, that some of the weirdest rap albums of all time…
Keeping track of metal and all its subgenres can often be confusing and frustrating. Classic and thrash metal are at the center of the metal universe, while various other styles are major and minor constellations radiating manic energy. Sorting through the subgenres can be a tedious task. This is why…
ROBERT PLANT @ RED ROCKS | 7/10/13 When you’re Robert Plant, you can get just about anyone to play with you. That’s why you see folks like Billy Fuller of Massive Attack, along with psychedelic rock impresario Justin Adams, ridiculously talented guitarist Liam “Skin” Tyson, talking drum/kolongo/riti master Juldeh Camara,…
Since the 2011 release of (feather), its debut EP, Chimney Choir has put out another EP, (turtle), and a full-length, (ladder), which came out last year. Not only is the band prolific, but it just keeps getting better, as evidenced by the sizable catalogue of really good material it’s amassed…
For those in search of a chill soundtrack to fight the summer heat, the prolific Qknox has delivered right on time. From back-room, cool-jazz musings to pulsing, post-Dilla neck-snappers, the eight tracks that make up On a Remote Frequency Outpost in Space deliver across the spectrum of beat-driven possibility. The…
Rapper (G)nosis’s new album, The Midnight Drifter LP, is conscious but not preachy, deep but not overwrought, forward-thinking but not inaccessible. More impressive, there aren’t any bad songs to be found here, and that’s most certainly a feat for such a lyrically ambitious project. On Midnight Drifter, (G)nosis challenges you…
It’s clear from the material on 3 that the members of Fingers of the Sun have greatly matured as songwriters. A tune like “Skinny Pert and Cool,” for instance, sustains the band’s signature knack for infectious melody while commenting on the beautiful ignorance of youth versus the depressing security of…
We all love music, and we all love all kinds of music,” notes James and the Devil frontman Jim Campbell. “I guess that rather than fast-tracking ourselves into a genre, we just decided to make songs for what they were. If we heard a metal song that we liked, it…
Little Fyodor started playing out live at the end of 1985, around the same time that the legendary experimental band he was in, Walls of Genius, was winding down. For the first two years, Little Fyodor (aka Dave Lichtenberg) was a solo act; his partner, Babushka, came on board in…
Attorneys for SoCo nightclub impresario Regas Christou and Beta owner and Beatport co-founder Brad Roulier each made their closing arguments this morning in the anti-trust lawsuit the former filed against the latter in December, 2010. Closing arguments wrapped just before lunch, and after three weeks of hearing testimony, the jury…
Update, 12 p.m. 7/10/13: The final celebrations slated for this weekend have been canceled because the buyers of the business received their liquor license earlier than anticipated and will take possession of the business tomorrow, July 11. Rick’s Tavern is now officially closed. After more than two decades of being…
Pop icon Barry Manilow is donating a new Yamaha piano to launch an instrument drive for Jefferson County Public Schools, which is partnering with The Manilow Music Project, which provides musical instruments to high schools and middle schools as well as music scholarships at universities throughout North America. Anyone who…
Update: Congrats to thadmccauley! Check your email for details on how to claim the tickets. Original post: This weekend, the 2013 Ride Festival kicks off in the mountain village of Telluride with performances from Rodrigo Y Gabriela, David Byrne and St. Vincent, Cake, Big Head Todd & the Monsters, Drive-By…
It’s one thing to be a political musician, to point out the inherent wrongs of our social and political constructs from afar. Admirable as that is, it takes a truly special person to take a personal stake in perceived injustice and do something that goes beyond music. A couple days…
