The rap that’s out this week is all over the place, in the clubs, perched on precariously high ledges and, as always, in the motherfucking streets, son. Mr. Midas puts moving pictures to his song “Tender Kisses” for a video that will definitely require tissues, while Spoke In Wordz gets…
Almost immediately after being introduced, the Cacheflowe/Brer Rabbit collaboration, Yo Soy Sauce, polarized folks. So when word of a remix contest surfaced last month, suffice to say, we were eager to hear what people came up with. Although Encanti ultimately took home the prize for “TurboBooty LabiaStep,” there were some…
There’s a reason that metal, particularly the kind produced by bands like Anthrax, Testament and Death Angel, endures year after year: The bands are made up of guys like Scott Ian, real, down-to-earth dudes who make music they love completely unaffected by the trends or popular opinions of the mainstream…
Update (10/19): Ah, yes. That explains it. According to Chris K., host of Colorado Sound and longtime friend of Backbeat, evidently, Colorado Rocks!: Five Decades of Rock Music History, is out of print, thus the hefty price tag we spied at the Goodwill over the weekend. “I had to buy…
The Colorado Symphony Orchestra is struggling: it’s over $1 million short on cash; its musicians are seeing massive pay cuts; and twenty of its board members (read: big donors) have left. The CSO cut five programs, which totaled ten shows, from now through early-December and brought back old personnel to…
Update 10/19: Congrats to Brian Robl and Veronica Espinoza. You and a guest will be our guest at tonight’s show. Send us an email for details on how to claim your tickets. Thanks to everybody else who entered! Okay, metalheads, while we’re sure that most of you already have your…
Testament (sharing a bill tomorrow night at Summit Music Hall with Anthrax and Death Angel) is one of the bands that make a strong case for expanding the Big 4 to the Big 5 (or Big 6, if the often-overlooked Exodus were included). The Bay Area act was part of…
Anthrax (due Wednesday, October 19, at Summit Music Hall) is one of the Big 4 thrash bands from the ’80s, and the only one originally based on the East Coast. More than most metal bands, Anthrax seemed willing to smile and display a wicked yet playful sense of humor –…
The bad news is that Snoop Dogg is getting a sitcom, a no-doubt hackneyed affair starring the Doggfather as a patriarch with his mind on his family and his family on his mind. The even worse news is that Limp Bizkit front-penis Fred Durst is apparently getting one, too. The…
The Photo Atlas has been hard at work on a new record. While there’s been a few EPs released since then, this untitled effort is slated to be the band’s first full-length since 2007’s No, Not Me, Never on Stolen Transmission. The album isn’t finished yet and won’t be released…
If there’s anything we’ve learned in our hundreds of years blogging, it’s that American Idol fans are nothing if not loyal, passionate, outspoken and quick to defend the honor of whatever idol they happen to have a Google alert set for at the expense of disparaging any fellow alums they…
After hearing two choruses of Charlie Christian’s solo on Benny Goodman’s “Grand Slam” in a record store, a thirteen-year old Jim Hall had a spiritual awakening of sorts. “That’s what I wanted to do,” Hall, now eighty, says about first hearing the song. “It was such a perfect solo —…
The space at 1434 Blake Street that was home to the legendary City Spirit in the ’90s has seen plenty of turnover in the past decade: from Andrew’s Pub & Lounge to Lure Lounge to SportsBook to Pre-Game Sports Bar, which lasted for only a few months before closing last…
Guitarist Paul Christus and drummer Tony Corona should be given some kind of medal for weathering numerous lineup changes over the years and sticking to their guns. With their long-running band, all capitals, these two guys have rearranged the roster more times than Spinal Tap, but they’ve never given up…
Anders Trentemøller has been turning the electronic-music world on its head since 1997, when he made his debut with DJ T.O.M. as Trigbag, the first live house act in Denmark. After a self-imposed hiatus of several years, he re-entered the fray and has since released music to wide critical acclaim…
Spencer Krug is probably best known to the world as a former member of Montreal’s Wolf Parade. Since that band took a break, Krug has been prolific, to say the very least. In addition to having been a member Frog Eyes, he’s currently still a member of Sunset Rubdown and…
Sweden’s Opeth started out as a fairly straightahead death-metal band, but in 1992, after drastic lineup changes, the band, led by singer and guitarist Mikael Åkerfeldt, slowly developed the sound it would bring to its 1995 debut, Orchid. Sonically, Opeth recalls ’70s art-rock bands like Jethro Tull mixed with late-’80s…
The fraught waters of “world music” have dashed many a well-intentioned album upon the rocks of pandering contrivance and misguided condescension. But that’s never been the case for Paul Simon. Over the course of his nearly six-decade career, Simon has never shied from appropriating ethnic textures and rhythms for songs…
If there’s any universal truth we can draw from the horror of World War II, it’s that Hitler was a real asshole. In the history of real-life villains, really, there’s probably none more villainous than der Führer, the very epitome of evil — and therefore a referential touchstone for every…
The songs on this album conjure the sensation of something unexpected in the weather — unseasonably cold nights in summer or uncommonly warm nights in winter — that makes the mind both nostalgic and able to function with the kind of clarity that makes subtleties easier to notice. Joshua Trinidad’s…
Together for over a decade now, Barstool Messiah shows no signs of letting up on its fourth effort, Bastards of Bacchus. Taking a few cues from the MC5, these revved-up garage-rockers even kick out a killer take of that group’s “Rock Reducer No. 62 (Rama Lama Fa Fa Fa).” As…
On Imanster, Iman S’s latest mixtape, the rapper mates superb production with subpar lyrics. On “Quagmire,” a throw to a super-horny character from Family Guy, when Iman brags about how many hos he fucks and the swagger that he uses to convince the women he beds, the metaphors feel forced…
