The Blackout Pact’s demise was a highly scrutinized one. A fellow touring band’s laptop went missing, and a quick search found it nestled among the Pact’s personal possessions. Blame was placed, and the band fell apart. More than two years after that fateful day in Las Vegas, the Pact is…
From the opening drum clicks, this debut release from the Outfit hooks you into the headlong pace of “Towns,” a song with familiar elements. But rather than trying to mimic the manic and loud-quiet guitar work of recent dance-punk bands, the Outfit presents moments of nuanced introspection that lend a…
The name Faces of Radio is fitting for this band, because it seems like the players are aiming for the airways — or at the very least, enticing people to make their way to the dance floor. With that in mind, the act relies on a somewhat safe and formulaic…
Recalling the frayed pop sounds of New Zealand indie-rock bands of the ’80s and the angular, contorted psychedelia of Pavement, Pacific Pride has always focused more on quality over quantity. Beginning in 2004 after the dissolution of the original lineup of the May Riots, Pacific Pride played few shows and…
Rachael Yamagata released her critically acclaimed debut disc, Happenstance, in 2004, only to be dumped by her record label, RCA, shortly thereafter. Last year the singer-songwriter and pianist finally resurfaced, on Warner Bros., with the wonderfully ambitious double album Elephants…Teeth Sinking Into Heart. Richly textured ballads dominate the first disc,…
From co-writing hit songs for Kylie Minogue to playing the biggest dance-music festivals in the world, Dave Seaman (due on Saturday, November 28 at the Church) has done it all. His mainstay is pumping, progressive house with a healthy tech influence that’s underground but easily accessible and capable of filling…
Even at the height of Bright Channel’s popularity and on-stage volume, leader Jeff Suthers played occasional acoustic shows as a solo artist. When Moonspeed, Bright Channel’s successor, debuted, Suthers seemingly had found a way to indulge both his predilections: vast, untamed soundscapes and whispery songcraft. Flowers of the Moon (whose…
Makeout Point, a newer outfit that formed this past spring, recently finished filming its first video for a song called “Falling In.” We just got a peek at some stills from the shoot and the video looks like it’s going to be positively funtastic on the homemade goodness tip, with…
Kill Paradise, which issued its brand new album, The Second Effect, on BreakSilence Recordings, this past month, just posted a vintage live clip filmed at the Plano Centre in Plano, Texas, at Unsilent Night 2, last holiday season. Although the crowd reaction seems to fairly lively in the video, we’re…
There’s something to be said about a group that boldly calls itself, CunninLynguists. Since 2001, the Kentucky-bred group, which consist of rapper Natti and producers/rappers Deacon the Villain and Kno, has redefined what it means to be courageous with their music, during a time when cookie-cutter groups are getting all…
Rachael Yamagata released her critically acclaimed debut disc Happenstance in 2004 only to be dumped by her record label, RCA, shortly thereafter. Last year the singer-songwriter and pianist finally resurfaced, on Warner Bros., with the wonderfully ambitious double album Elephants…Teeth Sinking Into Heart. Richly textured ballads dominate the first disc…
Fort Collins-based indie rock maestros M. Pyres just completed work on a brand new album titled Apart the Echo, which is out now on the band’s label, Patient Sounds, and will be officially released locally sometime within next month. We got our hands on a track from the new record,…
Doom metal group Shrinebuilder, which features Scott “Wino” Weinrich (St. Vitus, the Obsessed), Al Cisnersos (Om, Sleep), Scott Kelly (Neurosis) and Dale Crover (Melvins), grabbed the top spot at Wax Trax with its self-titled debut for the week ending November 22. Slayer’s World Painted Blood and Them Crooked Vultures’ self-titled…
We’re all familiar with the phrase “so wrong it’s right” but it’s rare that we come across an image that exemplifies that familiar idea as perfectly as this week’s top flier. We feel a little dirty just looking at it — liking it as much as we do surely indicates…
Chuck Potashner will always be awesome to us, even if he now calls San Diego his home. As you probably know, this past February, the mastermind behind teamAWESOME! picked up stakes and moved back to his native San Diego. Although he’s been gone almost a year now, we miss Chuck,…
Of Meese and Spin: You know what we love about life? We learn something new every day. Today, for instance, we learned that the members of Meese are literate — well, at least Nathan Meese, anyhow. And we also learned that Spin files the band under up-and-comers. We discovered this…
Take two parts freak folk and one part New Wave, filter it through a dying Gameboy, then melt shards of sampled hip-hop into the mix and allow to congeal into something weird. That should give you some idea of what to expect with Hideous Men, one of the latest and…
Being in the music business is tough these days. Ask Randall Frazier, who, as reported yesterday, recently shuttered Massive Music America, a fairly successful independent promotions firm he launched in 2003. “The digital music/iPod world that we are now living in has greatly changed the music industry,” he declares. “Five…
As music critics — and people who generally think about, talk about, listen to and make music — the most common question we get asked (and ask each other, for that matter) is, “What are you listening to right now?” The pervasiveness of this query is precisely what inspired Heavy…
The Big Pink, Crystal Antlers Monday, November 23 Larimer Lounge Better Than: Getting whacked in the face by something warm, fuzzy and pissed off. A cat, maybe. No subtleties here — just two bands probably hyped before their time, leaning on a couple tricks each. Both, but particularly Crystal Antlers,…
50 Cent’s Before I Self Destruct, released last week on Aftermath, grabbed the top spot at Independent Records for the week ending November 22. Hip-hop duo Felt, meanwhile, which features Slug from Atmosphere and Murs, follow up tributes to Christina Ricca and Lisa Bonet with A Tribute to Rosie Perez,…
This just in: Judy Collins and Neko Case will be headlining Swallow Hill’s fourth annual RootsFest on Saturday, March 6 at Ellie Caulkins Opera House. Local favorites Paper Bird and Trace Bundy are also slated to perform at the fest. Tickets, which are $35 to $140, go on sale Thursday,…
