Music

Everybody wants to be in a band. From the outside, it all looks so glamorous, doesn’t it, all the sex and drugs that go along with the rock and roll? If only they knew… Fact: In real life, the sex only leaves you with regrets or worse. The drugs don’t…

If you need to catch up with the local music scene in a hurry — or just keep up with it, if you’re already up to speed — you’re going to want to grab the new, third Local Shakedown CD compilation. Coming Friday, October 16 from Smooch Records, the double-disc…

Around these parts, Distrakt is known as one of the nicest producer-rappers in the game. But in the music industry, he’s starting to be the go-to-guy for vintage-style animated music videos. He recently directed videos for veteran indie rapper Count Bass D (“Neon Soul”) and up and coming Florida rapper…

Denver rapper/producer SP Double has been busy working on his new full-length, Loyalty, Honor, Respect, but in between tracks he found time to drop a new EP, Focus on SP.The entire EP was produced by Aftermath Records producer Focus, who has also produced tracks for Busta Rhymes, 50 Cent, Eminem…

DJ K-Tone and Adam Lo recently announced the launch of the Colorado Hip-Hop for Homeless, a new charity that seeks to help Colorado’s homeless community. A couple times a month, K-Tone and Lo recruit local hip-hop artists to donate and distribute clothes, water, non-perishable food and blankets to the homeless…

It’s natural for children to absorb musical talent from their parents. For St. Elias, though, music isn’t just an inherited proclivity; it’s also something that the band’s three members — two brothers and their cousin — have cultivated among themselves since they were kids growing up together in Houston. “We…

While the Ballpark neighborhood still has the town’s highest concentration of sports bars, the 1400 blocks of Market and Blake streets could soon be giving them a run for their money. In July, Francois Safieddine opened the Oak Tavern in the former home of Monarck, at 1427 Market Street, just…

Goth is dying in Denver, some fans complain. Charles Russell, aka One Skinny DJ, and Dave Vendetta, two prominent proponents of the scene, don’t disagree. But when they say they think goth deserves to be put to rest, they’re not talking about the music, which they feel is as relevant…

Led by Tripp Nasty and Zach Spencer, Bongo Fury (due at Glob on Tuesday, September 29) combines the fascination that Nasty and Spencer share for traditional Middle Eastern music and the folk music of northern India. Never amplified vocally or instrumentally, this project uses natural sounds and dynamics to weave…

How do you know when you’re one of the best DJs in the world? Well, winning the DMC World DJ Championships three times in a row — which no one has done before — is a pretty good indication. DJ Craze has done all of that and more, including releasing…

Blessed with a big thumbs-up from Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore and the membership of bassist Paz Lenchantin of A Perfect Circle and Zwan, the Entrance Band seems to have appeared fully formed and ready to take over the world. But the project — the brainchild of singer/guitarist Guy Blakeslee, formerly…

Performing in the United States for the first time at the Vendetta Festival in Denver, Luxembourg’s Rome has caught the attention of fans of neo-folk and lushly dark music in general. Jerome Reuter is often compared to Leonard Cohen for his deep, resonant voice and the band to Angels of…

On the surface, the music of Red Wire Black Wire sounds as though frontman Doug Walters grew up on a steady diet of the Human League’s landmark album, Dare! A closer listen, however, reveals roots in Grandmaster Flash-era hip-hop, with an emphasis on fluid bass lines and playfully melodic synth…

Judging by an appearance at Aspen’s Belly Up earlier this year, rapper Armando Christian Pérez didn’t choose the pseudonym “Pitbull” at random. As seen in a popular YouTube clip, Pitbull pulls a man on stage — but when the guy throws cash in his face, strip-club style, the star of…

These days, folk singers tend to tart up their arrangements under the assumption that the simple combination of voice and guitar puts too many people in mind of Boy Scout jamborees or other similarly traumatizing experiences. But not Ms. Negro, whose latest sticks to singing and strumming. The tack’s not…

As far as album titles go, GT & the Sidewinders found a perfect one with Across America. The album’s pretty much about traveling in one way or another, whether it be musically or through the lyrics — like the opener, “Coming Home,” in which frontman G.T. Scragg sings about driving…

To a certain cross-section of Coloradans, Aaron Hobbs’s scratchy, aching cry is the voice of a generation. As high-blown as that may sound, it’s true: While plenty of local bands have come and gone over the past decade and a half, Hobbs’s Small Dog Frenzy and Acrobat Down have stayed…

Reminiscent of noise-jazz-spazz rockers Total Shutdown and the Low Down, Crack Magic also seems steeped in the abbreviated brutality of hardcore and early screamo. Opening with the abrasive “Missed Connections,” the band sounds as though its singer were engaged in some kind of weird BDSM asphyxiation play with a psychotic…