Before they formed the Purple Fluid, Richard and Roman Kulwicki had rock and roll in their blood. Their father, of course, is the late, great Ricky Kulwicki, of Denver’s greatest rock-and-roll band, the Fluid. The two brothers hooked up with Orie Bender, Henry Solomon and Danny L’Episcopo and formed a…

Emil Amos is part experimental rock musician and part philosopher poet. Amos is a champion of stripping away the layers of conditioning we accept as payment for being part of a mainstream society that demands obedience to arbitrary rules of identity and what we are allowed to desire and aspire…

Even though Jared Mees & The Grown Children don’t write strictly confessional music, even a cursory listen to the band’s songs reveal that Mees and company are certainly heart on sleeve types. To describe the music as merely Americana would be overlooking the group’s penchant for unconventional hooks, which recall…

On songs like “Left-Right,” Pacific Pride sounds like a conjunction of the Buzzcocks and Pavement, with simple lyrics worthy of sarcastic Devo slogans. And yet there’s something exuberantly un-ironic about the way Pacific Pride plays its music. There’s no tongue-in-cheek, even with a song titled “Yankee Soda.” Paul Garcia comes…

Akron/Family started in 2002 as what some might call a “freak folk” band. But the group quickly headed in its own idiosyncratic direction. In 2004, the Family became involved with the Young God label and served as Michael Gira’s band on that year’s Angels of Light tour. It would be…

It’s probably just a coincidence that St. Vitus formed the same year Ozzy Osbourne parted ways with Black Sabbath. Nonetheless, this Los Angeles outfit was central to evolving Sabbath’s classic sound and dynamics into the kind of metal that was more concerned with genuine heaviness and mood than the party-time,…

MEN With Hideous Men 03.18.11 | hi-dive Before any bands played, DJ Sl8er and Piper Rose, the dynamic duo behind Titwrench, played a variety of records that could loosely fit into the context of dance music, if you go back just over thirty years, including some Joy Division and Tones…

Orchestral Manoevres in the Dark (due at the Bluebird Theater on Tuesday, March 22) is perhaps best known for its song “If You Leave,” featured in Pretty in Pink, the classic 1986 John Hughes movie. But the band first made waves in its native England with its first two albums,…

Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark came to the attention of a wide audience through early singles like “Enola Gay” and an appearance in the 1981 documentary Urgh! A Music War. For American audiences, OMD’s breakthrough came with the song “If You Leave,” made famous by the John Hughes film Pretty…

There’s an unmistakably classic sensibility to Robin Walker’s songwriting. Her versatile voice is central to the appeal of each of these songs, but like her creative use of ukulele in crafting gossamer atmospheres and drifty, daydreamy melodies, it’s Walker’s gift for subverting convention by actually knowing how to break the…

This isn’t exactly Mr. Van Driessen’s New Age Drum Circle for Men out in the woods. Oh, sure, the members of Foot Village perform in a big circle and they’re all playing drums, but there’s none of that namby-pamby, faux-civil keep-things-down-so-as-not-to-disturb-the-neighbors thing going on. Foot Village is more a raw,…

In recent years, Sic Alps has been tapped as an opening act on tours with Yo La Tengo, Pavement and Sonic Youth. But chances are if you saw these guys in Denver, it was up close and personal at a DIY space. The group’s ramshackle, lo-fi sound is akin to…

Five years ago, the music made by Dr. Sunshine’s X-Ray Machine probably would have been called “post-rock,” mainly because it comprises ethereal introductions and gradual builds to a swirling intensity in sound. Even though the band has songs with titles like “Particles” and “Postcards From the Atomic Lighthouse” and there…

“Glowing Eyes” finds Flashlights in a mood of deep, late-night contemplation. And that’s fitting, because “New Hampshire” sounds like waking up just after dawn on a cloudy day before the fog has lifted. Along with the contemplative “Canoes,” Flashlights display a real talent here for making sublimely surreal, hazy, pleasantly…

It might be a bit of an exaggeration to call Jeff Angell the Jeffrey Lee Pierce of Seattle, but a quick listen to Diamonds in a Dead Sky, the Missionary Position’s latest full-length, reveals rich, sonically diverse songwriting coupled with emotionally raw performances in all the right places. Although a…

A cursory glance at a list of the bands involved in the Elephant 6 collective is basically a who’s who of the most interesting, influential underground pop bands of the 1990s and beyond. Founded by future members of the Apples in Stereo, Olivia Tremor Control and Neutral Milk Hotel, Elephant…

In the crowded realm of bands purveying sunny garage-pop, it’s a little difficult to stand out, because the stuff seems to be coming out of the woodwork far and wide. Sauna (due at the hi-dive on Monday, March 14) has a youthful exuberance that most of those bands do not…

THEE GOOCHI BOIZ With Night of Joy • Bury My Bones • Miracleman 03.05.11 | Rockaway Tavern Miracleman — the duo comprised of Chris Westin and Sara Century — with its bedraggled drum kit, keyboards, a tape player with samples and an acoustic guitar, set up on the floor in…

Falling somewhere between Tin Pan Alley and bluesy Americana, this debut from Bonnie & the Beard sounds as if the band spent last year on an extended journey, collecting adventures and experiences along the way. The songs are the sort that come from people who once had dreams of running…

Anyone living in the United States after 1970 — when Randy Newman’s classic 12 Songs was released — has heard Randy Newman somewhere, somehow. Because of his hit songs, including “Short People” and “I Love L.A.,” and his scoring of numerous movies and television shows, Newman’s presence and his knack…

There’s nothing at all ironic about this band embracing ’70s power pop. In the ’80s, too many acts who were heavily influenced by the gritty glam rock of Slade and the sharp hooks of Sweet produced some seriously shlocky material. Bare Wires, meanwhile, seems to have taken stylistic cues from…