After working with jazz luminaries like Stan Getz, Sarah Vaughan and Dizzy Gillespie, pianist Chick Corea performed and recorded in Miles Davis’s electric bands in the late 1960s and early ’70s. During that time, he played on Davis’s Bitches Brew, a revolutionary album that gave birth to jazz-rock fusion. Davis,…
With scant few exceptions, musicians from this country who feign a British accent end up sounding like utter dipshits. Brits, meanwhile, who legitimately possess a Cockney inflection by birthright, often sound middle-American when they sing. It’s a truly puzzling phenomenon. You have to listen really closely to detect even the…
Though Joe Preston is better known for his tenures in the Melvins, Earth and High on Fire, his most musically interesting venture is perhaps his solo project, Thrones. With this act, Preston is free to let his imagination roam free, and the variety of his recorded output under this name…
Drummer Ahmir ?uestlove Thompson, who anchors the Roots, has an answer for those who consider the group’s strong new album, Rising Down, to be overly serious. “There’s clearly a generational gap that doesn’t see hip-hop as anything but playful fodder,” Thompson says in a sprawling Q&A accessible at blogs.westword.com/backbeat. “I…
In these days of brand-conscious music marketing, it’s no mean feat for an artist to take a left turn and completely reinvent himself. Jamie Lidell, in one of the oddest artistic evolutions ever, took everyone by surprise by successfully transforming himself from IDM whiz kid to neo-soul funkster with 2005’s…
California’s Cryptacize throws another option into the timeless debate over whether less is more, or less is less, or more is less, or more is more. That’s because the trio of Nedelle Torrisi, Chris Cohen and Michael Carreira offers less and more at precisely the same time. On Dig That…
The Breeders and the Montana Boys Wednesday, May 28, 2008 The Ogden Theatre, Denver Better Than: The last two times that the Pixies played live in Denver. The show started early, so I missed the entire Montana Boys set, even though I made it to the Ogden by 8:30. They…
‘Twas a gorgeous, late-spring evening in the foothills last night, when Ben Gibbard pulled his Death Cab into Red Rocks for a twenty-two song set complete with the obligatory references to U2. Click here to see the show through our lens, or read our full review after the jump…
Releasing albums on your own or through small labels can be a remarkably difficult and cash consuming process. However, as you’ll see in this slide show, it can also, at times, reveal beautiful and amazing artistic capacities…
Photo by Summit Studios This just in… In a completely unexpected turn of events, Magic Cyclops, who’s entire image is more or less built around the snappy, multi-colored Hulk Hogan headband he sports, has issued a statement effectively renouncing his Hulkamaniac status. Read his unedited, rather stoic note in its…
Photo by Chris Velarde The Dresden Dolls, Smoosh, and Ukulele Loki and the Gadabout Orchestra Tuesday, May 27, 2008 Ogden Theatre Better Than: Not dressing up in clothes from the movie Cabaret. The Dresden Dolls throng was out in full force last night, but only about half of them donned…
In conversation, singer-songwriter Erykah Badu, the subject of a May 29 Westword profile, sounds regal and all-knowing even when her words seem to defy space, time, logic and just about everything else. It’s a neat (and fascinating) trick, which she demonstrates throughout the Q&A below…
The Q&A below starring Roots drummer Ahmir ?uestlove Thompson, whose band opens for Westword profile and Q&A subject Erykah Badu, represented a first for yours truly. Never before had I conducted an interview with an artist who spent the first portion of the conversation on a treadmill. But Thompson is…
Click here for slide show by Jon Solomon Pee Pee, Paper Bird and New Denver Orchestra Saturday, May 24, 2008 Mercury Cafe Better than: Uh…doo doo? Just thinking about Pee Pee’s name makes me want to crack up. I was giggling like a twelve-year-old when I told a few people…
Photo by James Mitchell Evans. Jeremy Enigk and Damien Jurado Saturday, May 24, 2008 Fox Theatre The crowd at the Fox Theatre took the bad news stoically. By bad news I’m referring to here, of course, is the simple songs of heartbreak and woe that Damien Jurado and Jeremy Enigk…
Yerkish hamming it up. Denver Art Rock Collective Saturday, May 24, 2008 Toad Tavern Better than: The Des Moines Art Rock Collective. The Denver Art Rock Collective, a group of diverse local bands not easily pigeonholed into safe categories or genres, presented a sampling of the five acts in their…
Photo by Tom Murphy. Swervedriver, the Swayback and Life and Times Friday, May 23, 2008 The Marquis, Denver Better Than: Way too many guitar rock bands of the last decade and a half. With talk of how latecomer tickets were going for upwards of a hundred dollars for Swervedriver’s show…
UmConscious, Rhythm Vision and And Sometimes Why Friday, May 23, 2008 Soiled Dove Underground Better Than: Overblown, corportate hip-hop. By the time And Sometimes Why launched into “Down,” the second song of its set at the Soiled Dove, the act’s aspirations for radio play were clear. Lead singer Mike Berg…
Photo by Dragondeer. The Photo Atlas, The Epilogues, Set Forth Friday, May 23, 2008 Walnut Room Better Than: Staying at home and listening to Kiss FM. I’m not going to lie — I’m a huge fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Veronica Mars. Regardless of my love for these…
Here’s a run down of what you might have missed this week on Backbeat Online while all eyes were on R. Kelley, who was undoubtedly ruing the day that he gave in to his body, which was evidently telling him “yes,” while his mind was telling him “no”…..
Bass players and drummers, man. What is it about bass players and drummers? I’ve never been able to hold on to one. Ever. Actually, that’s probably more on me than them, if you want to know the truth. I’m what I would call a perfectionist — and what other musicians…
Remember this past November, when I wrote about Chris Fogal’s new doom metal super group, On High, featuring Ian O’Dougherty, Matty Clark and Dave Barker? I directed you to their page on Virb.com, which at the time had three free songs posted for download from their forthcoming disc. Those who…
