Although the Caucasian-centric mainstream press tends to see the manufacturing of musical idols as primarily a pop-music phenomenon, it’s prevalent in hip-hop and R&B, too. Consider Ciara Princess Harris, who was given an ultra-promotable name at birth and subsequently developed the sort of tough-but-tender voluptuousness that created such a demand…
It’s been more than three decades since hitmaker Al Green held court over secular soul — that is, since a former girlfriend, Mary Woodson, broke into Green’s home, poured boiling grits on him in the shower, then shot herself in an adjacent bedroom. With his baby-making music on indefinite hiatus,…
Some plants thrive in the shadows. Arlo Guthrie should know. Although he’s never reached his father’s iconic status, he has nonetheless enjoyed a long, successful career as a songwriter, bard and philanthropist in his own right, starting with his first public performance at age thirteen. Seven years later, his well-timed…
“Will the white noise of words survive a war declared on signs?” It’s lines like these, from “We’re All Going to Die,” the opening track of Make Believe’s eponymous debut EP, that have helped solidify leader Tim Kinsella’s notoriety as one of the most pretentious voices in indie rock. But…
Jenny Lewis, the centerpiece of Rilo Kiley (right), has a most uncommon resumé. She first earned attention as an actress who worked steadily between 1985, when she was just eight years old, and 2001. According to the Internet Movie Database, her credits include high-profile film appearances (she got seventh billing…
Doing its part to improve Franco-American relations, The Plot to Blow Up the Eiffel Tower (right) flaunts a high-art conceit that includes performing in spooky, faux-SS uniforms. Subtle as a sledgehammer, the San Diego-based noise outfit is clearly out to shock the folks whom it doesn’t already hack off –…
On the website belonging to Denver’s Filmstrip Series, leader John Common lists dozens of ludicrous band names that didn’t make the cut — his favorite being Walt Shitman. And while that wise-ass moniker might seem like a non sequitur at first, in a weird kind of way it almost fits…
Kill Memory Crash has spent the majority of the past ten years operating in relative obscurity, playing underground raves and clubs in Chicago and Detroit. Its style has developed from a pretty typical dance sound into a dark hybrid of Detroit techno, IDM and heavy industrial music reminiscent of Nitzer…
A legend has returned: Tracks is back. The club, which started out in 1980 as an after-hours joint on Fox Street in what was then known as the Bottoms (and is now the land of top-priced lofts), grew into a full-fledged nightclub and major party palace in the ’80s; it…
A household name among hard-core folkies, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott provides the musical conduit between Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan. Born Elliot Charles Adnopoz in 1931 to a Jewish physician in Brooklyn, the unlikely saddle tramp reinvented himself as a rodeo rider and cowboy singer — one whose worldly exploits have…
Most musicians and record labels are like, ‘Yo, the masses are stupid,'” says New York rhymer C-Rayz Walz. “But I’ve got more love than that. I’ve got more love than that for humanity, and people who buy hip-hop. I don’t think they’re stupid, and I don’t care if it’s a…
Poorly recorded in a converted chicken coop called Mud Bay (“not the rectum of the world, but you can see it from there,” Buzz Osbourne writes in the liner notes of this uneven effort), Mangled Demos From 1983 is the only document of the Melvins’ original lineup: guitarist/vocalist King Buzzo,…
To call Pavement’s Stephen Malkmus and Smog’s Bill Callahan icons of indie rock is no mere hyperbole. But besides the fact that the two have birthed thousands of misfit, hyper-intellectual troubadours, the parallels in their careers are uncanny. Both began recording in the late ’80s; both released EPs on the…
Plenty of Rage Against the Machine and Soundgarden buffs have been hoping Audioslave would produce a great album on its second try, but they’ll have to settle for pretty good. Although Out of Exile is solid and listenable, Chris Cornell, Tom Morello, Brad Wilk and Tim Commerford are ultimately pushing…
Talk about the triumph of the team concept. 534 is an intermittently entertaining listen, yet the limited success it achieves is owed not to Memphis Bleek, whose name is in front of the title, but to the formidable support staff assembled around him. Bleek isn’t a bad rapper, but he’s…
Growing up in the English countryside with parents who are into American folk isn’t exactly the most obvious path to acquiring a taste for raw funk. Nonetheless, as Will Holland, aka Quantic, dug through crates as a teen, he developed a penchant for clean horns, fuzzy bass and growling soul…
Colder Than Fargo’s debut, In the Basement of the Chapel, strove to embody its name: Frigid and hymnal, the disc was a lucid — if occasionally flawed — translation of simplicity and soul into song. But Blue (whose release will be celebrated Friday, June 3, at the hi-dive, with Channing…
“Landlocked Hip Hop” kicks off this CD with a hilariously pointed definition of Colorado rap, replete with satirical references to banging snow bunnies and celebrating “white boys with dreads.” Fortunately, the scene also encompasses D.O., whose impressive musical and lyrical statements do credit to the Ground Zero Movement, from which…
A Brit at birth, Richie Hawtin spent the majority of his formative years just within the borders of our neighbor to the north. While machine-assembly opportunities lured Hawtin’s father south to Detroit, it was machine-inspired music that later motivated his teenage son. One of the top two contenders for techno…
In a world where indie rock has become the Next Big Thing and marketing plans exist before the music, Pinback’s sincerity is a joy. Zach Smith and Rob Crow have no identifiable image, no signature wardrobes or hairstyles, and they’ve created three albums of such peculiar pop that no major-label…
Imagine the all-employee band at a Guitar Center company picnic — only instead of washed-up ponytail dudes and zit-faced Slipknot geeks, the guys on stage are true hipster bluebloods: One was a founding member of screamo forebear Nation of Ulysses, and the whole group has collaborated twice with the post-rock…
Once upon a time, sworn fealty to the Cure meant absolute disdain for AC/DC — and vice versa. Morrissey was Bluto to Axl Rose’s Popeye. Back then, It Dies Today wouldn’t have had an audience. But today, thanks to labels like Level-Plane and Trustkill, kids in black-framed glasses rub shoulders…
