Music

On Tuesday, Sting and Peter Gabriel bring their Rock Paper Scissors Tour to the Pepsi Center while Alice in Chains is at the Paramount Theatre, and the Bad Plus deconstructs Igor Stravinsky’s Rites of Spring at Chautauqua Auditorium as part of the Colorado Music Festival.  Also this week Soul Asylum and…

You may have heard of Fantasia, the multi-media presentation wherein Rhinoceropolis is converted for a night into an immersive art show and musical event, which is being scheduled for the fall. This weekend, on Saturday, July 9, you can participate in Cave Rave, a dance-music event coupled with installation art, and…

Marissa Nadler’s latest record, 2016’s Strangers, is a dusky-toned, haunting meditation on obsession and modern existence. Using a language of personal mythology, Nadler seeks to impact a potential listener on a deep, personal level. “This might be my most adult record because on early records I still held that notion…

Despite what your conservative Facebook friends tell you, all of this is political. Police brutality is political. Gender-neutral bathrooms are political. Being queer or black or both in America is political. And, in its own way, Thursday night at Lost Lake was political. It was happening blocks from the Black…

The Global Dance Festival, featuring Knife Party, Dash Berlin, AutoErotique, Boombox Cartel, Bear Grillz and more, returns to Red Rocks tonight, Friday, July 8 through Sunday, July 10. The RIDE Festival, featuring headliner Pearl Jam, is in Telluride tomorrow and Sunday while Channel 93.3’s Big Gig is at Fiddler’s Green…

While not formally associated with Wham City, the well-known Baltimore art collective, Wye Oak’s Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack have long been friends and associates of that crew and the Baltimore music scene generally. Ben O’Brien and Alan Resnick of Wham City made a video for “The Tower,” a track…

Pop-punk — though a divisive term, depending on who you talk to — is as precious a part of musical history as classical music or folk. The genre dates to the early 1990s, made popular by bands like Screeching Weasel, ZOiNKS! and the Queers. Again, this all depends on who you…

David Liebe Hart is perhaps best known these days for his contributions to Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! and Check It Out! with Dr. Steve Brule. With his songwriting, puppetry and his wide array of unusual voices, Hart carved a real niche for himself on those already surreal…

It’s been five years since the Sheepdogs rocked their way onto the national stage and quit their day-jobs, and they don’t plan on going back anytime soon. Bassist Ryan Gullen says he doesn’t miss the day-job life the band’s members were familiar with during the years before becoming the first…

Jackson Browne, who’s set to headline Red Rocks in August, will perform a solo acoustic show at Pike Peak Center on Monday October 10. Advance tickets, VIP packages, and GuacFund benefit seats are  at www.JacksonBrowne.com are on sale now while reserved tickets ($50-$101.50) go on sale on to the general public…

Hello…how are you? Would you like to get to see Adele? A donor contacted us with the wish to give away one VIP ticket (section AAA) to the sold-out Adele concert at Pepsi Center on July 16 to one die-hard fan. For your chance to win this ticket, comment on…

Fanzines have helped form part of the popular musical landscape since, well, popular music began. In the modern era, pretty much anyone can start an online zine with minimal, if not zero, costs. Why wouldn’t you get some of that action? Who knows? You might get into a few shows…

When Scream was released in December 1996, just in time for Christmas, it revitalized genre-horror cinema and the career of director Wes Craven as well as launched its cast to stardom. For its Film on the Rocks screening at Red Rocks this Thursday, July 7, the organizers of the program…

PWR BTTM is everything. No, seriously. In the space of thirty minutes, singer and multi-instrumentalist Ben Hopkins manages to touch upon a vast array of topics, running every available gamut in the process. Hopkins, who uses gender-neutral pronouns, transitions from talking about life after Bard College to playing dingy DIY…

Femi Kuti will return to the Boulder Theater tonight on Wednesday, July 6. We spoke to Kuti about the upcoming show and the peace that music has provided throughout his four-decade-long career. The last album his band released was No Place for My Dream in 2013, and Femi says that a new…

When a singer decides to go “go solo,” one can’t help but wonder about the circumstances surrounding the decision. Was there bad blood with the performer’s former bandmates? Were there financial problems? Or was it simply a decision to branch out musically, allowing them to stretch their musical capabilities? Monday…

A few weeks ago, I made the six-hour trek to Santa Fe to see Denver band Rubedo play at the recently opened Meow Wolf Art Complex (full disclosure: My boyfriend, Gregg Ziemba, is a founding member of Rubedo). As a sort of sister city to Denver, Santa Fe has long…

Last Saturday, June 25, marked the biggest festival in the 22-year history of the Westword Music Showcase, which spanned more than a dozen stages around Denver’s Golden Triangle and featured nearly 100 local bands and artists across many genres. This lineup was drawn from the finalist nominees for the 2016…

Ryan Chrys has long been a fixture of Denver’s music scene. His past bands include Spiv and Demon Funkies. But with his new gig, Ryan Chrys & The Rough Cuts, he’s returning to his country roots. Sort of. “My mom plays guitar and sings,” Chrys offers. “Growing up, she’d sing…

If there ever was a weekend to embrace your inner hippie, this Fourth of July weekend is it. While there’s big shows like Dead & Company and Umphrey’s McGee (each in town for two-night stands), there’s also Dead tribute acts Dark Star Orchestra and Shakedown Street as well as Blues Traveler’s…