Summer may be drawing to a slow, sad close, but there’s still plenty of time to pack up the family wagon and head for the hills. We took a bag of local releases along on a recent road trip, and while barreling down the highway, we discovered that the local…
The first minute of NOFX’s new album, Pump Up the Valluum, sounds damn near identical to the first minute of the band’s sixth album, Punk in Drublic, released in 1994. The rock-god dueling guitars fire up the intro, then the drum rolls of impending doom indicate something really big is…
Merman Jim Thomas could probably make a good living simply reproducing the surf sounds of old, or revving them up with a touch of punk rock and peddling them to a new audience. But he’s more ambitious than that, and on Road Show, his group’s latest, he proves it by…
Colorado, it’s safe to say, isn’t known for its soul men. But by creating some of the most stirring music to emerge from this state, Denver native and ex-Subdude John Magnie has been correcting that shortcoming for the past couple of decades. These days, Magnie’s crafting his spiritual sounds in…
There are two types of mourners in the world. One weeps openly in public, without shame, displaying his sorrow for all to see. The other stands stone cold and impassive, as if any show of emotion would bring on uncontrollable hysterics. Hefner definitely fits into the latter category. With songs…
Those of you who frequent Herman’s Hideaway have no doubt noticed the disappearance of Sharon Rawles, who toiled at the club for twelve years and was eventually named its general manager by owner Alan Roth. Well, you can relax, as both alien abduction and spontaneous combustion have been ruled out…
The life of Ohio’s Brainiac came to a sharp, sad and unexpected close in 1997: Vocalist/keyboardist Tim Taylor was killed in a car accident just as the band he helped start was accelerating its experiments with avant-garde indie noise pop. Led by Brainiac guitarist John Schmersal, Enon, Wednesday, August 23,…
While many eighteen-year-old female musicians are busy bleaching their hair, exposing their navels and ripping off Janet Jackson’s dance moves, Denver’s Liz Clark, Saturday, August 26, at the Soiled Dove, is carving out her own niche as a singer-songwriter. A solo performer who’s been at it for more than three…
Once upon a time, deejaying was considered the sole province of menfolk. Recently, however, a crop of female turntablists have put their own spin on that perception and emerged as creative and progressive practitioners of the craft. FIRE (Female Ingenuity Redefining Energy), Friday, August 18, at Rock Island, aims to…
There’s an unwritten rule in American society that once you grow up, you don’t listen to metal anymore,” says Kerry King, guitar mutilator for Slayer. “And that seems to happen in bands, too. I don’t consider Metallica to be a metal band anymore, or Megadeth. But this is still the…
Superstar collaborations now seem de rigueur for any hip-hop album or movie soundtrack that utilizes urban contemporary vibes to score points with audiences. But how many of these collaborations actually occur and succeed on the artist’s own terms, and how many just exist as a result of some executive producer’s…
It’s the night before Independence Day, and the moon is seemingly radiating heat. In the maze of strip malls that is South Parker Road, illuminated by the occasional premature firework, Heimmie’s Pub looks the part of a prototypical suburban dive, at least from the exterior. Take a few steps toward…
Mike Ballard and the small army of volunteers who compose Friends of Red Rocks — a musically minded not-for-profit organization that claims Twist & Shout owner Paul Epstein, former Herman’s Hideaway general manager Sharon Rawles, chanteuse Lannie Garrett, COMA president Dolly Zander and other local rock-and-roll representatives as members –…
Nathan Hamilton, Tuesday, August 15, at Quixotes True Blue and Wednesday, August 16, at the Dark Horse Saloon in Boulder, is on a roll these days. The Austin-based singer-songwriter (and former leader of the late Sharecroppers) has just won the revered New Folk award at this years Kerrville Folk Festival…
Rubber Planet, with Sad Star Cafe, Friday, August 11, at Hermans Hideaway, bounces around the pop universe with a classic songwriting approach that results in catchy, radio-ready anthems; luckily, the players possess the talent to make that proposition interesting. The Denver-based four-piece crafts catchy variations on the verse-chorus-verse formula while…
While working in an improv group, D.J. Yazzie observed a fellow player making a strange face every time she drew a blank on stage: She looked, he decided, like an undead jugfish. With this image etched in his mind, Yazzie named his new improv group Undead Jugfish, a titular reminder…
These days, Rachael Lampa’s schedule is not typical of that of most fifteen-year-old kids from Monarch High School in Louisville, Colorado. Of course, when a battery of people have you pegged as the next big thing — not just for Colorado, but for the country and possibly beyond — your…
Kim Richey is calling from the road, from somewhere inside the D.C. Beltway, trying her best to escape the confines of her hotel room even while on the phone. “I can’t open my window. I’m going to try to get my Swiss Army knife. I think if I can take…
There is something both chilling and beautiful about chaos and destruction, like watching a 21-story building implode. In a live setting, the Austin, TX-based foursome, …And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, live by this notion: The band takes the established order and structure and pulverizes it…
Dolomites provide a curious geographical anomaly, considering they’re Irish by way of Portland and take their name from the soaring limestone spires of the Italian Alps. But as pint-hoistin’ pub bands go, this acoustic quintet conveys as universally Celtic a feeling as getting shit-plastered on St. Paddy’s Day, or nigh…
A trip to your neighborhood CD store can be a disheartening experience, especially when the bestseller racks are filled with imitations (‘N Sync) of imitations (the Backstreet Boys) of imitations (New Kids on the Block) of imitations (the Osmonds) of imitations (I could go on, but is that really necessary?)…
There’s been a lot of talk lately about this little old thing called “online music.” Last week, a court ruling ordered the file-sharing system Napster to close its electronic doors for good (a ruling that was subsequently stayed until Napster’s pending appeal can be heard). In the wake of that…
