Kylesa’s Phillip Cope talks about his favorite horror movies

Kylesa got its start in 2001 when former members of sludge-metal band Damad teamed up with guitarist and visual artist Laura Pleasants. From the beginning, this Savannah, Georgia-based band has shown no loyalty to a specific genre; as a result, the outfit’s discography has been fascinatingly varied. See also: -…

Tobacco of Black Moth Super Rainbow talks about his favorite haunted houses

Although Black Moth Super Rainbow’s dreamlike, psychedelic melodies sound like they could’ve been part of those ’70s era Sid & Marty Krofft shows, the band actually formed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 2003 in the wake of earlier projects from the act’s singer and multi-instrumentalist, the unimonikered Tobacco (aka Thomas Fec)…

Esi Juey has a “hundred-round clip of hits”

Born Jewel Cameron III, Esi Juey was born in California, and he moved around as a child, living in places like Ohio, before eventually landing in the Mile High City. One of the most promising local rappers to emerge in recent years, he’s swinging for the fences. “I’m trying to…

Donna Grantis of 3rd Eye Girl on what it’s like to play with Prince

Prince became a household name after the release of his third album, 1982’s 1999. Over the years, his perfectly realized blend of rock, pop, funk and jazz has proved equally popular with audiences and critics. Throughout the ’80s, Prince released hit records that broke genre barriers, not just in terms…

Yngwie Malmsteen plays to impress himself first

Yngwie Malmsteen is a guitar god known for his supremely technical fretwork. The virtuosic guitarist burst into the world of international music in 1984 with Rising Force. At the age of seven, Malmsteen says, he saw a documentary about the death of Jimi Hendrix and was so taken by Hendrix’s…

DJ Rufio gets his guerrilla groove on at Red Rocks

The parking lot is a perfect place to mingle and get your pre-game on before a show, particularly at Red Rocks. But Brandon Chavez is taking tailgaiting to another level. At select EDM shows, you can find Chavez, aka DJ Rufio, and his crew of party people gathered around a…

Robert Jepsen of Seris on making accessible heady metal

Seris is a mathy metal band with a footing in technical death metal that has found a way to blend all of that into something far more accessible than either would suggest. There is a groove and fluidity underlying the band’s sound that gives the heaviness a paradoxical kind of…

Black Amex sounds as opulent as its name

The American Express Centurion Card is the ultimate status symbol. Otherwise known as the Black Card, the card is issued on an invitation-only basis — according to Wikipedia, whose word we’re going to have to take because we know precisely zero cardholders — to the upper echelon of the upper…

Derek Plaslaiko on how well Communikey is run

A genuine craftsman from the days when DJs played actual records and an encouraging reminder that some in fact still do, Derek Plaslaiko is truly a DJ’s DJ. The Michigan native was a fixture on the Detroit rave scene from the mid-’90s until 2004, when he relocated to New York…