The term “singer/songwriter” conjures images of musicians lounging in coffeehouses while strumming open chords on classically tuned acoustic guitars to overly earnest lyrics. But since leaving his band War on Drugs to go solo, Kurt Vile has consistently subverted the stereotype with experimental atmospherics. This signature sonic approach can be…
“Who Am I to You?” It’s a very generous question for an artist to ask an audience. Not enough artists present this self-reflective inquiry. The ultimate value of art is not monetary, but what it offers in terms of in its experiential value. Organized by the Museum of Art Fort…
Better than: A Yes greatest hits show. Consider me won over. I had a feeling seeing Yes live would crystalize the band for me. For all these years, I have been a fan of certain bands of progressive rock (though not necessarily of the genre as a whole), I had never given Yes…
If there exists one genre of popular music with the most cantankerous and anal fans and critics, progressive rock would take the prize. Some of rock’s most talented musicians work in the genre. They often bring experience from classical music and a working knowledge of music theory. Some of the…
When Rob Crow and Armistead Burwell Smith IV’s named their project Pinback, a reference to an obscure science fiction movie of the 1970s, only the nerdiest of film nerds got the joke. The San Diego indie rock stalwarts were paying tribute to a key character in John Carpenter’s low budget…
Since Pinback debuted in the late 1990s, the San Diego duo has maintained a distinctive sound based on the product of two creative minds and bodies joining forces at an opportune moment. Rob Crow reacted to Armistead Burwell Smith IV’s desire to collaborate with someone when the latter’s band, Three…
Since Pinback debuted in the late 1990s, the San Diego duo has maintained a distinctive sound based on the product of two creative minds and bodies joining forces at an opportune moment. Rob Crow reacted to Armistead Burwell Smith IV’s desire to collaborate with someone when the latter’s band, Three Mile…
Better than: Having to sit through an entire Alan Parsons Project studio album.The Alan Parsons Project is one bizarro creature born of England’s matured prog-rock scene in the latter half of the 1970s. Most important progressive pop music albums, including the famously Parsons-engineered Pink Floyd LP Dark Side of the…
Better than: A hot poker in your earThere’s a new crack in the world’s surface. Swans left it there smoldering and smelling of brimstone on the stage at Respectable Street Café. See also- Slideshow from Swans at Respectable Street 2012- Swans’ Michael Gira: “At the Best Moments, Music Plays You…
When the members of Swans bring their live show back to Respectable Street Café on Wednesday, bring your earplugs. See also- Swans’ Michael Gira: “At the Best Moments, Music Plays You and Not the Opposite.”- Swans’ Michael Gira on Ecstatic Feelings, The Seer, and Being “All in the Sound”- Review:…
Arising from the cracks of the New York City postpunk scene in the early 1980s, Swans’ music is a genre unto itself. An otherworldly sonic disturbance, their sound is aggression turned musical. Not obnoxious noise but fearsome magnificence. The band’s clever turns take you from cacophony to gorgeous compositions. Luscious…
Arising from the cracks of the New York City postpunk scene in the early 1980s, Swans’ music is a genre unto itself. An otherworldly sonic disturbance, their sound is aggression turned musical. Not obnoxious noise but fearsome magnificence.See also- Swans Michael Gira on the Seer: “Once It’s Done, It’s Just…
See alsoSwans’ Piercing Assault on Respectable Street, September 14, 2011Today marks the official release date of the Swans’ extraordinary two-hour journey into delicate sounds and furious din with The Seer. The New York-based group’s figurehead, Michael Gira, resurrected Swans in 2010, after the band had officially broken up following a…
My memories of Dan Hosker begin and end with his hands. Though he passed away over the weekend, when I think of him, I can still feel the chubby, callused fingers of his handshake, which he offered with a slanted, benign grin every time we bumped into each other at…
Photos of Boston at Hard Rock Live.BostonSeminole Hard Rock Live, HollywoodThursday, June 28, 2012Better than: The computerized arena pop of todayThough no longer playing arenas, like in their 1970s heyday, Boston still played at a volume loud enough to feel as if it were playing in a mega huge stadium last…
Roger Waters – The Wall Bank Atlantic Center, Sunrise Friday, June 15, 2012 Better than: Watching a Pink Floyd tribute band.For the full slideshow, click here. Few concerts nowadays have a rhetorical agenda or offer a commentary on the way we live. Even when Roger Waters first wrote 99 percent…
Normal He’s a musician’s musician who has inspired generations of artists and invented the “ambient music” genre. Coming out of the early British prog scene as a founding member of Roxy Music, his ego was too big to be contained beyond the band’s first two albums, so he went solo…
For a man who came from the seed of Roger Waters — one of Pink Floyd’s founders and key songwriter — Harry Waters has a humble attitude. Before he began touring with his dad as part of his backing band in 2001, Waters, 34, spent many years honing his piano…
The Musical BoxHard Rock LiveMay 2, 2012I have seen the future of classic rock, and it is the tribute band. More so than most popular music genres, a key component to so-called classic rock is live performance on analog instruments. As bands that began in the sixties suffer the loss…
Tony Banks, Peter Gabriel, and Michael Rutherford formed Genesis whilst attending an English boarding school in 1966. Their only desire was to write pop songs for other rock bands. Wunderkind Jonathan King discovered them and wanted to groom them as the next Bee Gees. Early in the band’s career, Gabriel…
Editor’s Note: New Times writer Hans Morgenstern cautiously made his way to Revolution Live for about seven hours of complete fascination with touches of horror. What follows are the ten most shocking things he spotted at the Blood on the Dance Floor show last night. Click here for the full…
Blood on the Dance Floorwith Brokencyde, Deuce, Polkadot Cadaver, William ControlRevolution Live April 29, 2012For the ten most shocking moments of the night, click here. Better than: Actually being Frankenstein Goth rock, what hath ye wrought? For this writer, goth died when Joy Division’s singer Ian Curtis hanged himself in his Manchester home…
