You could finish repaving Clematis Street with all the hyphens: Happy Anarchy is the indie-brass-pub-emo-anthem-jam-rock band you’ve always craved but never thought possible. Hailing from Staten Island, New York, this energetic eight-piece plays the kind of broad-minded music that usually slips through the cracks because of bogus attempts at categorization…
On the short-lived but fruitful 1982 TV show Police Squad (which spawned three movies and countless replicants), the character of Johnny was an informant to whom not only cops went for information but also surgeons, priests, and, weirdly, Dick Clark. Dick pays Johnny and asks: “What’s ska?” Johnny clues him…
Though techno elitists constantly write breakbeat off as lightweight tripe, the backlash hasn’t fazed DJ Icey and Baby Anne one bit. Ten years on, these two Florida-grown club vets are still dropping those patented trapkit-thumping beats with swirling acid lines. The pair obviously know where their target demographic lies, having…
Takk…, the title of Sigur Rós’ new album, means thanks in Icelandic. Perhaps it signifies gratitude to fans for not falling asleep over the course of their last two LPs. The band’s impressive discography has been high on melancholy and talent but short on range. On Takk… , things are…
You have to automatically concede a certain amount of praise for the massive imaginative output in Princess Superstar’s My Machine, a dystopic, sci-fi hip-hop concept album about a future celebrity who takes over the world with the help of a cloning machine. As in any good epic, apocalyptic replicant war…
Something like an Amazonian leprechaun, Curumin is a mythical jungle troublemaker in the guise of a feral child. His favorite tactic was misdirection — with his feet facing backward, poachers would never know exactly which way Curumin was heading. The same could be said for Luciano Nakata Albuquerque, the multitalented…
Your biggest concern after listening to Get Some is whether your shower ought to be hot or cold. Kicking up a miasma of filthy noise and musky lust, Nashville Pussy’s fourth disc veers precisely zero degrees from its headlong rush into the depths of Dixie-fried porn punk. Still, the disc…
If you want to interview Chicago-based singer-songwriter Jason Molina, you must follow some ground rules. First, Molina does not talk publicly about his personal life. He will not reveal whether he’s married or even if he has a family. In addition, he doesn’t like to refer to specific incidents in…
It’s another Friday night at Club M, and another local band throws down a hard-rocking set to unfazed regulars. Despite the swaggering, white-boy funkitude coming from the Bittercups — helmed by New Times staffer Jason Budjinski — the crowd reaction consists mostly of arched eyebrows, crossed arms, and trips to…
Is this what heavy metal has come to? Foul-mouthed exchanges between Iron Maiden’s aging sextet and washed-up doper Ozzy Osbourne’s hausfrau, Sharon, who spent the past couple of weeks publicly berating main Maiden Bruce Dickinson after allegedly pulling the plug on his band’s final Ozzfest gig? But just when you…
For the most part, dance music seldom holds its own outside the club, but there are exceptions. Recent danceable rockers like the darling Franz Ferdinand and future popsters the Epoxies have put out solid albums completely listenable without chemical or liquid aid. Add now to that playlist the Shiny Toy…
To those rockist stiffs who claim that all jam bands are talentless wankers: Your argument is wholly nullified by Garaj Mahal. This four-piece supergroup is made up of well-credentialed, veteran virtuosos from San Francisco and Chicago who get off on slapping around their extensive jazz background with rubbery improv and…
There are only two places on Earth with the right mix of ethnic and urban influences to spawn a band like Yerba Buena: Miami and New York. This Latin-leaning, multiculti seven-piece actually has roots in both cities, though Manhattan has served as its home and launching pad for world domination…
Thanks to the advent of sound-looping technology, the traditional one-man band can now multiply himself into a veritable one-man symphony. But even with the coolest, newest toys, you have to have serious chops and an innovative approach to keep an audience rapt and dancing all by yourself. That’s where Keller…
The sad truth is that there’s no term better than the overused folktronica to describe Aussie songwriter Mark Mitchell’s menagerie of digitally rendered psych-pop. Though recorded in the disparate urban locales of Adelaide and Brooklyn, Clue to Kalo’s second effort sounds more inspired by the mountains and lakes within eyeshot…
All vivacious jangle, thigh-slapping stomp, and grinning, good-ol’-boy charm, North Mississippi All Stars are the band Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer would’ve started if they knew where to get an electric guitar. Not to say that NMA’s fourth effort is at all rustic or simple: On the contrary, its compact,…
From the childlike front-cover drawing of a unicorn humping a horse (that’s in turn humping a zebra that’s barfing all over the place) and the back-cover photo of the sister duo dressed like two Native American Boy Georges (we couldn’t make this stuff up), CocoRosie’s Noah’s Ark is out there…
The Juan Maclean’s “Give Me Every Little Thing” stood in melancholic contrast to the rest of DFA Records’ second compilation. On a disc full of aggressively human percussion, tangible vocals, and feasibly live instrumentation, “Every Little Thing” was artificial and futuristic — the best song on a great album. The…
In their two years of growth and exploration, Miami alt-rockers Modernage have set out to thrive amid the city’s notorious schmaltz and glitz. With an influence list including Joy Division, Fugazi, and Gang of Four, Modernage strives to be more than just another entry into the post-punk annals, churning out…
Incredulous, primed to take the stage in front of a packed house of diehard fans, Z-Trip wanted to know one thing only: “Did that motherfucker just grab his dick at me?” That motherfucker was big-time raver DJ Icey, and, yes, that motherfucker had, in fact, just grabbed his dick at…
Last Wednesday’s sold-out crowd at Mizner Park was floating along on a sea of huge beers and pungent weed. SoFla’s notoriously rambunctious audience was in full form, with brawny dudes high-fiving and bleach-blond Bettys woo-hooing to Jack Johnson’s mellowed, front-porch acousticisms. As casual and assured as the North Shore breeze…
In a world where metal bands measure their bravery in terms of inane shock and menacing poses, Napalm Death frontman Mark “Barney” Greenway is a man made of real guts. A self-proclaimed “card-carrying pinko socialist,” Greenway isn’t shy about his left-wing views (or his love of the band Journey). He…
