Judging by record and ringtone sales, hip-hop is the most popular genre of music in the country. There’s a host of cocksure yet affable rappers out there for whom people can’t help but cheer these days. But who needs to go over a list of the most beloved rappers in…
It’s nearly 2 a.m. on a recent weekend morning inside a packed Gryphon Nightclub, and the sights and sounds of debauchery are everywhere. The hard-driven electronic beats careening out of the DJ booth are sending the crowd into a frenzy, as measured by all of the dancing and sexual energy…
Better to burn out or fade away? The current musical tendency to fetishize the past, creating new markets through nostalgia, has come up with a new answer to this timeless rock ‘n’ roll question: the reissue. For the second year in a row, David Byrne has chosen this route, and…
It’s easy to take Ryan Adams for granted; after all, he’s a prodigious overachiever whose output often manifests in multiple annual offerings. So it’s no surprise to find Follow the Lights, a well-stocked seven-song EP, following closely on the heels of his recent full-length Easy Tiger. But while some artists…
After more than 30 years as a reggae musician, Cocoa Tea should be either a cutting-edge groundbreaker or a torchbearer for easy-does-it standards. As Biological Warfare disappointingly makes clear, he’s neither. The dancehall vibe he’s worked with for most of his career has seen him occasionally flirting with progressive electronic…
In Defense of the Genre, Say Anything’s 27-song, two-disc quasi-concept album — which is twice as long and nowhere near as good as its predecessor, 2004’s Is a Real Boy — is about Max Bemis’ struggles with drug abuse and his very public bipolarity. (He was busted in NYC last…
By ANDY VIHSTADT Led On Those of you waiting on a full-scale reunion tour from Led Zeppelin should find something else to obsess about in 2008. According to Robert Plant’s site , he and Alison Krauss are launching a European tour in May with US dates to follow. In the…
Stephen C. Foster, composer of Florida’s current state song There’s been talk of getting rid of Florida’s state song for years. “The Swanee River (Old Folks at Home)” by Stephen C. Foster was officially adopted in 1935 — less enlightened times, shall we say. At the end of 2007, it…
It’s funny that one of the greatest gifts to South Florida musickers this year is coming from San Francisco, but it’s pretty fitting that the givers are called Kreamy ‘Lectric Santa. The famed avant-punk-whatever quintet is flying in from the Bay Area to stage a festival, heartwarming to anyone who…
Music DVDs are typically used as stopgaps between CD releases or to drum up support for some other project (movie cameo, tour, impending jail sentence) that an artist is promoting. Most amount to little more than hastily shot concert films, music-video compilations, or the latest chapters in continuing sagas about…
Cumbia isn’t the type of music that’s typically associated with American funk. Sure, you can do the proverbial watusi to a cumbia any night of the week depending on what nightclub you’re in, but there’s generally a distinct difference between Andean cumbia music and the funked-out grooves of ’60s psychedelic…
Local band, Map of the Universe, hit the South Florida scene in late 2005, after Ed Artigas and Ivan Marchena’s band (acclaimed local act Bling Bling) called it quits. Along with drummer Johnny Calderin, they started gigging all over the tri-county area, spreading some righteous hooks and melodies while releasing…
The ’70s fell to Pink Floyd — and so the Zeroes have fallen to Daft Punk. The French duo started churning out techno/house/electronica music in the ’90s. Now, they’re globally dilated and definers of that diffuse genre. Alive 2007, their new album, is a live recording from a June concert…
Not to minimize Buck 65’s abilities as a rhymer, but it must be said: the greatest thing this man has brought to contemporary hip-hop is dirt. There’s dirt and noise and grime and spilled drinks all over Buck’s records, and his rough, full-throated voice is just part of it. The…
Retro soul’s got to be damn fine to justify its existence, since the stuff it’s modeled on is readily available for listening pleasure to anyone with a computer and access to Rhapsody, iTunes, or any number of re-issue catalogues. Fortunately, the latest from Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings qualifies as…
That’s what I said? But last night around 6 p.m., my phone was ringing off the hook from a publicist trying to get me to do a sit-down interview with P who’ll be here today talking about his upcoming album, HNIC2. If you don’t already know, Prodigy was recently sentenced…
By ANDY VIHSTADT Stephen Malkmus, at left Gold Soundz Along with the deluxe version of Pavement’s Brighten the Corners, Stephen Malkmus will be issuing solo LP4 in 2008. You Ain’t No Picasso’s has more info and a live version of the title-track from the forthcoming Real Emotional Trash, due March…
I’m a big fan of beautiful accidents,” Skeleton Key leader Erik Sanko says. And he might as well be. Though he is referring to spontaneous creative accidents, Sanko also admits to being mystified that Skeleton Key — which formed in 1996 amid a thriving downtown New York arts scene —…
Wu-Tang Clan’s fifth album, 8 Diagrams, comes at a time of group strife. Ghostface Killah and Raekwon have laid into Wu ringleader and beat maker RZA for the album’s creative direction. Calling Wu a sinking ship and RZA a “hip hop hippie,” Raekwon claims the beats on 8 Diagrams are…
Though over the years there had been much speculation about an Os Mutantes reunion concert, the event would not happen until almost 30 years after the breakup of their final lineup in 1978. In the fall of 2006, three of the band’s original members (brothers Arnaldo and Sergio Dias Baptista,…
So earthen is Gigi Dover’s singing that it might be echoing through canyons on the seven continents right now, with or without her involvement. But at the base of her voice is an underground welt — some sort of cosmic canker. On her new CD, Nouveau, she collaborates with her…
History has branded Ike and Tina Turner’s story as a violent one for good reason, but musically there were many joyful moments in their rock and soul catalog. The three-disc boxed set The Ike & Tina Story 1960-1975 rewards listeners who are able to execute the difficult task of removing…
