Music

— Brian ZimmermanPicture this: You’re in an elevator, alone, when suddenly, a gentle island ditty starts piping through the speakers. It starts with a guitar, a wave-like rhythm that reminds you of white sand and lapping waves. Then the melody kicks in. It sounds familiar, strangely familiar, and you probe…

Recently, Fort Lauderdale band Suede Dudes gave County Grind a “Moist Vagina.” Ewwwww!, we can hear your screech of disgut. No fear! It was merely a cover of Nirvana’s B-side to “No Apologies”/”Rape Me” double A-side released in 1993. They took it and made it all their own. We’ve called Suede Dudes drone-y,…

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the fact that Yelawolf is a good lookin’ dude, but that was the last thing on the crowd’s mind last night. And rightfully so. His looks might be good, but his flow is so much better. In no way is he just some…

The lamb lies down on Broadway. It is a sentence that stirs the soul of hard-core progressive-rock fans who know the days when Peter Gabriel fronted Genesis while Phil Collins concentrated on complex time signatures on an intricate drum kit. Those fans also know The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway…

Elvis Costello and the ImpostersHard Rock LiveApril 25, 2012Better than: Elvis befriending Burt Bacharach. Call it the redemption of Elvis Costello. After all his various side excursions over the past couple of decades — from country to classical, as well as tentative attempts at jazz and equally awkward passes at…

Timothy NorrisDrum roll, please… Individual results may vary.We’ve just rolled out a new and improved calendar of Broward/Palm Beach concerts. Our online music listings are now sortable by artist, venue and price. We’ve also got a raw, unadulterated, alphabetical list of upcoming shows in the drop-down menus on the righthand…

There’s nothing shy about Lacuna Coil, an Italian six-piece that helped fully solidify the subgenre dubbed “gothic metal.” Nearly everything about the band is bombastic, from vocalist Andrea Ferro and Cristina Scabbia’s dramatic male-female vocal interplay to the effects-heavy, ethereal touches to the music itself. In clumsier hands, this could…

Duo Blood on the Dance Floor seems tailor-made for the nightmares of any old person — let’s say, anyone over 21. The group’s masterminds, Dahvie Vanity and Jayy von Monroe, revel in looking like vastly over-the-top versions of a latter-day “scene” look, taken to the extreme, all teased hair, makeup,…

The great achievement of Chicago-based punk foursome Rise Against is that the group has walked a tightrope on which few similar bands have managed to balance. Its original stance, down to its name, was largely political, and yet the group has mostly enjoyed the continued respect of fans and critics…

Lit is a band that’s experienced its share of tragedies. The death of drummer Allen Shellenberger in 2008 definitely put making new music on hold for a minute, but the band took up where it left off, adding drummer Nathan Walker. “We’ve all come to accept that out of tragedy…

This week: Rockers who are seemingly determined to do themselves in. It seems to me that self-destruction is a fairly common phenomenon in modern music. Forget the fact that drink and drugs have led to many a musician’s downhill spiral. Listing all those who have succumbed to those vices would be an…

When it rains, it pours, and in South Florida, that kind of idiom applies to sporadic climate patterns, live music, and community events alike. Sometimes the region even plays host to all three at once, which manifested into something like what Delray Beach’s Old School Beer Fest and the Open…

Better than: Staying home and watching Gossip Girl reruns. In a world where pop stars and dubstep DJs reign king (and queen), Taylor Momsen is without a doubt going against the typical formula for “making it big.” Some may argue that it’s a gimmick and that she’s just another angsty…

Cheryl James says of her groundbreaking three-lady hip-hop group whose music you likely sweat to over the past three decades, “We’re in a class by ourselves.” No shit. Salt-N-Pepa has no contemporary equivalent, James, AKA Salt, believes. And she’s really right. Talk about staying power. Salt-N-Pepa formed in 1985 with Sandra…

Boca’s Livid Records had one hell of a streak from 2010 to 2011. The label released ten albums by local, national, and international groups. And we’re still impatiently waiting for that Bulletproof Tiger seven-inch, which, we hear, is getting plated and lacquered at the pressing plant as you read. The…

Recently, I heard Train’s new song “Drive By,” and for whatever reason, I let the radio play it all the way through. However, at one point, the lyric “My love for you went viral” caught my attention.A myriad of questions suddenly flooded my brain. Did a band really make a…

Remember reading magazines like Tiger Beat and Bop? Week after week, you’d thumb through the pages, ripping out photos of cute musicians to paste into your binders. And sometimes — if you were feeling really brave — you’d send a fan letter or two or three to your heartthrob, hoping…