Now that there are endless new synth-tech-electro-pop-punk-Clash compilations on the racks every time you enter a record store, it’s become nearly impossible to find much refreshing within the once-underground genre. Many of the key players in the movement have already moved on and are experimenting with the sounds of early…
Tokyo’s Melt-Banana — just two guys and two girls in their late 20s — defy traditional definitions of speedcore, avant-metal terror, or even Japanoise. Naturally, that hasn’t stopped niche-makers from branding the band with such labels over the course of its ten-year life. Though Melt-Banana has achieved much recognition for…
Astute indie listeners with ears to the ground have been rising up to call Rilo Kiley the best new American band of the year. The group’s reputation — including a habit of stealing shows — is ever-growing. Music journalists, having dragged their sprezzatura out to analyze the Breeders, Superchunk, or…
A trail of glitter on the New Times carpet presents irrefutable evidence: Fort Lauderdale’s lovable Noodles paid a visit. It’s not often Bandwidth sees guests during office hours, but something about Noodles’ rambling voice-mail message from the previous day made us realize this was no ordinary local musician pumping an…
Billing themselves as providers of “the only rock from Siberia,” the Russian rockabilly vaudevillians in the Red Elvises have spent the past six years conquering the club circuit with an over-the-top stage show that features an Old Country interpretation of American trash culture. Surfing (“Surfing in Siberia”) and disco (“Closet…
DJ Trip (Keith Rosenberg) and DJ Subliminal (Danny Brown) were once so immersed with creating techno-bass and booty tracks, they didn’t even have time to cruise the clubs at night or listen to the radio, where their own music could often be heard. Nowadays, the spinning busybodies have a better…
Trey Anastasio, lead singer/guitarist of perennial American jam-band Phish and all-around neohippie icon, is prepared to slam into Florida with gale-force winds. You can hear the excitement in his voice. A Dennis Hopperish frenetic pace infiltrates his speech, and as he talks, each word seems to be a stepping stone…
Peaches derives power from her follicles just like Samson did; it’s just that hers are shorter and curlier. Witness her self-directed video for “Set It Off,” which opens with the Carla-from-Cheers-looking rapper perched on a urinal: a Eurotart in pink undies and cheapo aviator sunglasses. She chants the song from…
The last thing that I’d ever expect to hear on a Mudhoney song is a lone saxophone staggering through the psychedelic mist of hippy-dippy organs, twittering electronica, and slow-burn guitar rumble. Yet thar she blows in meandering amplitude on “Baby, Can You Dig the Light?” the opening extended salvo from…
There’s nothing wrong with a great songwriter taking someone else’s tunes for a spin — especially since most would agree that Mark Eitzel can often let pissiness creep into his own material. His recent collection of covers, Music for Courage and Confidence, is so full of tongue-in-cheekiness, it’s hard not…
Disturbed’s second album is a giant leap for the band and a hopeful sign for metal. On Believe, the group has traveled far beyond the electronic-tinged rhythm-and-riffs territory of its debut, The Sickness, creating one of the best metal records of the year. David Draiman has developed into an actual…
Over the course of its last two albums, Low has been investigating methods by which to expand its sound, a pretty natural progression for any group of artists working their way up to LP number six and virtually imperative for a band with an infrastructure as skeletal as theirs. You…
For the past few years, a group of independent hip-hop producers and MCs has been fucking with mainstream hip-hop, lobbing cherry bombs down the toilet of a genre that’s become pretty lame. Reversing convention, these artists craft records by replacing bombast with insecurity, using field recordings instead of samples, and…
Every week, Hollywood’s DJ Wendel Marcisse combs through bins of vinyl at local record stores or sifts through music his friends have sent him. With each new beat that greets his ears, his anticipation multiplies like that of a deep-sea fisherman hauling up a scaly critter of the sea. Love…
It’s been three years since we last heard from Underworld, the popular British group that successfully combines elements of techno and house with vocals and melody. Having the human element of a singer (Karl Hyde) up at the front of the stage undoubtedly helped them gain a foothold in the…
Too many musical dramas start off promisingly but putrefy into self-pity sessions. Boston¹s Bleu (a.k.a. William James McAuley III) goes beyond the pale, opting for eloquent songs that steer clear of singer-songwriter redundancy. At times, Bleu¹s voice resembles that of Styx¹s Dennis DeYoung, even though it floats over pop songs…
“Are you ready to be liberated/On this sad side city street/Well the birds have been freed from their cages/I’ve got freedom and my youth! ” The whiskeyed snarl evokes Mia Zapata and Courtney Love. The anthemic guitar riff brings to mind Prison Bound-era Social Distortion. It’s the Distillers’ “The Young…
It looked like a powerful dumb idea from the start. How could a band like GWAR — a visual experience more than anything else, a feculent feast for the optic nerve, messier than Gallagher smashing bunny rabbits with ball-peen hammers — possibly perform atop a piddling little stage in a…
There are few moments in current popular culture as delicious as watching a washed-up Martha Quinn shilling on a late-night infomercial for Time-Life’s Sounds of the ’80s collection. When asked what it was like to be an MTV VJ back in the day, the former party animal sniffs unconsciously, rubbing…
Throughout Sex, Age & Death, the former Boomtown Rat can’t seem to decide whether the state of the world makes him want to kick some ass or curl up and cry. Somewhat surprisingly, the once-prototypical New Wave nihilist is often easier to take when he chooses the latter approach. With…
Filled with lackluster covers, the average tribute album isn’t worth the CD it’s burned on. Rise Above, however, not only deserves your entertainment dollars but it forwards them to a good cause. (Visit www.WM3.org for details about the controversial case.) Rise Above’s definitive hardcore is essential and authentic. Latter-day Black…
When Robert Pollard was 21, halfway between Dayton high school basketball stardom and a fourth-grade teaching gig and a few years before starting his lo-fidelity beer-drinking rock band, Guided by Voices, he, his brother Jimmy, and some friends would get together. They’d descend their basements steps and spend hours banging…
