50 Years Later: The Who Tone Down Heavy Concepts On Stripped Down ‘The Who By Numbers’
A half-century of perspective on The Who By Numbers (released 10/3/75) reveals not only how durable the album is, but also how it remains so enduring in spite of itself. The stripped-down production by Glyn Johns is bereft of the innovative synthesizer work of 1971’s Who’s Next and the density of arrangements on Quadrophenia from […]
Guitar Legend Vernon Reid Talks New Album ‘Hoodoo Telemetry’, Playing Ozzy’s ‘Back To The Beginning’ & More (INTERVIEW)
He may have burst on the scene in the late ‘80s via Living Colour and that awesome “Cult of Personality” riff, but guitarist Vernon Reid has gone on to participate in a variety of projects from a head-spinning number of genres from jazz to electronic. Reid is back with a new solo album, Hoodoo Telemetry, […]
Listen: Pesky Kid Break Emotional Cycle With Jangly Alt-pop Melodies On “Terrific Boomerang”
Pesky Kid is a multimedia artist who has dabbled in a variety of things, currently hoping to unleash “beats for self-actualization.” A product of the DIY world, Benjamin Champagne ran a small club for over 5 years and helped produce hundreds of shows. In that space, he cultivated art shows, workshops, resistance lectures, law briefings, […]
Listen: BLD DRV’s “Vines” Mixes Lush Shoegaze With Alt-rock Urgency
BLD DRV (blood drive) is the collaborative alt-rock project of Craig Daitch (vocals/guitar) of Detroit and Tacoma-based Justin Tamminga (drums) of the Spartan Records band Assertion. Working across time zones, the duo crafts a sound that blends textured guitars with brooding atmospherics through music that is both reflective and unflinching. On their new single, “Vines,” […]
Ten Years Later: Deafheaven Reshapes Metal With Blistering ‘New Bermuda’
Metal music has always been crafted to hit you directly in the chest, with a perfectly aligned chord that pierces through the speakers and sticks to the bottled-up aggression most people carry with them. Like the finishing move in a fighting game, there is a violent, celebratory poetry that cuts through the stereotypical wall of […]
25 Years Later: Radiohead Shifts Gears & Modern Alt Rock Landscape With Kid A
The idea of a consensus amongst a large group of people feels more like a fantasy than something we’ll ever see in person. Even outside of the phony socio-political arguments that flood your social media feed every time you decide to check an app, the large-scale music distribution platform that is the internet may be […]
Waylon Jennings’ Previously Unheard Album ‘Songbird’ Reveals Poignant Gems (ALBUM REVIEW)
When the country music Hall of Famer Waylon Jennings passed away in 2002, the artist left behind a host of recordings that had never been released. His son, famed musician/producer Shooter Jennings, recently discovered these and was amazed by the high quality and sheer number of top-notch offerings. Songbird is the first of a scheduled […]
Golden Age Thursday: Bags (Alice Bag Band) Deliver Hauntingly Beautiful Performance for Iconic Documentary
You can call them Bags, The Bags, Alice Bag Band, or simply call them exactly what they are, one of the pioneering bands of the Southern California punk movement. The band was founded in 1977 by Alicia Armendariz and Patricia Morrison, who initially formed their own band, Femme Fatale, before teaming up with Kim Fowley […]
A Perfect Circle’s ‘Mer de Noms’ Receives Definitive Sound Series 25th Anniversary Vinyl Reissue (ALBUM REVIEW)
When A Perfect Circle released Mer de Noms in 2000, the band immediately stood apart from the crowded rock landscape of the era. Formed by guitarist Billy Howerdel, with Maynard James Keenan stepping outside of his role in Tool to provide vocals, the group fused heavy riffs with atmosphere and restraint in a way that […]
Kashena Sampson Gravitates Toward Moody and Cinematic Folk-rock Sounds on ‘Ghost Of Me’ (ALBUM REVIEW)
For her third album, Nashville-based Kashena Sampson pivots away from her more traditional folk-leaning roots toward a moodier, psychedelic folk-rock sound that gives her music a darker edge and continues to add to her appeal. You can hear influences as varied as Kate Bush, Siouxsie Sioux, and Tori Amos woven throughout the nine tracks that […]