Lexicographer Samuel Johnson once wrote that, “He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man” and, truly, Iggy Pop and The Stooges had tested that adage to its' absolute extreme by 1970. Between 1968 and 1970, the pages of those...
Alright ya mugs,So here it is, your newest load o' stuff that my sticky little fingers could – shall we say – liberate from the greater clutches of the music business. I'm still a little amazed at how easy it is – I'm not gonna lie; what...
For the last twenty-three years (at least), the Cowboy Junkies have cut a solid and celebrated career out of accentuating both the 'southern' and the 'gothic' ends of the term 'southern gothic' – essentially enhancing and focusing on those...
Some things are just beyond comprehension – no matter how open-minded or understanding you try to be. Are you skeptical? Here are some examples of questions that have no easy answer: “How is it that there are throwbacks in evolutionary...
Sometimes a band will start to generate excitement upon the very announcement of a forthcoming record; the stars will have aligned just right and, when the record in question does come out, it is to a legion of people that are literally standing and waiting with open...
At this point, there's no debating that some sounds are impossible to easily qualify. That, presumably, is why some clever critic coined the term 'Freak Folk' – it's a handy catch-all term that holds artists as far flung as Devandra Banhart,...
About twenty years ago (before Nirvana blew up), Sub Pop was a very different label from what it is now. Since grunge exploded, things have changed a lot – now, the label specializes in very clean-cut, polished and poppy mainstream indie rock typified by the...
"What would you do,” asks Wintersleep singer Paul Murphy wryly as “Experience The Jewel” peels open New Inheritors and simultaneously compels everyone within earshot to jump into the palm of his hand. “What would you do if desperation...
There's an old French proverb that reads, “It's all very well in practice, but it will never work in theory.” Of course, hearing that or reading it makes the rational mind recoil for a minute because it flies in the face of precautionary principles...
What is it about a record that makes a listener feel it? I don't mean “feel it” like it makes you want to move, I mean “feel it” like it moves you. You – a third party observer totally detached from the events that inspired the music,...