There aren't many people that would argue Three Days Grace had an easy trip up a very crowded street when they first appeared in 2003. At that time, an angry band whose muse was centered in an angry and resentful place had it made and it didn't hurt that Three...
The romantic image that most music fans tend to harbor when they think about the process of making a new album is always the same: even the most social of bands will retire to comfortable studio confines after a regimen of touring and songwriting, where they'll...
The process of deconstruction – of values, of style, of established forms, of any number of aesthetics – can be a very salacious thing when done well and with a bit of foresight. Simply ripping shit up arbitrarily before gluing it back together and...
I had to look twice to make sure I'd put the right album on for review as the lead-off track from Another Link In The Chain, “Birds Of Prey” kicked into gear. Then I went online to see if there were two bands called The Junction. Incidentally –...
'Designer impostor' products are funny things. On one hand, they're rather mawkish and genuinely looked down upon because, as the term implies, they're bargain-basement replicas of established and lauded matter. Sometimes they don't even bear a...
Australia has the particular ability to create things lovely and drastic and just above the edge of destruction. Take the tragic beauty of the Outback, for example, or the impossible tangle of muscle that constitutes kangaroos or Mel Gibson. Among this number—but...
Sometimes it takes looking at an experience through new eyes to really appreciate it. As a fan of live music in general, I've probably been to–conservative estimate–200 shows in my admittedly short lifetime. But you never forget your first one. Mine?...
Nearing the end of their 2009 Pandemonium tour in support of their latest release Yes, Pet Shop Boys return to the U.S. promising another avant-garde performance. Original members Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe—with four Grammy awards, dozens chart-topping hits and...
When he tried to sum up singer Richard Thompson's place in the grand scheme of the alt-rock pantheon in 1994, Spin/San Francisco Bay Guardian contributor Dirk Richardson wrote: “Even when his impeccably crafted tunes are covered by such established stars as...
I love shows with such a diverse line-up of bands that it not only crosses multiple genres of metal, but still bring out so many different types of fans, from the Stoner Metal Weedeater fans to the slightly geekish Melvins fans (I only say that because I am on of...