It may seem hard to believe, but the Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival has been steamrolling its way across America with a solid tour of premier Metal bands for six years now. That sort of history is impressive in its own right but, if the Mountain View stop on this year's tour is any indication of the tour's future, I think it's safe to say that Mayhem has permanently cemented itself as one of the summer's most anticipated tours. Although...

It feels like the height of rock critic snobbery to claim that, after over a decade together, Toronto's Maximum RNR have finally slammed together an effort which truly deserves attention on a massive scale, but there's just no other way to qualify how good Rough Side Of The Dial is. Prior to this point, sure – Maximum RNR could record a good seven-inch and make listeners recognize how good a band they were on the strength of that (the band's...

Heyo Junky! Awright, so, betta late than neva, I'm back again wit' anotha great big bag o' SWAG fer yer approval. It's some tasty samples too – ther's a bitta punk, a bitta stoner rock a bitta pop an' hip hop an' everything else too – youse gotcherself a smorgasboard dis week! O' course, sittin' at da head o' da smorg is da big names like Bob Mould an' Murray Lightburn an' Radiohead. I dunno where or why, but I...

"I don't know why we're making people wait around. It makes it seem like we're important or something." So begins the Swingin' Utters show in the Middle East in Cambridge. On an absolutely lovely not-quite-yet-Summer Sunday evening, The Swingin' Utters are taking the stage at 11:15. Exactly on time too, as the crew, some showgoers and I are waiting on stage watching the digital clock to say 11:15. Right before the band takes the stage, lead singer Johnny Bonnel puts...

Everyone should be listening to Fucked Up. That’s a fact. Unfortunately, hardly anyone does. That’s a sad fact. I mean this in the sense that this band should be much much bigger than they actually are. For one thing, they play glam punk, fuzzy and complex, and layered. They release a plethora of vinyl and take it all on tour with them. And, finally, their latest release David Comes to Life is such a fantastic concept album (a punk opera)...

I can’t really say what it is that I found so catchy about Tegan and Sara when I first heard them. It must be that their songs, in essence, are pop (punk) songs about girls. Chalk that up to my affinity for Lookout!/Fat Wreck albums released in the Nineties (hey, their songs are often only two minutes long too). The problem, however, with most Tegan and Sara albums is that they are so infused with cuteness that they can turn...

After a decade of sporadic (at best) activity, it can only be assumed that most of the expectations those fans left in the Transplants' camp might have had were gone. Like, sure – the band's debut was awesome, but that was due in part to the fact that there was no template for the band to follow or listeners to make comparisons to; there was Tim Armstrong doing a cool kind of Rancid-esque thing on the mic and his guitar,...

As perfectly rich and varied as the musical spectrum has proven to be thus far in the twenty-first century, albums like Nation II Nation still stand out because they're completely unlike everything else on the pop music spectrum. If you doubt it – if you really think you've heard everything music (and especially hip hop) has to offer – then you haven't heard A Tribe Called Red. As over-developed and refined as hip hop has become over the last couple...

If the early twenty-first century has been characterized by anything thus far, it has been instant gratification and, tonight, Washingtone D.C. emcee Wale will show fans what the term really means. Tonight (that's right tonight), Wale will beat the excitement generated by the release of his new album, The Gifted, to the punch by doing a free live streaming show at Event Live. The Gifted (Wale's third full-length album) has only grown more hotly anticipated as details have slowly been...

It's incredible how, in spite of the fact that nothing has really changed about the band's circumstances, Mixtapes sound like they're primed to explode and take over the world on Ordinary Silence. That the band is giving off that kind of energy might simply be because they worked hard and, after a series of successes (including the release of a well-received LP and five great EPs between 2010 and 2012 as well as really good tours with Masked Intruder, The...