As good as the releases and catalogue reissues bearing the Jimi Hendrix name have been over the last couple of years (Sony has been much more careful with the work than EMI ever was), it was almost inevitable that something was going to come along which would tarnish that record. That release is Live At Berkeley – a document which is very representative of its time in all the wrong ways. The problem with it? Simply said, while the sound...

It might sound difficult to believe, but Shonen Knife's newest album, Pop Tune, reiterates the idea that a band really doesn't need to change very much in order to keep listeners interested as years pass. This is, after all, Shonen Knife's eighteenth studio album since the band formed in 1981 – and the only real change to the band's formula in all that time has been the players which comprise their rhythm section. Does that mean their sound is played...

In 1998, The Shape of Punk to Come album arrived. Its architects, Refused, were a small punk band from Sweden who were basically unknown until then but, when the record landed, the impact (and mark it left) was phenomenal; in fact, it was the punk to come. Classic punk was fun and bouncy, hardcore was raw, fast and gravelly, Nineties punk was fast and technical or fun and bouncy, but Refused were different; they mixed elements of dark electronica with...

Awright junky,So yeah, yeah, yeah I'm back an' blah blah blah i's good ta see me an' nah nah nah I ain't dead. Betcher thrilled, sure. So le's get down ta business; I been outta town an' ya know what I foun' when I got back? A fuck ton o' SWAG jus' layin' aroun'! An' some good, good shit too! Dis week, I got forty – FORTY – pieces o' primo dope fo' ya. Le's talk about some o' da...

Not every story has to be wildly dramatic and feature a series of cliffhanger dramas or recollections of terrible turmoil, sometimes it just has to be satisfying in the end to feel rewarding; like everything worked out how everyone wanted and the results were great and everyone is able to say it was just a good experience. That's exactly how it feels when one hears JEFF the Brotherhood singer/guitarist Jake Orrall lay out the series of events surrounding his band's...

It's a hot July afternoon, but Alex Levine is already starting to feel the cold rush of what's on its way. When Ground Control spoke to him, the bassist was just hours away from taking the stage with Gaslight Anthem – the band he, singer Btian Fallon, bassist Alex Rosamilia and drummer Benny Horowitz formed six years ago – and doing one of the last shows the band had scheduled before their forth album, Handwritten, came out. The bassist is...

Now in its fifth year, the Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival has not only become the premier metal tour of the Summer, it has also become one of the most highly anticipated tours of the year; and with the lineup of bands on the 2012 edition, it's easy to see why the anticipation has been particularly high this year. One look at the list of bands scheduled to play during the fest says it all, really, because each has a...

As it turns out, all those associated critics, cynical doomsayers and associated worrywarts who have spent the last few years questioning the health and status of rock n' roll have been wrong all along; the details of rock's demise have been greatly exaggerated. Rock's not dead but, as JEFF the Brotherhood happily concedes on their major label debut, Hypnotic Nights, the music is finally willing to admit that it is a little older and does actually see itself that way....

From the moment “Blood Red Youth” eases its way in to open Art History – California Wives' debut album – some listeners will just have a flood of images come rushing at them all at once: John Hughes movie posters, sequences out of Christian Slater movies, scenes from Cure music videos circa 1992, Replacements music videos released between 1985 and 1990 and more. Listeners will be surprised at how vividly and vibrantly those images come rushing back, and the storm...

Everyone knows that, when the man calls his children, they come running and line up to be counted. That is a constant, and Muddy Waters' performance at Buddy Guy's Checkerboard Lounge in 1981 proves it; The Rolling Stones were not scheduled to perform onstage that night (they had the night off between shows on their mammoth 1981 American tour) but, when Muddy Waters spotted them in the crowd watching him play, he called each of them up – Mick Jagger...