There are few things so delicious in pop than a singer that looks like your garden variety pop tart poppet but starts fires in your mind as soon as you hear her because she clearly has no faith in the “power of pop” and so tears it apart to suit her ends and make it her own. Those are the sorts of moments that tend to make critics feel a little funny in the pants and (as was the case...
No fanfare. No fake attempts to elicit enthusiasm from the audience. At Oakland’s Fox Theater, London’s The xx emerged quietly and began to make their presence known with a rich, swirling statement of music. Sounding just as they do on their eponymous debut album, the black-clad trio of Oliver Sim on bass and vocals, Romy Croft on vocals and guitar and Jamie Smith on percussion maintained their understated style as they worked through their all-too-short repertoire. Touring tirelessly across Europe...
The two most classic themes in Country music are heartache and heartbreak. Some naysayers or those that have never listened to Country music will ask what the difference is, but those on the inside know; the difference is all a matter of time. 'Heartbreak' happens in a moment – a series of events comes to a head and when the breaking point comes and a relationship unravels it's done; one person is left alone, heartbroken. Heartache is the lasting hurt...
Anyone who's been paying attention over the last few years had to have seen the possibility of Taylor Hawkins restarting The Coattail Riders coming. Recently, Hawkins has leant his voice to a series of albums including those by Dennis Wilson (where he filled in a missing vocal part), Slash, Queen and a few others as well as stepping up to the mic to sing with Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones at the Foo Fighters' classic show at Wembley Stadium....
Hey there you reprobates,Alright, I'm early – live with it. But I'm gonna make it worth your while, I swear; some things I just can't sit on. Like this monster load o' SWAG for example; this one's a beaut. Can you believe there are folks sending me stuff to put in here now? Works for me, they're taking out some of the leg work for me, and I'm takin' all the rest of it out for you. Howdaya like that...
Those of us that grew up in the Eighties understand just how bizarre a time it was. While the underground was busy brewing many of the bands that would go on to inspire and influence a staggering amount of the music that would come out through the Nineties and early Millennium , things were very different in the mainstream climate. Some portions of the economic sector enjoyed an unprecedented boom and mainstream culture really reflected that; items looked statuesque and...
It seems bizarre to think this way, but there are a very great few moments when trash culture can have a profound effect and influence on pop culture – even if it's totally impossible to understand why or how it happened. Such was exactly the case with Big Audio Dynamite; somehow in the early Eighties, a ragtag bunch of dispossessed punks and punk supporters ended up making music that would eventually influence not just punk, but Top 40 pop, electronic...
Ever wonder what it would sound like if The Kills got together with The Black Keys and did one enormous, bluesy rave-up? Probably not (who, other than the biggest music geeks, ever thinks about stuff like that?), but such a question might get more valid consideration if you listen to The Pack a.d.'s third album, We Kill Computers. Stomping out of the gate with a renewed sense of frustration and a petulant desire to get even with everything, We Kill...
Awright youse, So we reached the milestone of five posts full o' ill-gotten SWAG, and nobody's caught up with us yet – nobody's complainin'. Suits me, I can scour the web lookin' for free shit all day! And wouldn't you know? I've got a whole bunch more right now. Now, I know you little miscreants have some anger management issues (it' a bitch isn't it? I'm still in therapy), so I went and I found some metal SWAG for you...
It's funny how a musical style is able to mutate after the initial bloom comes off its' rose. Take the creature that punk rock has become for example. After the first wave of punk bands crested and receded, in smashed hardcore and that made sense – the latter was a distillation of the former – but the music continued to mutate even further; to date, it is possible to find bands crossbreeding even imaginable genre of music (including – but...