Some bands come readymade. That statement sounds like a slight, because critics have used the term as a synonym for ‘prefabricated,’ but in some cases, it can be complimentary. Bands like AC/DC, Green Day, Metallica, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Social Distortion appear on the public radar fully formed, with everything they’re shooting for in place and are just looking for a time—not a place—from which to begin and move forward. While small variations in personnel may occur that slightly...
On Saturday, June 7, the cool kids from all over the Bay—tan dudes with tattooed chests, punk chicks with pink hair, boys and girls sporting green Flogging Molly tees, and families with tiny tots—all converged on Mountain View’s Shoreline Amphitheatre for one reason: to rock. BFD, the Bay Area alternative radio station Live 105’s annual all-day shindig, brought out the crowds as well as some...
There would be no Jolly Rancher chews for Chuck Inglish last Tuesday night at The Independent in San Francisco. Mikey Rocks, the other part of the Chicago based duo, The Cool Kids, simply wouldn’t let him eat the sweets. There were too many rhymes to be laid down, and a mouth full of candy could have hurt the lyrical swagger that these two possess. Apparently, it’s not easy being fly. Before commandeering the stage from the L.A.-based trio, Pacific Division,...
This Is Not The World, the third record from post-punk devotees The Futureheads, finds them not so much moving forward or backward as sitting still and reducing their sound to something more easily digestible. Think of it this way: If 2004's The Futureheads and 2006's News and Tributes are a steak dinner, This Is Not The World is a steak dinner pill to be eaten on board the space shuttle. This isn't at all an insult. Rather, the band simply...
As Minneapolis-based rockers Tapes ‘N Tapes—Josh Grier (guitar, vocals), Jeremy Hanson (drums), Matt Kretzmann (keyboards), and Erik Appelwick (bass guitar)—released their acclaimed sophomore album, Walk It Off, it was inevitable that a U.S. tour would follow. They played First Avenue in their hometown on April 10 and weaved their way across this country with stops in New York, Philly, Atlanta, Los Angeles (Where Ground Control caught them with White Denim) and finished up in Denver, CO. There are a few...
On a personal note, it needs to be said that I sat on The Ting Tings’ debut for a little over a week, listening to it repeatedly, trying to figure out what I liked about it and how I was going to review it. Then it occurred to me; at the dawn of the Eighties, punk bands discovered what fun it was to make people dance, and so groups like the Talking Heads and Blondie softened up and jumped into...
It almost feels like sacrilege to say it, but more than most of the “new underground” bands that surfaced in the post-Nirvana maelstrom that suddenly found so many acts with readymade credibility (bands as far flung as The Flaming Lips, Constantines and Beck were all ranking members of this crew), few seemed to need the presence of a major label so badly as The Dandy Warhols. Always flaunting a significant pop jones and boasting a mercurial writing palette along with...
Who would have thought that going home again would be the catalyst that Sloan needed to experience a rebirth? Having recently resurrected their own label, Murderecords, and rejoined its roster for the first time in sixteen years, Sloan established carte blanche for themselves to follow up 30-track monster Never Hear The End Of It from 2006. Rather than attempting to go even bigger though, for their first album back the band chose to cut Parallel Play in their Toronto rehearsal...
After watching Death Angel absolutely rule Slim's only three months earlier, I gotta admit that I didn't think there was any way that they could possibly do it again. Now that the band has been on tour for a few months (their first in over seventeen years) I figured it would be damn near impossible for them to give the same amount of energy as they did the last time they played their hometown of San Francisco. I also knew...
When Ground Control photographer Muhammad Asranur caught The Dresden Dolls at The Fillmore in San Francisco, he experienced more than just a concert. In fact there was so much that GC's editors received an entire folder of photos dedicated to the goings-on surrounding the show, in addition to the performances of The Dresden Dolls and Vermillion Lies. What follows are some notes from the evening: The whole evening was festive. As we waited in the line outside, we were greeted...