This is the latest installment of the Super Roots series from Osaka, Japan's Boredoms. Super Roots 9 (finally released domestically) features a single 40-minute live recording from Christmas Eve in Japan, 2004. The CD comes in a gatefold format with a 40-page booklet containing artwork, music scores and notations. This release is more in line with the band’s recent releases like Vision Creation Newsun than with their previous noise recordings. The impression it leaves you with is how dynamic, technical and...
In a time when the modern rock show too often comes packaged with pretense and posturing, the Breeders re-emerge to remind us what real rock is. At Slim’s, the crowd—young punks, dudes with Mohawks, girl-girl couples, and a large swath of middle-aged guys in tees and sweatshirts—hadn’t come to be trendy, they’d come for Kim Deal. Playing for the sold-out house, the former Pixies bassist—alongside twin sister Kelley—delved into the Breeders’ back catalogue, dusting off enough classics to delight...
It’s been about five years since Gossip started to spread like wildfire out of Olympia, WA. People really started to notice when Movement appeared on KRS in 2003; blasting scruffy riffs, hammering drums and a singer with a voice that could make you cry or organize a riot with just the right word, the album made the biggest of big indie rawk splashes. Not at home though—Gossip erupted and began their insurrection abroad. Five years later and the band is...
I had been curious about DeVotchKa for a long time. Any band that can take a Theremin, violin, accordion, sousaphone, stand-up bass and a string section and make it all sound like some twisted Slavic love song has got to be worth checking out, right? If a band like Einstürzende Neubauten can take scraps of metal, wood and anything else they could find and turn it into an aural delight then surely the members of DeVotchKa could take all of...
You ever have one of those days where you get the voicemail of every single person you call? Well, Ground Control had one of those days when trying to find a writer to cover Les Savy Fav and The Dodos. Everyone seemed to be out of town. But we'd have to be complete idiots to pass up a chance to spend an even ing with Tim Harrington and the boys, so we didn't. If a picture is worth a thousand...
It's been a rather active decade for Joy Division considering the band have been out of order (so to speak) for almost 30 years. Their influence created a genre of its own in the early 2000s with bands like Interpol, She Wants Revenge and others owing quite a bit of their sound to the band, while branding of the band hit fever pitch as Peter Saville's iconic Unknown Pleasures logo was splashed across scores of products and people (who probably...
For those of you who didn't catch Bloc Party along their massive 2007 world tour, the British lads are hitting the road for a short jaunt across the country in late July and early August. They'll be accompanied by Does It Offend You, Yeah? at all the dates, and who knows, you may be in for a surprise. And by surprise, we mean new songs, since Bloc Party is currently in the studio writing and recording their follow-up to A...
As with Prince, Depeche Mode, Led Zeppelin and countless other bands that have shaped our musical collections over the years, Duran Duran can comfortably live within that same realm of influential bands. Listening to songs from a couple of decades ago like “Planet Earth,” “Girls on Film,” and “The Chauffeur,” to songs off their latest album, Red Carpet Massacre (Epic Records), you get the feeling that this band is just as powerful as they have ever been. Now on the...
I have wanted to see Behemoth live for years. For some reason though every time they rolled into San Francisco the stars were not aligned, and inevitably something would always come up that would prevent me from witnessing their brutal assault. Not tonight, however. After more than a few missed opportunities I was finally able to experience a Behemoth show, and needless to say, it was well worth the wait. Walking into an already packed Warfield, I made my way...