For some musicians, like C’mon co-founder Ian Blurton, the bloom never comes off the rose—particularly where playing in front of a live crowd is concerned. Blurton is the portrait of a Canadian rock lifer. Beginning in 1982 with Change Of Heart and then with Blurtonia, the singer/guitarist has played on virtually every stage in Canada—at least twice. But now, with C’mon, Blurton has rediscovered the joy that brought him to the stage in the first place: a band of friends...

Let’s take a minute to discuss Sweden—a musical muse of a country with a population roughly a quarter that of California and where the largest national export is sexy rock ‘n’ roll bands in tight skinny jeans. (I made that last part up. According to Wikipedia, the largest national export is tall, beautiful blondes and Muppet chefs. Ha! I kid… it’s actually something like timber and chemicals and hydropower, which are, obviously, much less interesting.) Take, for example, the Scandinavian...

Let’s take a minute to discuss Sweden—a musical muse of a country with a population roughly a quarter that of California and where the largest national export is sexy rock ‘n’ roll bands in tight skinny jeans. (I made that last part up. According to Wikipedia, the largest national export is tall, beautiful blondes and Muppet chefs. Ha! I kid… it’s actually something like timber and chemicals and hydropower, which are, obviously, much less interesting.) Take, for example, the Scandinavian...

What has gotten into Frank Black? In fact, where is Frank Black? What sort of event occurred in this man’s life to cause him to revert to the Black Francis moniker of bygone days, put down his Fender Telecaster and dramatically pace back and forth across the stage, shouting into the mic during his most recent performances, like a man possessed by a spirit of fire? Could it be the ghost and essence of Herman Brood? I don’t know, but...

Those of you that have an ear for the grandiose might just be delighted to hear that Commodore Jason Spaceman, helmsman of the good ship Spiritualized, has set course for American shores. In the U.S. for the first time in four years, the band will be coming off a string of European dates as part of the Acoustic Mainline Tour, which includes the music of both Spiritualized and Spaceman 3. Perhaps show-goers will catch audio glimpses of Spiritualized's recently recorded,...

My co-workers and I were discussing the Avril Lavigne/Rubinoos controversy (in case you live in a cave, Lavigne's last hit "I Wanna Be Your Girlfriend" quite obviously steals its chorus, hook, and title from the Rubinoos' "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend"). One of them argued that, plagiarism or not, Avril's song was much better. Now, I have no desire to get into a debate about which cheesy pop song is a better cheesy pop song, but it did get me...

When the folks over at K7! Records decided to let two non-DJs take a crack at putting out a DJ-Kicks, there might not be two people better suited for this task. Self-admitted, Berlin’s Booka Shade (Arno Kammermeier and Walter Merziger) are not DJs. They are, however, producers, musicians, remixers and label owners (Get Physical). But still, that doesn’t make them DJs, does it? Apparently, by the magic of osmosis, Booka Shade can, in fact, DJ with the best of them....

“I’m 100 years old today,” said lead singer, Matt Popieluch, after his band, Foreign Born, did their best to sneak on stage Friday at the crowded Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco. If not for his strange announcement, the band might have been mistaken for a couple of stagehands adjusting the equipment. At first I was little bothered by the abruptness of their arrival, but I soon found myself attracted to such arrogance. The group of four, normal looking dudes breezed...

In spite of the fact that Foo Fighters’ new album encompasses four tenets that imply passive forms of solitude, there isn’t much in the way of passivity in Grace’s dozen tracks—although they do express another reaction to loneliness. Dave Grohl has not sung this hard in years—particularly on faster numbers like “The Pretender” and “Let It Die” that have a propensity to start slow and quiet before exploding—and often resort to the simpler melodies of the band’s first album that...

It’s difficult to pinpoint exactly why, but something about Devendra Banhart’s music in general—but certainly the 16 tracks that comprise Thunder Canyon specifically—always sounds incredibly old. Is it the combination of sleepy tempos and reverb-soaked vocals on songs like “So Long Old Bean” and “Seahorse?” The inclusion of samba rhythms (not heard much in pop songs for decades) in the corners of Latin-flavored tracks like “Samba Vexillographica?” Who knows really, but Banhart knows...