May 29th, 2019 | by Stephen Slaybaugh | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
Born in 2014 as a continuation of sorts of the ideas singer Dan Boeckner was exploring in the Handsome Furs, Operators has developed its own set of aesthetics and a sound as distinctive as any of Boeckner’s other previous projects (Wolf Parade, Divine Fits). While Operators rely on a largely electronic palette, there is nevertheless no shortage of human emotion in what they create. As …
June 4th, 2018 | by Brian O'Neill | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
Blueprint, a.k.a. Printmatic, a.k.a. Albert Shepard, wears more hats than he has names. He emerged from Columbus, Ohio in the late ‘90s to create some of the most enduring underground hip-hop albums of the first decade of the new millennium as a producer with Greenhouse Effect, as a rapper with Soul Position (a partnership with RJD2), and also as a solo artist with 10 albums …
June 27th, 2017 | by Stephen Slaybaugh | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
While Bauhaus has enjoyed the cult following that comes with being seen as goth figureheads and Love and Rockets the spoils that go along with a Top 10 hit (“So Alive”), despite having what has become a fixture of alternative club nights the world over (“Go!”), Tones on Tail has never enjoyed the degree of notoriety as the bands that preceded and followed it. Formed …
May 5th, 2017 | by Kevin J. Ellliott | published in Features | 1 Comment »
Oakland, California’s Rays are a fairly typical indie band. They look the part, play the part, run around with other bands who do the same, and get loads of redundant comparisons to the Flying Nun and C-86 jangle pop that undoubtedly clogs their record collections. But it’s the way the quartet—Eva Hannan on bass, Troy Hewitt on guitar, Stanley Martinez on guitar, and Alexa Pantalone …
April 4th, 2017 | by Stephen Slaybaugh | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
It’s been 17 years since Boss Hog put out a record, and although a lot has changed during that time, you might not know it by listening to the new album. Named after a strain of cicada that also only reappears every 17 years, Brood X (In the Red Records) doesn’t sound like the work of a band that’s been lying dormant for nearly two …
February 27th, 2017 | by Stephen Slaybaugh | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
When I last spoke to Feelies guitarist and singer Glenn Mercer and percussionist Dave Weckerman nearly eight years ago, the New Jersey band had just reconvened after a 17-year hiatus. Aside from a gig at the now defunct All Tomorrow’s Parties playing their 1976 debut, Crazy Rhythms, in its entirety, the group had few concrete plans, although they did intend to make a new …
October 10th, 2016 | by Stephen Slaybaugh | published in Features | 1 Comment »
It’s been said before in these virtual pages, but we are living in an age where everything old is new again. Indeed, it’s telling that in 2015, reissues and downloads of old music outsold new music for the first time since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking sales in 1991. I haven’t seen any stats, but I wouldn’t be surprised if reunited acts have bested new acts …
October 3rd, 2016 | by Jamie Pietras | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
My favorite moment in talking with fabled Pixies axeman Joey Santiago occurs in the first few minutes of our conversation, when I can hear him turn to his teenage daughter in response to a question about whether he likes the band’s new album, Head Carrier. “Are you annoyed that I listen to it a lot?” Santiago asks her as he drives. “No,” she responds, …
June 23rd, 2016 | by Stephen Slaybaugh | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
While the music of the ’80s is often disparaged for the plasticity and seeming lack of soul that characterized its most extreme new wave caricatures, the truth is it was a time of top-notch pop and great experimentation, particularly in the realm of electronic instrumentation. Book of Love, a New York–based quartet that formed in 1983, melded the two along with a certain amount of …
June 13th, 2016 | by Stephen Slaybaugh | published in Features | Leave A Comment »
In the accepted pantheon of punk (or whatever you want to call it), figureheads in New York, London, and L.A. are revered as the innovators of this nefarious genre. But running concurrently and almost continuously alongside the fashionable faces of “underground” music, Pere Ubu has existed as a true alternative. Metabolized out of the remains of Rocket from the Tombs, this innovative group first made …