Authors: Rebecca Vernon
Pounds of Love for the Legendary Porch Pounders
The last night of SXSW, on Saturday, Angela and I went to see a Bill Kirchen show with Bad Brad at this cool wooden cafe on the other side of the bridge from downtown Austin. … read more
The Moroccan Revisited: Long, Slow Death and the End of...
Scenes thrive around a center, be it a band, label or venue. Salt Lake venues have long been the catalysts fueling the city’s fire. One of Salt Lake’s greatest, most influential and most unknown venues of the not-too-distant past was the Moroccan, and barely anyone under the age of 24 here knows about it. The
Local Reviews: Rotten Musicians
Here we have another sophisticated hip-hop album straight from the heart of the SLC made up of Mike Danner, Shanty, Scarecrow and Madman. “Fantasy Impromptu 89” is probably my favorite track, but the disco-ish, R&B “Rotten Musicians Go to the Movies” is also a charmer. But then again, “So What Comes After Postmodern” is really catchy and powerful too, with its strobing guitar beat and buzzy synth samples. … read more
Local Reviews: Will Sartain
Will Sartain’s solo material has trappings of Redd Tape; as RT’s main songwriter, that’s to be expected. But Will seems to strip away some of the cutesy quirkiness that Redd Tape possesses in this album and his previous one and replaces it with about the same amount of pain and offbeat discordance, but painted with much more seriousness. … read more
The Corleones
This is the last show, reunion or otherwise, The Corleones will ever play. … read more
Drop Cards: Not So Much a Brave New World as...
Recently, an MSN.com article ruminated on the next 25 years of technology: tiny cameras in your glasses and shirt buttons that allow you to record every moment of your life, the Internet as a 3-D virtual world you interact with via nanocomputer holograms, and brain-implanted microchips that pipe the Internet, sound and music, straight into your brain. For Jon Collins, Director of Sales & Marketing of the alt-distribution company Dropcards, technological changes aren’t seen as revolutionary; they’re business. … read more
Andy Goes to the Slammer
In Iota’s first few years, they worked their asses off playing a ton of obscure Salt Lake City shows and were generally ignored by the larger Salt Lake music scene. Then they got signed to one of the biggest stoner rock labels in the world. … read more
SXSW Source Worship
The biggest independent music industry festival in the world, South by Southwest was founded in 1987 by Roland Swenson, managing director of the festival’s parent company, SXSW Inc. The festival was created as a way to give exposure to deserving underground bands and was characterized by its edgy rebellion against the mainstream and championing of independent music. … read more
Subrosa’s Fun Lil’ List of European Tour Tips
Once I asked another band where they went to make their stickers, but they wouldn’t tell me, citing their need to keep their connections secret so other bands wouldn’t have the same advantage. From that moment on, I made a vow to share every single thing I ever learned that would help another band. … read more
If Not Now, When?
Eric Tanner expected 30 or 40 people to show up to his poetry book pre-release party at nobrow coffee and tea on Dec. 15, but over 150 people ended up attending. He tells me this happily, his sentences choppy, peppered with a strange cadence, the meaning blunt. You could say his poetry follows suit, gets straight to the heart of a matter, imbued with a simplicity that knows the most important question in poetry is, “How much can I cut and get away with?” … read more