Music
Winter Battle of the Bands @ Velour Live Music Gallery...
“It’s over,” I’m furiously scribbling down high marks on the scoring sheet provided by Velour, speaking to no one in particular. “It’s fucking over!” The sold out crowd has become unhinged, saying, “One More Song! One More Song!” The electricity is palpable. After the fourth band of five, Velour’s semi-annual competition is over. I just feel bad for whoever has to go after this … I’m getting ahead of myself. The Battle started at 8:15 p.m. … … read more
Pere Ubu House Concert 12.10
Have you ever dreamt that you were at a party in some unfamiliar house, and one of those cool, obscure bands that you admire was playing there? I found myself saying that to a friend one evening recently—one of the strangest, most singular evenings I’ve had in a long time with Pere Ubu! … read more
Emilie Autumn @ The Complex 12.05
Emilie Autumn typically has no opening act or live band, therefore her show is mainly focused on an overarching storyline of her time being locked within the walls of an asylum. She utilizes heavy satire and Victorian flair while confronting the issues of sanity and sexism within the world today. She has built an entire world that encompasses a novel, several album releases, and a soon-to-be major theatrical production. If you are expecting to see a traditional concert, you will more than likely question what it is you are experiencing; this is much more of an interactive performance piece. … read more
Negative Approach @ Club Manhattan 11.21 with The Casualties, M.D.C....
John Brannon’s lip is bleeding, Harold Richardson is wailing away that wiry solo on “Lead Song.” Some idiot is screaming out for a Suicidal Tendencies (what?) cover. These songs are quick, borderline psychotic snaps of furor. Perfectly crafted by some mystic core entity into some divinely inspired audiovisual ratio of power and speed. No frills, no whistles. The calcified gristle of rock n’ roll’s fattened carcass, the parts that stay behind when the glistening flesh has long rotted away. … read more
Dawes @ Eccles Center 11.30
Opening with “Most People” from their 2013 album Stories Don’t End, lead singer/guitarist Taylor Goldsmith flawlessly captured every member of the audience both young and old with an epic yet interesting guitar solo, which set the tone for the rest of the show. … read more
Meat Puppets @ The State Room 11.26 with Cory Mon
The remainder of the evening progressed, or degenerated, into the more Butthole Surfers’ end of the psychedelic swimming pool/cesspool. At the same time, their music, song after song, proved itself as just solid rock n’ roll that doesn’t fit easily into a pigeonhole of country, psychedelic or punk—it’s a little of all of those things. … read more
Built To Spill @ Urban Lounge 11.27 with Slam Dunk,...
If you haven’t seen Built to Spill live, you have no excuse. Starting and ending their most recent tour in Salt Lake City, they gave me the opportunity to see them twice in the last two months. … read more
Cat Power and Nico Turner Live @ The Depot 11.25
It wasn’t utterly packed—just full. Cat Power draws an interestingly eclectic crowd: professors, obligatory hippies, hipsters and maybe a vegan–straight edge kid, too. After the release of her electronica album, Sun, it seemed that there was a yearning for the older, more classic styling of Chan Marshall, and there was no better way to realize that desire than an intimate, seated setting where she would perform solo. … read more
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin @ Kilby Court 11.22...
From the get-go, the small cluster of people to my right, all huddled beside the large speaker hanging from the ceiling, are in their thrall. Two kids with jet black hair are laboring over a sharpie mural on the plywood wall, only stopping intermittently to do something that resembles a dance, but is more likely some ancient satanic ritual, their possessed bodies twisting along with those sweet bass lines. … read more
Bill Callahan @ The State Room 11.23 with Judson Claiborne
Bill Callahan seems like the minimalist indie songwriter par excellence, letting his lyrics, often more spoken than sung, work their dry yet poetic magic, but on stage with a full band, you realize that they are capable of a much more deep and uncanny array of tricks. They surprised from the get-go, opening with a cover of the Velvet Underground’s “White Light/White Heat,” in tribute of the recently departed Lou Reed. Callahan is perhaps the only singer who could deliver the lines more dryly than Reed. … read more