Who are the most influential bands and artists in the history of rock? Well, start with The Beatles and Elvis, I guess, and for good reason. Chuck Berry, Little Richard, The Stones, of course, The Who and David Bowie. The big names. All of them signed their names on our culture with a fat permanent marker, and in doing so
Read moreLast September we hit you with part one of our best music videos ever, featuring Death in Vegas, The Prodigy and Pop Will Eat Itself. Powerful stuff, to say the least. Today we’re back with round two – alieNation. Up first is Orbital’s “The Box.” I used this one in a class or two back in the late ’90s. Humanities
Read moreAlan Wilder of Recoil (and formerly of Depeche Mode) has some thoughts on the state of music these days. So who shall we blame for the whole mess? Do we stick two fingers up at the record companies who have sat around twiddling their thumbs, peddling overpriced re-issues for years while their A&R men bombard us with shallow, faceless pop
Read moreThe last three or four years have seen a veritable explosion in New Wave- and ’80s-influenced bands. A few of these groups have found ways to take their influences and move their music forward (The Killers, Interpol, Franz Ferdinand, The Strays), while most of the rest remain captive to the sounds of the bands they so clearly love. But damn,
Read moreOnce is a film that deserves more, so much more. A truly independent effort built around music and characters whose authenticity simply bursts off the screen and fills your heart, this movie was so real in its violation of all things Hollywood that it was almost hard to watch. I kept waiting for the goddamned formula to kick in, and
Read moreTonight my good friend Jeffrey Dean Foster, who’s also one of the most outstanding musical artists I’ve ever run across, is playing a solo show back home in Winston-Salem, NC. I’m unspeakably happy to be back in Colorado, hopefully for good, but I miss being able to wander out on a night like this to grab a Duck Rabbit Wee
Read moreI don’t know what kind of musical talent lies in the McCain and Romney camps, but right now Obama is whomping the bejeezus out of Hillary’s girl Celine.
Read moreToday is Imbolc, the midpoint of Winter. That’s Groundhog Day to you secular/non-pagan types (and yeah, P-Phil peeped his shadow, so throw another blanket on the bed). It’s also my birthday, and my good friend Dr. Mike Pecaut has offered up a fine present – lots of concert footage from one of my all-time favorite bands, the unparalleled Queen! I
Read moreWelcome back to part two of our annual music wrap-up. Today we award the Platinum LPs, given for superior achievement. (If you missed part one, click here to review the Gold LP winners, updated to include three inadvertent omissions.) These appear in no particular order. Platinum LP The Birthday Massacre: Walking with Strangers Toronto’s The Birthday Massacre is a study
Read moreSVR has been all about the music of late, and thanks to a few submissions by fellow Scrogue Mike Sheehan we’re going to continue the trend this morning. Today we shine the spotlight on what I guess we’ll call “unconventional musicianship.”Let’s start with this heartwarming tale of a country boy, a harmonica, and a dream of someday playing Carnegie Hall.
Read moreIt was a pretty good year in music. A handful of artists produced absolutely fabulous CDs and a lot more managed releases ranging from “worth the money” to “are you sure that shouldn’t be rated a little higher”? Here’s the format. Instead of the tedious task of actually ranking CDs – a torture I used to inflict on myself every
Read moreFinding and buying music used to be a lot simpler process. You could sample new stuff by turning on this thing called a “radio,” and when you heard something you liked you could go purchase it at this other thing called a “record store.” It wasn’t a perfect system, of course. Sometimes the great song on the radio was the
Read moreGood morning, and welcome to this week’s edition of Saturday Video Roundup. I’m your host, Katie Couric. You might remember last week, when we presented some talented teens laying the smack down on the Electone. Well, JS O’Brien one of my colleagues who shall remain nameless wasn’t all that impressed. He comes from a pretty serious music background, I think,
Read moreEver run across a phrase that causes you to back up and re-read, then re-read again, trying to figure out what exactly the writer meant to say? Consider this sentence, taken from the bio of The Stratford Four at eMusic.com. Alt-popsters the Stratford 4 consists of members Chris Streng (vocals, guitar), Jake Hosek (guitar), Andrea Caturegli (drums), and Sheetal Singh
Read moreOne of the great things about the Internets is that there’s a whole world of stuff out there you don’t know about, never imagined, that’s just insanely amazing. And periodically somebody will send you a link, as fellow Scrogue Mike Sheehan did this past week, saying “hey, check this out.” And it will be so feckin’ amazing it will just
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lullaby pit 