IS THIS A CONSPIRACY?
This week Julian Casablancas dropped “Phrazes for the Young,” Casablancas’s first solo album and one of the best debuts I’ve heard.
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Search Within Music
Let Tegan and Sara love you
The spring of my junior year of high school was the time when my musical sensibilities began to take shape. I started attending noise shows, downloading album upon album of math rock and ambient drone and exhibiting a condescending lack of interest anytime my friends tried to talk to me about music.
Erol takes on Dlugosch
It all started with Trash. And by Trash, think nightclub night. No really, it was a night started by Turkish electro DJ Erol Alkan in 1997 at The End, a club in London.
Sharif vs. Cheese
The String Cheese Incident, a group of five musicians from Colorado, has proven the old adage true: the band that jams together, stays together.
Beitler vs. Lil’ Wayne
You may have heard about Lil’ Wayne. He has a new mixtape out, “No Ceilings,” an album that is basically Weezy’s walking tour through post-Weezy candy rap.
Le Roi de Rock
PARIS — “Didier–Wampas–est–le –roi” (Didier Wampas is the king) echoes throughout L’Alhambra Music Hall.
Dear Jack: He’s back
Andrew McMahon lived the rock & roll dream. His high school band, Something Corporate, landed a major record deal with Geffen and sold out venues as they headlined a world tour. In August 2005, his first solo album with his side project, Jack’s Mannequin, was poised to be released, kicking off a U.S. tour.
Indie Declines & O Goes “Wild”
When I heard early last year that “Where the Wild Things Are” was being adapted into a film, I didn’t really care. When I saw the first few clips in the preview, I still didn’t really care. When “Wake Up” by the Arcade Fire started to play, though, I cared.
Country meets city
With heart-wrenching (bordering on soul-baring) song lyrics, an authentic bluegrass twang, and fraternal love front and center, the Avett Brothers never apologize for their earnestness and enthusiasm. The idea wouldn’t occur to them. And their certainty makes one wonder when those qualities lost their luster.
eat your flockhart out
At one point over “Ally McBeal’s” five seasons, the title character exclaims, “There is no sin in loving men. Only pain!”
The boss “wrecks” Giants’ stadium
Bruce Springsteen utterly demolished Giant’s Stadium last Friday night — the final event before the venue is actually torn down.
“True Grime”
“True Grime.” Printed in 2005, this was the title of the first Sasha Frere-Jones article I ever read.
“Steel” smells like sushi!
If you know me, you know I’m virtually senile. Yes, I wear white cotton socks pulled midway up my shins. Yes, I spend my Sunday afternoons bird watching on my favorite bench in the Branford courtyard. Yes, I’m balding.
The heart of the turntable
“Put your fucking hands in the air!” At a raging block party in the Bronx, one man stands out amidst smoke and flashing lights. That man is the notorious DJ Grandmaster Flash. Donning a large pair of headphones, he jumps from one vinyl record to another, scratching, cutting, manipulating and mixing never-before-heard beats, causing the crowd to go wild. Every so often, he...
Headlights dim
Tristan Wraight sounds passionate — over the phone. He addresses his fractured band and sick father in expectedly somber tones. Yet his stated devotion to making “gorgeous, poignant music” comes off livelier than anything on his band Headlights’ latest release.
Bad songs go bad
What do drunken Yale girls want on Saturday at 1 a.m. nearly as much as Yorkside pizza and/or cock? To dance, of course! What do their plastered male counterparts desire? In many cases, sloppy chicks/other men rubbing up on their genitals — to a beat! Sadly, too many weekend dance parties, particularly those of the dorm variety, feature flaccid sound tracks. This...
Stutter like your daddy
It was a cold day at Universal Republic Records when Jay-Z proclaimed the “Death of Auto-Tune.” T-Pain ran up the spine of the company execs as they readied their latest single, Jay Sean’s “Down,” for mass release. The song showcases auto-tune like never before, as Jay Sean’s synthetic riffing assures the listener that “even though the sky is falling down” luscious...
Six degrees of ‘Fame’
I have the theme song from “Fame” stuck in my head. “I’m gonna live forever. I’m gonna learn how to fly. I feel it coming together. People will see me and cry.” Catchy, right?
The Willy Wonka of art rock
It’s official: Tyondai Braxton is the Willy Wonka of art rock. Braxton’s latest solo creation, “Central Market,” is so exuberant, so droll, so whimsically entertaining and unpredictable, that you’d practically have to be Augustus Gloop to resist its charm.
Arty ‘Monster’
A supergroup usually forms for a simple reason: Talented musicians who happen to be friends enjoy playing together and decide to make a record. This holds true for the members of Monsters of Folk, but something deeper is at work.
