For a duo, Eureka California make a hell of a lot of noise. The Athens indie rockers, comprised of drummer Marie Uhler and singer/guitarist Jake Ward, have just turned in their second full length in 18 months and far from sounding like a rushed out also ran, Crunch is a remarkably satisfying slice of unpretentious college rock.
There have been a slew of documentaries reliving the punk scene in the late ‘70s. There have even been a few focusing on the Southern California punk scene during that time period. But Clockwork Orange County is compelling enough to justify one more.
Former war correspondent and current surf writer Chas Smith is almost daring you not to like his writing. He’s arrogant, smug overly-opinionated, focuses too much on style over substance (how surfers dress and whether or not they’re attractive holds much more weight for Smith than something as obvious as… well, how they surf). But damn, the guy knows how to write a fascinating story.
Sounding like very few bands around today, on The Bastards of Fate’s sophomore record (Vampires Are Real And Palpable), they offer up a perfect example of how refreshingly creative a group can be if they simply don’t give a fuck about pleasing anyone but themselves. Over the course of just 10 songs, the Roanoke-based band pull apart pop, psychedelic and college rock and then twist and force it into their…
Three dudes and six songs can still add up to a lot of noise. On their latest 12” EP, Guilt, this Minneapolis trio conjure up an aggressive, eclectic mix of atonal music. Whether or not the result is impressive all hinges on how much you can take of the barrage of sounds. I gave up after just two go rounds with the record.
Despite being wildly popular in the UK, Alan Partridge – the clueless radio host played for decades by British comedian Steve Coogan – still has little more than a small cult following among U.S. audiences. The movie, Alan Partridge, likely won’t broaden the appeal here, but is still a welcome treat for longtime fans.
Long before they became catnip for modern hippies and jam band devotees, the Dave Matthews Band was just another group trying to find their niche in an alternative rock music world. Remember Two Things, featuring mainly live tracks, was released on the band’s own label in 1993, when radio stations were liberally defining modern rock as something between Liz Phair and Pearl Jam. It was pretty adventurous then for a…
British novelist Tom Rob Smith is best known for his award-winning Child 44 series, but The Farm, his latest book, is certain to continue to the parade of acclaim and likely bring with it a bigger audience. The book, which grabs your attention very early on, focuses on Daniel, struggling in his career, still in the closet to his parents and slightly guilty for not having visited them since they…
If the first-time series Ray Donovan had premiered on the oft-buzzed about HBO or even AMC, it likely would have gotten a lot more attention. Instead, this Showtime drama starring Live Schreiber and John Voight (in his best role in decades), remains one of the best new shows flying under the radar.
The indie drama Adult World certainly has its share of faults: one-dimensional characters, a phoned in performance from its one marque star (John Cusack) and a whiny, self-entitled main character that’s has you almost rooting for her failure. But somehow, despite all of these obstacles, director Scott Coffey still manages to turn in a film that is charming and oddly satisfying despite – or thanks – to its quirks.
Fresh out of the clink, pop punk’s saving grace are finally back with a new record. The Masked Intruder, who turned in one of the genre’s most satisfying records in years with their 2012 debut, has managed to top that effort with M.I. A baker’s dozen of three-minute sing-alongs that are tighter than a set of police-issued handcuffs wrapped around your wrists.
This is your opportunity to see this stellar British TV drama, originally aired here on BBC America, before it gets bastardized and watered-down with predictable clichés for U.S. audience with an American remake. This original focuses on a British coastal town where an 11-year-old boy is found murdered on the beach.
Putting aside for a minute the truly obnoxious personalities of the Gallagher brothers, it’s hard to find fault with the band’s debut, Definitely Maybe. Released in 1994, when the U.S. was still madly in love with grunge, Oasis lead a second British Invasion (well, tried, at least).
Peter Hook, known best as the co-founder and bassist for the wildly influential bands Joy Division and New Order, can also add fledgling club co-owner to his CV. In The Hacienda: How Not to Run a Club, Hook goes into hilarious detail reliving the disastrous experience he, his New Order band mates and his label bosses at Factory Records had in starting and running into the ground this popular Manchester…
Before he was a lite-FM staple in the 90’s thanks to his Dirty Dancing soundtrack jem (sarcasm implied here) “Hungry Eyes,” Eric Carmen was a founding member of the influential and sadly underrated power pop band The Raspberries. The just-released 30-song collection Essential Eric Carmen serves as a perfect reminder of just how strong a pop songwriter Carmen was.
Pretentious album title aside, with Zonian Girls and the Echoes That Surround Us All, King of Prussia have managed to make a 20-song double album sounds amazingly conscience. The concept album, brimming with psychedelic Indie rock songs, is a result of frontman Brandon Hanick’s three years spent traversing Barcelona. He picked up some band members there and combined them with some from Athens, GA and got to work on…
Knight of Badassdom, the latest horror comedy from Joe Lynch, has all the hallmarks of a cult classic: metal music, roleplaying games that conjure up demons and plenty of stoner laughs.
Even if you don’t know your Kajagoogoo from your Yaz, this oral history of New Wave is entertaining enough to suck up the next few hours of your life, regardless of your relationship with the genre. Culled from countless interviews by music journalists Lori Majewski and Jonathan Bernstein, Mad World captures bands big (Duran Duran, The Psychedelic Furs) and obscure (The Normal, Ultravox) in this run down of the music…
Aram Garriga’s absorbing documentary American Jesus is one of the few religious documentaries in recent memory that manages to even-handedly offer a glimpse at the uniqueness of Christianity in the U.S. without taking a clear side praising or condemning the way these groups choose to worship.
Musicians are notoriously a sensitive group. Even more so when it comes to poking fun at their own legacy. So it was particularly admirable of longtime cult rocker Graham Parker to play himself in 2012’s This Is 40, a film where Paul Rudd’s character is losing money because his record label banked on the failed notion that there was still an audience for Parker and his longtime band The Rumors.