Blog: Badical Beats

Hellogoodbye and Self Against City have decided to put a smile on the faces of all hipsters in San Diego. On January 13th at 7:00pm, these bands will open the doors for a night of FREE debauchery, dancing, synth bleeps and skinny jeans. This is of course thanks to Myspace Secret Shows as they are the only people that can actually afford to pay bands for free shows. Just get to the SOMA side stage at 3350 Sports Arena Blvd. before [...]

It looks like CDs are gonna be the next freestyle frisbee. According to Jupiter Research, digital media revenues are headed in one direction... UP. Digital album sales have been steadily growing about 16% per year, and digital music subscription services like Napster and eMusic have shown compound growth of about 34% per year. In the next five years, Jupiter is projecting that between digital albums and ringtone revenues, digital music will hold about 34% of all consumer music [...]

Word has it that fancy London-town boys The Horrors will be releasing their full length debut Strange House on March 5th. From the track list below, it looks like they took the easy way and threw a lot of their old material on the record to fill in the space. How many more times can they get away with re-releasing "Sheena Is A Parasite"? It looks like there are a few new ones for us to enjoy. I am hoping they stick with their signature blend of spooky organs, [...]

This video from The Bronx always cracks me up. It was filmed in my neighborhood right in the heart of Hollywood, and if you look close enough, you can see me driving on the freeway in my 86' minivan. I'm the dude giving the camera the middle finger. Here is "They Will Kill Us All Without Mercy" from The Bronx's White Drugs debut.

I know I had waaaay too much to drink that night, but trust me, I Still Remember. Unfortunately for one of London's most promising artists, Bloc Party , they forgot to add some "uuumph" to their new single. Capturing the short attention spans of the young music minds of America is not an easy task, and unless these guys step it up a few notches for the rest of the songs on the new album, they are gonna be yet another band left in the industry's dust. Let's hope not. [...]

I recently attended the Monsters Are Waiting show at L.A.'s best converted strip club, Safari Sams, and had the chance to see these guys up close and personal at one of the coolest "converted" venues in L.A. The club draws a fun crowd, it's got good sound and an intimate atmosphere, and best of all, there is free parking in the grafitti-ridden $0.99 store parking lot. You can't find a deal like that on the Sunset Strip. Monsters Are Waiting blasted through an awesome set [...]

What most people in the States don't realize is that Australian indie-roos Youth Group have been playing the field for quite a long time. Before Skeleton Jar, their full length debut with Epitaph Records, they stormed the Syndey music scene with seven EP's and one full length album, courtesy of Aussie label Ivy League Records. Casino Twilight Dogs, the new full length album from Epitaph, hits the streets in the US on January 30th. The record was released in [...]

Here are some new records that will help all you music heads get through the post-holiday-depression-syndro me with flying colors. Buy these tunes, put on the head phones, spark up a J-bomb, and zone out. January 2, 2006 Unwritten Law - The Hit List January 9, 2006 Mos Def - True Magic January 23, 2006 Deer Hoof - [...]

Everytime I go out to a bar in L.A. (seriously... every single time) the DJ always throws in a Journey song into the mix to get the crowd going. In light of this unexplainable phenomenon, Journey's classic video for "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)" has made the Badical Beats Classic Re-Runs list. Everybody sing along.

The legendary (alternative or punk??) rockers Unwritten Law from sunny San Diego have released a brand new greatest hits record through Abydos Records called The Hit List . These seasoned vets have been around since 1990 and have seen their fair share of ups and downs. Since their inception, UL has been through about a half dozen members and just as many record labels. They have released seven full length albums and have had five top 20 singles, three of which hit the top 10 and one which hit number 1 ("Seein' Red" from [...]

I saw The Blood Brothers show a few weeks back at the Henry Fonda Music Box. The five-piece art/thrash rockers from Seattle spit out plenty of songs from their catalog, from March on Electric Children to their latest effort from V2, Young Machetes . The turnout was embarassingly small, perhaps because of the mismatched music styles (it's not easy finding bands that gel with The Blood Brothers diehard fanbase or eccentric sound), but The Blood Brothers had no trouble completely stealing the show from co-headliners Trail of Dead . The live [...]

Pharoahe Monch has done it once again. The rapper with the sickest flow has put out another controversial video that highlights gun violence awhile rebelling against it. The video for Gun Draws features a little boy shooting his little sister in the head, while showing a collage of media snippets of real gun related deaths and historic assassinations. The track tells a story from a bullet's perspective and garnering mixed reviews from fans and critics. Of course this video is an internet release only, as a video as heavy handed as this would never [...]

Wow...I don't even know what to say about this video, or who this video was made by. I guess we can just conclude that any video with little kids, a weird guy in a super hero suit, break dancers and a dweeb'ish violin player is an instant classic. I'd have to conclude that Michael Jackson produced this, because it's what I imagine his dreams are at night.