Tagged: livemusicreview

Pop pop, pop berry.

Updates of Srawberry, and hear our talks with Re-Tros, Candy Monster, and Deerhoof

During Androsace's first tour around China the band consolidated and established as one of the best metal acts from China, thus they were the only band from Shanghai playing at Midi Festival in Beijing this year. Their first tour is now over, and this is the epilog to their diary.

There's only one more entry left to Androsace's diary of their tour. It's been a tough way, you can't imagine all the details we have had to edit in order to keep our editorial line within the limits of decency. ...We'll miss their stories, and their photos.

Squinzi's first incursion in Japan

Full report about the stormed dancing concert of Friendly Fires in Shanghai last week.

Glasvegas met Layabozi before and after their show last week in Mao Livehouse Shanghai. Meredith and Squinzi report on their meeting and the show

The Great Escape is truly that - Brighton is the backdrop for an always amazing festival; the line up beating any other city festival of similar accolade and I'm starting 20122s Great Escape posts with the 2 performances that blew me away last weekend. Well apart from Foxes; who had packed out Chess Club/Neon Gold so much that I couldn't get anywhere near with my camera. Liverpool based by way of Essex singer, Jethro Fox opened the Saturday evening with a sublime performance at St Mary's Church. To be honest, I'm no fan of churches, [...]

Or: why the "change" pocket in cargo shorts is truly, genuinely great and useful: Said pocket holds an iPod nano nearly perfectly, which in turn holds the digital version of the above record, which in turn-- allows Radio Music Society to permeate me while I go about my normal day: washing dishes, vacuuming and whatnot... Radio Music Society is undeniably "pop" music (a term I'd normally consider an insult) at its very best (perhaps hence Esperanza's recent Grammy win): innovative music with clever, inspirational lyrics, while still melodically memorable: it's George Clinton-- if he [...]

This is how we roll

See how MIDI rocked

I stood staring out the open door, watching the earth move 15,000 feet below me. I'd taken many a dive before, so I had no reason to be anxious, but as the wind belted my face, I couldn't help but think something terribly wrong was about to happen. Fastening the earbuds into my ears, I hit my iPod and the Pagan Folk Metal of Dutch band, Heidevolk, burst into my ears. It seemed like the perfect accompaniment to my jump. Swallowing my fear, I leaped from the plane, flinging myself into the vastness of the [...]

The first time I heard the phrase “Nine Pound Gun” was when I was partridge and pheasant hunting near the Madison River in Montana. As we practiced with 12 gauge shotguns on some skeet before heading out into the fields near the river, one of the guides pulled out an old Civil War-era Springfield rifle and quickly hit, reloaded and hit, two clays. The second guide, who had been tending to the dogs, yelled back at the group of us hootin’ and hollerin’ over the accomplishment and said “Hey, Eagle-Eye, showing off with your 9 lb gun?” [...]

Alestorm's genre was listed as Scottish Pirate Metal. I am not kidding you. This is possibly the coolest, weirdest thing I have ever had the fortune to stumble upon. And the album cover of Back Through Time fits perfectly within the genre description. A bloodied skeleton warrior wielding a sword that's impaling a severed head, you really cannot get any cooler than that. Well, maybe add a bit more corpes and spookiness, but you get the idea. Back Through Time starts with the sound of wind whistling through sails while gutteral voices shout admidst cannon sounds. No, I'm [...]

There I was - an American in Barcelona in the late 1970’s. I paid for a small habitación off Las Ramblas. The city was, and is, a dizzyingly strange merger of cultures. The Romans conquered it and it is said to have been settled by the crew of one of the nine ships of Hercules and Jason and the Argonauts when they shipwrecked in search of the Golden Fleece. The City has been run by the Christians, overrun by the Visigoths, conquered by the Muslim Moors, and tended by the French. All that cultural [...]

Acephalix' last full-length, Interminable Night, was my no. 7 album of last year, so I was excited to hear this one. It's very similar to Black Breath's newest, in that there's a marriage of Entombed to New York City Hardcore-- the difference here is that Acephalix are much closer to Entombed than the NYHC-- they're boldly detuned, and overall slower than BB. "Tomb of Our Fathers" is the first standout, with its groovy, Asphyx-like riffing and completely unintelligible lyrics... "Raw Life" is a lurching, undead-Golem of a riff/song, and highlights one of the qualities of this [...]

Three classics on the road, rock, drugs and sex

Black Earth. Dwell on the words for a second. Imagine it. Inhale it. Feel it in your hands. Black. Rich. Pungent. Dirty. Fertile. Moist. Six words that best describe the uber talented shit kickin’ powerhouse three piece from Austin, Texas. Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you Black Earth. The essence of our existence is the earth itself. Where all good things come from. Under the sun. Holding the water. The earth. Black loam. The kind that gets under the nails [...]

Hailing from the Midwest, (I’ve seen that they are from Kansas and Kansas City, and there is a Kansas City, Kansas, so both could be right), we have Stonehaven. They’ve come through Seattle a couple of times in the past year but unfortunately I did not catch their live shows, but I will rectify that in short order the next time they come through town, because this is the good stuff. The Midwest is not known as a stronghold of black metal, but these guys certainly own what they do. This is as grim and frosty [...]

Exceptional experimental musicians make me ecstatic. Every so often there comes a wave of really good music and an argument can be made the most recent occurrence came on January 31, 2012. Two of my favorite albums of the year, Gotye’s Making Mirrors and Lana Del Rey’s Born to Die, were released on the same day. You can argue its pure coincidence, but I think not. The old proverb “all good things come in threes” comes to mind when discussing this auspicious occurrence and Grimes latest album Visions, which was also released on January 31, 2012, proves my [...]