AltWeeklies Wire
Filthybird Finally Flies--In Music and In Lovenew
Songs for Other People, Filthybird's second album, is an arduously made, exquisitely written record.
Tags: Filthybird
Last Year's Mennew
Not quite out of high school, Last Year's Men have made one of the year's most addictive records.
INDY Week |
Grayson Currin |
10-25-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Last Year's Men
Maple Stave Speaks With Its Musicnew
As a band, they're better than ever before on their new LP1. As analysts of their own music, they still struggle.
INDY Week |
Grayson Currin |
10-14-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Maple Stave
The Small Ponds' Caitlin Cary & Matt Douglas Are The Small Pondsnew
Caitlin Cary could start a goddamn grindcore band and she'd still be tagged popularly as an alt-country siren.
Tags: The Small Ponds
The Body Might Have the Most Terrifying, Electrifying Album of the Yearnew
All the Waters of the Earth Turn to Blood takes doom metal -- that is, the most torturously heavy and slow music you can imagine -- and reshapes it with zeal.
INDY Week |
Grayson Currin |
09-02-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: The Body
The Arcade Fire's ascension, and their cold stare back downnew
The Arcade Fire was once about possibility; they still sound that way, but—egalitarian subject, best-seller be damned—they're now at the top of the pile, coldly staring down at the mess.
INDY Week |
Grayson Currin |
08-16-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Merge Records, The Arcade Fire
Team Spirit: Durham's 307 Knox Records Turns Fivenew
Since 2004, the imprint has released 31 records—a compilation full of Bull City bands, full-lengths by Midtown Dickens, The Future Kings of Nowhere and Cantwell, Gomez & Jordan and a series of 7-inch vinyl singles. Meet founder Melissa Thomas.
Year in Review: A Sizable Fleet of North Carolina Bands Found Bigger Audiencesnew
This year, more than any other this decade, the Triangle's local band scene seemed to engender broader support. It was a good year to be, as one excellent local compilation put it, "hearing here," at home.
#thissongissogreat: How to Change This Band's Life, in 140 Characters or Lessnew
The Twitter paradigm reverts to the antiquated record-store clerk model, where you discover new music because you trust the person behind the counter who loves something you've yet to hear.
Two Jersey Boys Called Spider Bags Find a New Chance in North Carolinanew
Goodbye Cruel World, Hello Crueler World, the second album by Spider Bags, is a glorious mess. Each of its 10 tracks feels as if it fights from beneath a haze of distortion or gasps for air underneath a tide of tape hiss.
INDY Week |
Grayson Currin |
09-18-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
It's Your Noise, Too: Merge Records Turns 20new
Instead of pursuing the cold, quick cash-in of some hot new trend, Merge has consistently sought out the songs and bands its owners loved.
If Your Love is Cheap, Windows Loves Your Bandnew
Microsoft's Sponsored Songs program is the latest in a series of variably successful attempts by large companies to use independent music to reach a new audience. If it is to be a long-term strategy, though, many say it must form a stronger bond between the bands and brands it links.
The Dirty Little Heaters Live Better Through Rock 'n' Rollnew
This high-energy, high-emotion soul-punk-rock act comprises three rock 'n' roll lifers who committed to this band after tough bouts with life, love and other bands that didn't last.
INDY Week |
Grayson Currin |
11-13-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
A University Press Gives Legendary Mag No Depression a Second Chancenew
Can this new model work for other struggling magazines, music or otherwise?
If James Jackson Toth is Sell-out Freak-folk, Keep It Comingnew
Outsider figurehead Devendra Banhart may date Hollywood actress Natalie Portman, and CocoRosie may have nabbed a multi-page spread in a July New York Times Magazine. But don't expect the beloved beardos and weirdos to be on sale at Wal-Mart summarily.
