AltWeeklies Wire
Baltimore's Vinny Vegas Makes Normal the New Weirdnew
The band makes a slightly off-kilter normal that doesn't quite gel with the anarchic, nu-punk, and defiantly experimental sounds with which the City That Bleeds is often associated.
Baltimore City Paper |
Raymond Cummings |
04-11-2011 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Vinny Vegas
The Oranges Band Remembers Its First Decadenew
The band from Baltimore discusses the best moments of its 10-year run.
Baltimore City Paper |
Joe Tropea |
04-27-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: The Oranges Band
Maryland's Doom-Metal Godfather Had a Pretty Good Year (For Once)new
Now nearly 50 years old, Scott Weinrich has fronted two seminal metal bands, The Obsessed and Saint Vitus. He has piloted vital Maryland outfits the Hidden Hand and Spirit Caravan, made music with Dave Grohl under the Probot handle, and, finally, in 2009 issued his first-ever solo album, Punctuated Equilibrium.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
01-12-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Gary Barrett and the Notions Plug Ahead With Their Idiosyncratic Guitar Popnew
As the frontman of Gary B and the Notions, Gary Barrett has been refining the expression of his personal quirks and neuroses with the accompaniment of jangly guitar riffs for the past five years. He knows exactly how to project his own personality and unique way of looking at the world.
Baltimore City Paper |
Al Shipley |
01-05-2010 |
Profiles & Interviews
Evol Intent Ruptures the Walls of Drum 'n' Bassnew
These three guys originally from Atlanta produce and play galvanic, kinetically de-tuning, glitch-hop-tinged drum 'n' bass, influenced by everyone from N.W.A. to Squarepusher. And they are popular in a genre that doesn't get much press but that is loyal and long-running.
Baltimore City Paper |
Tony Ware |
12-01-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Baltimore's Rapdragons Smoke Up and Breathe Firenew
"This band could never have started on some Craigslist thing like 'Hey, do you wanna play music?'" says Nick Often about Rapdragons, the hip-hop duo he co-founded with Greg Ward earlier this year. "It's really out of the fact that we're friends, that's what feeds it."
Baltimore City Paper |
Al Shipley |
11-24-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Rapdragons, Ten Stories High
Renaissance MEN: Le Tigre's JD Samson and Friends Fuse Music and Visual Art, Dance-Pop and Politicsnew
What would a man do? That's the question that powered first a DJ duo, then a band, and now a full-blown art collective.
Baltimore City Paper |
Judy Berman |
11-17-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
The Flaming Lips Keep Their Fearless Freak Flag Flyingnew
Put simply, you'd have to be the most loathsome, granite-hearted reptilian cynic this side of Bill O'Reilly -- or quite possibly clinically dead -- not to be moved or uplifted by the Lips in action. Which is all well and good, but Wayne Coyne insists that the evolution of their live shows has been down to a series of happy accidents and a certain degree of "dumb luck."
Baltimore City Paper |
Neil Ferguson |
09-01-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: wayne coyne, The Flaming Lips
NYC Trio Naam Puts a Fine Finish on Sludgenew
It's refreshing to hear a prog-rock element in a band that isn't a sit-down proposition, such as Tortoise. "I wanted to make [prog-influenced music] in a much more loud, droning, drug-induced sense," Naam bassist John Bundy says.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michaelangelo Matos |
08-25-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Kingdom EP, Naam
Brutal Truth: Interviewing Grindcore Bassist Dan Lilkernew
Brutal Truth, founded in 1990 by ex-Anthrax bassist Dan Lilker, has bookended the last decade by breaking up, reforming, and releasing arguably its finest record this year. In this Q&A Lilker discusses the band's recent history and metal's subgenres.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
08-04-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
R&B Flower Child Lynee Michelle Spreads a Message of Peace, Love, and Happinessnew
Lynee Michelle makes a living recording love songs and sexy dance tracks, but has built her career from within Baltimore's male-dominated hip-hop scene.
Baltimore City Paper |
Al Shipley |
05-19-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Torche Takes on Metal with an Unlikely Arsenal of Pop Hooksnew
It's a little difficult imagining Torche's eureka formula of unalloyed metal power and unabashed pop hooks not winning over susceptible converts everywhere the Miami/Atlanta-based trio brings it. But to hear drummer Rick Smith tell it, Torche's hybrid appeal hasn't made things as easy as you might think.
Baltimore City Paper |
Lee Gardner |
04-21-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Leave the Ego Behind and the Music Will Follow With the Yahowa 13new
For the past 30 years the music of the Yahowa 13 has entranced that segment of music heads who dig spaced-out excursions into psychedelic tapestries and krautrock tumults of infinite jams.
Baltimore City Paper |
Bret McCabe |
03-31-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Kenny Tompkins' Side Hustle Hasn't Spoiled Him Yetnew
Christmas Lights frontman Kenny Tompkins describes Walk Like a Human as a meditation on "the challenges of waking up every day"--something that, for many paycheck-to-paycheck workers, is increasingly tough to do.
Baltimore City Paper |
Raymond Cummings |
03-31-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
Ami Dang Bridges Classical Sitar and Voice with Western Avant-Garde Musicnew
It's abrupt when you hear Indian classical music as meditative and spiritual -- that is, as it is intended to be. And it's even more abrupt when it's heard woven into Western avant-garde music, each element working to develop/unshroud the other. This act is a large part of the sublime art of Ami Dang.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
01-06-2009 |
Profiles & Interviews
