AltWeeklies Wire
This is Marnie Stern -- Long May She Shrednew
The electric feminist explosion that is This Is It masks deep personal anxieties, something she describes as a "combination of zen and extreme loneliness." It's why she lyrically reaches for zen bliss. It's the musical equivalent of making lemonade from lemons.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Mosi Reeves |
11-12-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Why My Bloody Valentine Isn't Anything to Dismiss: A Fan's Sonic Memorynew
I don't even know if I'm going to see MBV this week. If I don't, I suspect I'll still hear their noise, or feel it, from across town. If I can touch that instrumental passage of "You Made Me Realise," I'll grab on to a point within it. That point will be my nostalgia. It'll levitate, compress, and then shatter.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Johnny Ray Huston |
09-24-2008 |
Music
My Bloody Valentine's Tour Points to Pitfalls of a Generations's Reunion-Fueled Nostalgianew
Which My Bloody Valentine will reappear this fall when Kevin Shields and company tour the states for the first time since 1992? The feedback scientists who briefly earned the title of "Loudest Band Ever," or the shaggy shoegazers who fans, including myself, know and adore?
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Mosi Reeves |
09-24-2008 |
Music
Taking Apart Rock Journalism and Loving Country with David Berman of Silver Jewsnew
Berman is a really fun -- gabby, even -- intelligent, well-read, and eminently likable dude, willing to break it down with sincere, self-effacing erudition and venture off on thoughtful tangents.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Kimberly Chun |
09-24-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Flip the Switch and Begin Anew with TV on the Radionew
If Cookie Mountain closed a chapter for TV on the Radio's alabaster soul, then Dear Science signifies a new direction. Tunde Adebimpe calls it "brighter and cleaner," shorn of the dense layers of distortion of the past. The music is wide open. The future is wide open.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Mosi Reeves |
09-17-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: TV on the Radio, Dear Science
Serena Southam Conjures that Old-Timey Magicnew
Going by Serena Jean & the Whiskey Trippers' first, eponymous self-released EP -- brimming with rich, autobiographical songs only six months into their collective career -- it's safe for me to rephrase Alfred Stieglitz on Georgia O'Keeffe: "At last, a woman on wax!"
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Kandia Crazy Horse |
08-21-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Rock Riffs Meet Classical Chops in the Hands of Judgement Daynew
For a mutant that's half-string quartet, half-power trio, this triple threat of violin, cello, and drums turns out to be mighty tough.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Dina Maccabee |
08-13-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Judgement Day
Why Does the Bay Area Have a Hard Time Harboring Hip-Hop Venues?new
Hip-hop is one of the most popular genres on earth, and San Francisco is a world-class city. Yet this town seems hostile toward this musical nightlife with such revenue-generating potential. Why?
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Garrett Caples |
08-06-2008 |
Music
Oakland Hyphy God Keak da Sneak Drops a New Full-Lengthnew
While major-label discs by Mistah FAB and Clyde Carson continue to languish, Deified could be the breakthrough everyone's hoping for. With his diehard local following, plus an instantly recognizable, burbling, volcanic growl spewing out new slang like "hyphy" and "fasheezy," Keak has a real shot at shattering the glass ceiling frustrating the Bay's national ambitions.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Garrett Caples |
07-02-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tilly and the Wall Enjoy the Ridenew
The wild children of the Midwest are attempting to hold their fans' attention offstage as well with their latest, third full-length, a multitextured affair enigmatically titled O, after the oval frame that will surround the various, limited-edition, handmade prints created by friends.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Kimberly Chun |
07-02-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: O, Tilly and the Wall
Two Queer Legends of Indie Rock and Queercore Look Backnew
Pansy Division's Jon Ginoli and Camper Van Beethoven's Victor Krummenacher got together recently to talk about the way it was, coming out in the repressed 1980s and coming into their own experientially, politically, and musically in 1990s San Francisco -- each, as Krummenacher puts it, a "gay guy suddenly in Candyland."
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Kimberly Chun |
06-25-2008 |
Music
Fleet Foxes Tears Back the Centuriesnew
In their quest to fuse pre-rock 'n' roll sounds with indie-rock sensibilities, Fleet Foxes don't simply settle for 20th-century American Music 101. Rather, their time-travel extends all the way back to the Black Plague.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Todd Lavoie |
06-25-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: Fleet Foxes
The Explorers Club Channels the Beach Boysnew
Everything on Freedom Wind has been faithfully rendered, from its lush, four-part harmonies to its evocative timpani-rolls to the CD booklet's resemblance to a well-worn record sleeve with the vinyl edges showing through.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Todd Lavoie |
06-18-2008 |
Reviews
Earth Grounds Itself in Twang and Dronenew
Thanks to Earth worshippers Sunn O))) and the scads of other low-end drone specialists who have cropped up in recent years, the band's once-misunderstood sound has come to be seen as pioneering, opening the way for a range of experimentalists operating at the crossroads of metal, improv, and avant-garde rock. The thing is, Carlson doesn't have much interest in that sound anymore.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Will York |
06-18-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Jack Carneal's Yaala Yaala Records Pipelines the Sounds of Malinew
Labels like Yaala Yaala, which is distributed by Drag City, don't play by the outmoded rules of so-called world music production, eschewing both academic empiricism and the major labels' reductive tendency to isolate bankable masters. Meanwhile, kids in Mali listen to dubbed tapes of Led Zeppelin and Jay-Z.
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
Max Goldberg |
06-11-2008 |
Music
