AltWeeklies Wire
The Sublime Vacuum Rock of the Vivian Girls and the Crystal Stiltsnew
Crystal Stilts and Vivian Girls are two of the most exciting and, yes, wholly original bands around today. Both take feel-good pop sounds from the '60s and '80s and fuck with them, turning them on their head.
Baltimore City Paper |
Mike McGonigal |
08-19-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
A New Six-Disc Set Documents Two Years of Live Suicide Havocnew
Filling six discs with 13 complete sets from New York and Europe, Live 1977-78 is perhaps, as the back cover text admits, "Not for the fainthearted or casual fan." (Is there even such a thing as a casual Suicide fan?)
Baltimore City Paper |
Marc Masters |
08-12-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: suicide, Live 1977-78
On Waiting For Ariel Pink's Warped Pop Songs to Catch Up to The Now Adult Artistnew
Between 2004 and '06, the imprint promoted the bejesus Pink's work then the full-court media press stopped dead. Information about his activities became much harder to come by, and recordings--now tougher to track down--began flowing through no-name labels.
Baltimore City Paper |
Raymond Cummings |
08-05-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Ariel Pink
How Does Wham City Get Away with Whartscape?new
Now in its third year, the anti-festival turned oddball indie magnet covers four nights, two full days, and four venues, is backed by a list of sponsors, and brings in headliners whose individual payment guarantees could probably cover a month's rent for everyone involved in organizing the fest combined.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
07-29-2008 |
Concerts
Usher's Maturity Makes You Long for His Childish Waysnew
He even reprints Corinthians 13:11 ("when I became a man, I put away childish things") in the liner notes, just to beat you over the head with the point.
Baltimore City Paper |
Al Shipley |
07-08-2008 |
Reviews
Wolf Parade Shows a Mature, Polished Side on 'At Mount Zoomer'new
Part of it is the recording: It sounds more professional. The drums are mixed down and don't have that ragged, recorded-in-a-concrete-closet feeling. The record has more interest in melody--guitars are used as paint instead of gasoline.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
07-08-2008 |
Reviews
Half-Baked Record Nerd Oddities From Dennis Wilson and Droids Resurfacenew
In the late '70s, both these albums were wonders of displacement--either too far behind or ahead of the time to achieve much more than a ripple.
Baltimore City Paper |
Brandon Soderberg |
07-08-2008 |
Reviews
Tags: space, epic, Dennis Wilson, legacy, Pacific Ocean Blue, Repressed, Star Peace, stoner rock, The Droids
Michael Dante Wilson, Jan. 23, 1973-June 5, 2008new
To fans and peers in Baltimore music, he was Mr. Wilson, a charismatic rapper with the long-running group JI-900 and the organizer of countless concerts and events. But to perhaps an even greater number of people, Michael Dante Wilson was simply a warm and genuine human being.
Baltimore City Paper |
Al Shipley |
07-01-2008 |
Music
Where Hip-hop Wentnew
Gold: New Jack Swing, a genre overview, and and What Does It All Mean?, the collected works of cut-up pioneer Steinski, tell the story of rap going beyond itself.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michaelangelo Matos |
06-24-2008 |
Reviews
Legendary Avant-Garde Musician and Philosopher Henry Flynt Performs Again After 25 Yearsnew
Before he called it quits in 1984, he recorded long drone pieces and shorter country jams, collaborated with Tony Conrad, Pandit Pran Nath, and Yoko Ono, and even replaced John Cale in the Velvet Underground for two weeks in 1966. He also pursued mathematics at Harvard and New York University and economics at the New School.
Baltimore City Paper |
Marc Masters |
06-24-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Hip-Hop is My Crazy Girlfriendnew
Like many young passionate relationships, as we got older, hip-hop and I drifted apart. My sensibilities remained progressive, my humor became more biting, and my patience for ignorance became shorter than ever. And hip-hop? Well, we all know what happened to hip-hop.
Baltimore City Paper |
Vincent Williams |
06-10-2008 |
Music
Ponytail Taps Into Something Deeper and More Adaptable Than Moon/Junenew
Molly Siegel's vocals are almost certainly the strangest and most refreshing in indie music since Xiu Xiu's Jamie Stewart taught his throat to cry. It's like listening to a child learn its first word in accelerated form, only it's a twentysomething art-school graduate backed by an epic, even more clamorous version of Deerhoof.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
06-03-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Ice Cream Spiritual, Ponytail
Portishead Forgets Everything It Knows About Dreadnew
Third feels like an exploratory exercise and a reintroduction rolled into a somewhat flat, frowny package, wrapped in rough burlap. In 2001 or '02 it might have registered as a rudderless junior slump; in 2008, it's just lame.
Baltimore City Paper |
Raymond Cummings |
04-29-2008 |
Reviews
'Love and Circuits' Captures America's Current Musical Undergroundnew
Cardboard Records founders Dan Friel and BJ Warshaw explain the comp in no humble terms: a representation of "the current underground scene as a whole." And it's a fair approximation, at least within the bounds of white twentysomethings' fickle tastes.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
04-15-2008 |
Reviews
Thrushes Let The World's DJs Feel Their Heartbeatsnew
Last spring, the introspective indie-pop outfit rose out the internet ether when "Hearbeats," the lead single off their then just-released debut album, became the No. 1 downloaded song for the week of March 30. In light of this success, the band offered a remix contest, intending to release its favorite version.
Baltimore City Paper |
Raven Baker |
04-08-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
