I'm fascinated by the notion of influences and inspirations, especially when they're mashed up and twisted by geographical and cultural differences. Listening to any The Soundtrack Of Our Lives album conjures up bits from the historical nature of rock n roll—how it was served like a flaming tennis ball across the pond to Britain by [...]

The Sundance Film festival is as much a showcase for documentaries as it is a venue for edgy independent fare. Hoop Dreams, Supersize Me, and An Inconvenient Truth all captured initial buzz from the mountain town festival. The director of Oscar winning Truth, Davis Guggenheim, brought a new film to this year's festival. It Might [...]

For full length albums in 2008, I enjoyed:
The Black Keys' new sonic attitude on Attack and Release; Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks reaping the benefit of Janet “Thundersticks” Weiss on Real Emotional Trash; the Bonnie Raitt-meets-Tom Waits exuberance of Austin songrestress Carolyn Wonderland on Miss Understood; the echo of Zep III in the Dodos' Visiter; [...]

Just got word that the immensely talented and former half of Georgie James, Laura Burhenn, will be playing a set at the Velvet Lounge tonight at 9:30 p.m. sharp. Here's a quick note from Laura on what she plans for tonight:
Tonight is a night for feedback – of all sorts. I’ll be experimenting with some [...]

The full-on rock spectacle that is Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band was on display last night at the 9:30 Club. For me, the transition from quirky Americana to Oberst's special brand of theatrical rock was "Road to Joy's" proclamation "Let's fuck it up boys...make some noise!" from 2004's I'm Wide Awake, It's [...]

The New York Times ran a story last Thursday about a service that ranks in societal importance next to dog psychiatrists and fish pedicures.
...it is just in the last five years that a handful of music consultants, mostly in New York and London, have begun to specialize in creating custom domestic soundtracks. From Aspen lodges [...]

DJ Will Eastman brings another night of dance grooves to the Black Cat. I caught a set of his a couple of weeks back at Saint X and enjoyed it so much I overimbibed and fell down. Twice. Here's how Will described Bliss to me:
Bliss is a no attitude, just fun party where people can [...]

I'm not as familiar with Steve Love and Philip Goyete as I am with Sean Gone, aka Sean Pearce. I asked Sean what his goal for tonight's Level Up was.
What I try to do with me sets is bring together all the really great forms of underground indie dance from hip-hop electro remixes to rocked [...]

Arlo Guthrie's Kennedy Center performance last night with the National Symphany Orchestra was often a cinematic experience. Strings and brass propelled Arlo's still strong and rooted-in-rural-America vocals into every corner of the performance space, and invoked a Randy Newman Pixar/Disney film end of credits vibe.
The between song banter was fun and fresh. There were revelatory [...]

JJ Grey and Mofro released Orange Blossoms on August 26th. I'm a big Mofro fan, and would reccomend any of their four records. With Blossoms, however, they are predictably tagged again with the head- scratching moniker of "swamp rockers"–the quasi-sub genre the stubbornly defies definition. The wiki pedia page on swamp rock lists CCR, Jim [...]