I never got a chance to see Spitboy, the band in which Michelle Cruz Gonzales played drums in the early and mid-1990s. They were a band that was spoken about reverently by friends of mine who were familiar with them; the fact that they’d released a split LP with the equally great Los Crudos also played a part. So when news emerged last year that The Spitboy Rule: Tales of a Xicana in a Female Punk Band was set to […]
“I Knew I Wanted This One To Sound Different”: TW Walsh On Making “Fruitless Research”
I’ve been listening to the music of TW Walsh for a long time now–from his first solo album How We Spend Our Days to his time as a member of Pedro the Lion and Headphones and on through his latest album, Fruitless Research. It’s an album that retains the same off-beat sensibility of his earlier work while also venturing into more stylized, dreamlike arrangements, with longtime collaborator Yuuki Matthews (The Shins, Crystal Skulls) along for the ride. It’s a a […]
Bridging Versions of Cities at Extreme Volumes
Confession time: I don’t normally find myself in the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of the State of New York. And if I had ever planned to be there, I would not have expected for it to be for a crushingly loud and yet liberating program of music played by nine guitarists and a drummer. In fact, that was how I spent my Monday night: taking in a program featuring three symphonies written by composer Glenn Branca, as […]
A Mixtape of Musical History: A Review of John Doe’s “Under the Big Black Sun”
“Writing about music is like dancing about architecture” said either Martin Mull or Elvis Costello, depending on which source you believe. Either way we keep doing it, knowing full well the kind of lightning made by mouths or slapping strings can’t be captured on the printed page. The many differences between the sung and written word kept eating at me as I read Under the Big Black Sun—a Personal History of L.A. Punk.
Battle of the Band Coffees: Hot Water Music vs. Brain Tentacles
In retrospect, it’s a little baffling that someone hasn’t made a Descendents-inspired coffee yet. (Update: or so I thought! As it turns out, Sweetwater did exactly this in 2013.) As a recent article on Vice pointed out, bands are increasingly lending their names to various foods and drinks: among others, Dogfish Head has collaborated with Juliana Barwick and Guided by Voices on beer; the former also resulted in a very good EP, Rosabi. Coffee roasters based near the labels in […]
Karaoke, Tattoos, and Liberating Solitude: An Interview With Gazebos
Die Alone, the first full-length from Seattle’s Gazebos, is an eminently unpredictable album. Quirky punk numbers co-exist with covers of songs from Grease, and transitions within the songs themselves represent bold stylistic shifts. It’s an album that rewards multiple listens, and one that rarely dwells on a particular style or sound. I talked with singer Shannon Perry and guitarist TV Coahran about the making of Die Alone, how they arrived at their particular approach, and more.
“You Don’t Have to Know the Words, You Can Feel It”: An Interview With Gustav Ejstes of Dungen
It’s been over a decade now since the Swedish psychedelic rock band Dungen first made an impression on American shores. That album, Ta Det Lugnt, attracted a wide-ranging group of devotees on this side of the Atlantic–no small measure, given that the group’s lyrics were (and remain) in Swedish. At the time of its release, Brandon Stosuy reviewed it for Pitchfork and called it “an exceedingly triumphant psych-pop oddity.” While it was their first album to receive wide attention in […]
“The Other Channel Is Just Chaos”: A Conversation With Dan Friel
The first time I ever saw Dan Friel play music was in Parts & Labor, the gloriously urgent noise-rock group of which he was a founding member. (“Fractured Skies,” from their 2007 album Mapmaker, sits very high on my list of great side one/track ones.) Since Parts & Labor’s final show in early 2012, Friel has released two solo LPs on Thrill Jockey, moved from north Brooklyn to Park Slope, and become a father. One can find the thematic influence […]