[Birthday greetings go out today to Portishead’s Geoff Barrow …] Tonight’s top 3 ways to get an earful: ‣ The Satellite (f/k/a Spaceland) will be decked out in black light and ready for an alien invasion to welcome the L.A. debut of Epic Ruins, the stoner rock project of L.A.-based drummer Jordan Richardson and his […]
Pigeon John has canceled his remaining 2010 tour dates, including an appearance Dec. 16 at the Echoplex – a spokesperson cited “unforeseen health issues,” declining to elaborate further – but a digital dose of L.A. most genial hip-hop guy is always in order. In October, John released his seventh album, “Dragon Slayer” (Quannum), which has […]
Modern Time Machines’ cocktail of fuzzed-out dissonance and cirrus melody gets sweeter with each outing, and on “Mammoth” the L.A. quartet of Ben Golomb, Chanda Dancy, Dean Estrella and Nicole Smith fashions a four-minute cloud of melancholic shoegaze that gets under your skin a little. The new video for the song features Chervine Naamani ”Žand […]
I never post on late-night TV appearances, but today is an exception, and it should be. Long-running SoCal punk band Social Distortion made its first national TV appearance in its estimable 30-year-history when Mike Ness and company played “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” on Monday night. Mind-boggling, really, for a band that has had radio hits, a […]
What has it been – more than two years since IO Echo began mesmerizing L.A. audiences with its haunting, Goth-tinged shoegaze? The duo of Leopold Ross and Ioanna Gika took their act on the road before it was really fully formed, but they’ve spent the past year supporting the likes of Florence + the Machine, […]
Buzz Bands LA returned to the Internet “airwaves” Friday on MoheakRadio. One of the tunes I played was from L.A. trio Mini Mansions, the side project of Queens of the Stone Age keyboardist Michael Shuman, so I’ll take this opportunity to share the recent video they did for the song “Wunderbars.” It’s off today their […]
Top 2 homecoming shows by L.A. bands who’ve been away: ‣ Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti plays the Music Box with Os Mutantes and Teen Inc. That’s Steve Hanft’s video for “Bright Lit Blue Skies,” above. ‣ Everest and He’s My Brother, She’s My Sister team up at the Echo. ||| Download: Ariel Pink, “Round and […]
Attention holiday shoppers: We know that your favorite price tag reads “free,” so at the risk of whoring ourselves out to a major retailer, we’re going to tell you about “The Christmas Gig,” a digital compilation of holiday tunes. It’s free. It’s original music. It’s good, in places really good. And it includes a lot […]
Three sold-out deals tonight: ‣ Grinderman at the Music Box. That’s the video for “Heathen Child,” above, and if that’s unsettling there was a great piece in the Guardian recently that will soothe your troubled sensibilities. ‣ Faith No More, the first of two nights at the Palladium, as its reunion tour nears the end. […]
L.A. singer-songwriter Nik Freitas has probably had very few moments to himself since he released his fourth album, “Sun Down,” in 2008 for Conor Oberst’s Team Love imprint. He’s toured as part of Oberst’s Mystic Valley Band, and most recently he’s joined the touring juggernaut of the Danger Mouse/James Mercer project Broken Bells. “Recorded on […]
