Go to an open mic night for new, original songwriters and you will see two types of performances. The first you’ve seen before. I mean, it’ll be much, much shittier than you’re used to, but it’ll be familiar. A frizzy haired kid with a harmonica holder and acoustic guitar mangling his vowels. A girl wearing […]
Sometimes magic happens. A song enters your mind and slides out fully formed. “Check Out at the SRO” came to me this way. After watching the ending of a character on the underseen David Simon show The Deuce, I felt the itch of inspiration. It was late Monday on a weeknight, but I didn’t want […]
You want to start a band. You go to Craigslist.com. You click the “Community” tab. You click “Musicians.” You read: “I play guitar, sing and write songs. Blues rock, punk, metal, country.” “For-fun rock group seeking 2nd guitarist to share rhythm and lead duties. 80s-90s indie rock, garage, punk, alt. Some originals.” […]
One of the fun things about being alive for a while is that you get to see your friends proven correct. Curta has been making dystopian noise rap since the early 2010s, through the era of Facebook pokes, Harlem Shakes, Ice Bucket and Tide Pod Challenges, and they always seemingly asked the question: what if […]
We describe art that was groundbreaking and hip in the day as the “punk rock” of its time – e.g. Stravinski’s “The Rite of Spring” was the “punk rock” of 1913 – under the assumption that now it’s…well…corny. “The Rite of Spring” caused a riot when it debuted, but soundtracked Fantasia 27 years later. Disney […]
“It’s twelve songs. About 53 minutes.” This is Nic, last week, discussing our forthcoming album Touch Grass with a fellow musician at a local show. I know 53 minutes is too long. There’s a sweet spot for an LP’s length. You want to give listeners enough music to feel like it was worth […]
Last week, HBO released Yacht Rock: a DOCKumentary (their capitalization) that both celebrates and snickers at the smooth, sophisticated pop music that was big in the late 70s and early 80s. After a 2005 mockumentary web series, titled Yacht Rock, this Grammy-winning but critically disliked music has become ironically (and non-ironically) appreciated, and its creators […]
This column comes by request from Nic. He called Bilmuri’s American Motor Sports “country metal” and “the first country album where [he] listened to the whole thing.” I have thoughts. Thanks for the request, Nic. If you have a suggestion for a Heck Record, hit us up on socials, by email, or in the comments. […]
You can hear the hands on the strings – pick scrapes, little bends out of tune, blobs of distortion from a mis-struck notes. It’s the sound of pieces of wood and wire being manhandled. Yank Crimes is one the 1990’s great guitar albums. The corrosive interplay between lead guitarist John Reis and rhythm/vocalist Rick […]
In 2009, during the first of what have become periodic reunions, I saw My Bloody Valentine play the Fillmore Auditorium in Denver. On stage, MBV personify the musical genre whose name they helped inspire, shoegaze. They seemed lost in a world that only existed between their guitars and pedalboards. They didn’t say so much as […]