Music
Jib Kidder’s Mixed-Up World
After spending many years making music with his guitar and other tactile instruments Sean Yent Schuster Craig created Jib Kibber. The idea behind the project is using found music from LPs, cassettes, mp3s and other audio translations to make something entirely new with them. Four records are scheduled for release this year, including "Cold Hands" cassette on Demo/Forever, "Nucular Mind" on DVD from States Rights Records, an LCM volume on Asthmatic Kitty and very soon, and a split [...]
Sweaty Weapons Blow Shit Up
Words by Luke Koz Photography by Jamey O'Quinn ` “Todd's the only punk guy in the band. John's emo, Leeora's a lesbian, and I'm just fucked.” It's appropriate that Sweaty Weapons was born in a bathroom at a house party, as the band's sugar-laced noise sounds cut from a two-inch line of coke on a squat house sink. The band's music is touched by '80s Los Angeles punk and '90s riot grrrl, but singer Leeora Empire's lyrics are distinctly New York City. The characters who occupy her stories [...]
Newtown Radio
Words by Megan Cahn Playing everything from the Fuck Buttons to Madonna to Holy Ghost!, Newtown Radio—an Internet station based out of Bushwick—is the itch to the scratch of Brooklyners and beyond who are sick of Pandora, missing their college radio listening days and just wanting to hear some good tunes without having to work too hard for it. Mixing local favorites, cult classics, crowd pleasers and hidden gems of the past with the latest from the indie music scene, Newtown Radio [...]
Brian Jonestown Massacre and the Art of Underworld Domination
Photography by Nicholas Breslow Words by Megan Martin Anton Newcombe on Houston Street in NYC. “I very much want to rip the pop culture’s fucking lungs out and smoke ‘em. All of it.” –Anton Newcombe Being a successful artist is a fine balancing act between the exposure of the art and the introverted tendencies to get it done. Its never been a question that Anton Newcombe from the San Francisco-bred band Brian Jonestown Massacre has walked this tightrope his whole life, [...]
Be Set Free with Langhorne Slim
Photography by Cracker Farm Words by Adriana Rizzolo "Yeah well, whether you feel like dancing and singing or not dancing and singing, just not worrying about what other people are thinking is cool, being true to yourself." -Langhorne Slim Hailing not far from the small borough in Bucks County, Pennsylvania called Langhorne is the singer/songwriter who carried it's namesake, Mr. Langhorne Slim. Once dubbed the “bastard son” of lunatic rockabilly musician Hasil Adkins, the [...]
Ian Mackaye, I Love You
This article is from several issues back, but I've seen a resurgence of Ian Mackaye in the blogosphere as of late on sites like Buddyhead, and Arthur Magazine. So I figured I'd re-dedicate myself to the genius that is Mackaye and re-post my interview with him. He is such a well-spoken and intelligent guy; best interview yet. ** GUIDING YOUR BAND’S POLITICAL AGENDA by Ian MacKaye Intro and Interview by Megan Martin There’s something inherently linked between music and politics. [...]
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Photography by Tessa Angus Words by Megan Martin We can all bow our heads and hold touching palms to hearts for a prayer of thanks to the dirty, bearded rock-and-roll Jesus and the resurrection of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. Rock music, in all its grittiness and smoke and drink and raw emotion and sound, isn’t something that anyone can just pick up and do. It’s a lifestyle, a pocket of resistance. After nearly ten years as a band, BRMC has constantly risen to the occasion as the [...]
JM Airis Creates an Indian Summer in a Brooklyn Winter
Photography by Megan Martin Words by Ryan Spoto "Oh baby, watch my fears hold for a million years. I know what you're thinking, but its not love that's making your heart sick." –‘Divider,’ JM Airis JM Airis, drummer from the New York rock group Dead Sparrows, has taken a bold leap that only few musicians can manage: creating a solo album that sounds drastically different from, yet equally powerful as his other projects. Filled with heavy emotions and heart felt lyrics, the sounds [...]
Isn’t It Romantic? Er, Sort of? A Rather Grey and Lovely Chat with THE xx
Words by Ken Scrudato It’s pithy that The xx’s name employs the same sort of intentional poetic colorlessness as did the name choice of The Smiths. Indeed, this London foursome similarly forward a particular brand of graveyard and teatime poetry laced with turbulent, bemused sexuality. Their rather astonishing debut is one of those rarest of birds: a record that is both enthrallingly sexy and almost unfailingly, well, grey. Intrigued to peel back a couple of layers of the already [...]