A few weeks back, hipster journal Vice published a review of Lonely Twin, the second LP from Lawrence act Hospital Ships. The magazine named it “Worst Album of the Month.” Taking issue with the review is a fool’s errand. Dumping on things is Vice’s modus operandi, and Hospital Ships has earned love from plenty of other outlets — including National…
In British comedian Richard Ayoade’s directorial debut, Craig Roberts plays a smart, sensitive teenage kid who’s trying to save his parents’ failing marriage while winning the heart of an aloof classmate (Yasmin Paige). Submarine is funny and stylish, and shot in a way that gives the early 1980s an archaic glow, as though lit by candles and the setting sun….
Incendies, the new French-Canadian/Lebanese film by director Denis Villeneuve (Maelstrom, Polytechnique), is the sort of work that can give a critic fits. There is more than enough “right” with it to make it worthy of recommendation, even though it has certain significant problems as well. But it’s also different enough and accomplished enough that it merits much more than a…
Seven years ago, Ratatat’s home-recorded debut single, “Seventeen Years,” hit college-radio airwaves amid a trend of instrumental electronic music built on pulsating bass and heavy synthesizers. These days, the Brooklyn duo is best-known for its remixes, with the signature tailoring of whining synth lines and drop-out dance beats. Something about the video-game sound has attracted artists in other genres —…
Straight outta Hollywood: A starving musician is working in a restaurant, hoping to one day find his vocal muse, when in walks a shy but talented songstress lunching with her mother. The musician chats them up, and eventually, the girl’s mother volunteers her daughter to sing with the charming young man. They form a band and live happy, quirky lives…
The pale, white tentacles of the music blogosphere extend far and wide, and they can anoint or destroy when wielded in relative unison. Yeasayer found itself on the winning side of this divide. Last year, Hype Machine named the psych-pop group the “Most Blogged-About Artist” of the year. This is owed, in part, to style. The band comes from Brooklyn,…
Influenced by fellow Lubbock native Buddy Holly, Joe Ely brought a rock-and-roll sensibility to the Texas country trio the Flatlanders, which formed in the early ’70s. And bandmates Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Butch Hancock educated Ely in the sounds of country and folk. By the time Ely also began releasing solo albums, he had developed his own sound by merging…
My claim of objectivity regarding Dollar Fox’s debut, Close to Home, is about as convincing as a drunk friend pleading for his car keys back. I have a built-in weakness for the band’s down-home Americana. Still, I think listeners who are less biased than I am will recognize that these are better-than-average roots-rock tunes, making for a fitting soundtrack to…
The eve of the predicted rapture a couple of weeks back seemed like an appropriate time to speak with David Bazan. As songwriter for Pedro the Lion, Bazan was something of a revolutionary indie-rock character for singing about his Christian faith. As the years passed, doubt crept into his religious worldview, most notably on 2009’s Curse Your Branches, on which…
Chef Alex Pope — who was the featured chef in a series of interviews on Fat City last week — has announced that he’s officially leaving his post at the R Bar on Saturday, June 4. Pope’s departure ends a nearly two-year tenure at the saloon, restaurant and music venue in the West Bottoms. Pope says owner Joy Jacobs wants…
Former Miss USA and porn star Kelli McCarty is donating her winning dress to the tornado relief effort in Joplin, Missouri, according to TMZ. The gown is on eBay with a starting bid of $5,000 (no one has bid on it yet), and all of the proceeds go to the Salvation Army in Joplin. McCarty won the 1991 Miss USA…
This is sure to be traumatizing. St. Joseph police say a car hit by a freight train in Chillicothe on Tuesday had a 10-year-old at the wheel. The girl was driving her father and four other children, The St. Joseph News-Press reports, when the car became stuck on the tracks, and the train smashed it. Amazingly, nobody was injured. Police…
The third, and final, installment of Mark Lowrey’s popular pianist-meets-hip-hop event, Mark Lowrey vs. Hip Hop, goes down tonight at Crosstown. But fret not: Lowrey says he’ll continue to work with hip-hop musicians in the future. Here’s the lowdown on tonight’s show. Categories: Music Tags: brandon draper, hermon mehari, hip hop, hip-hop, Mark Lowrey, reach, the Phantom, the phantom*
We wrote about hip-hop/party collective Team Bear Club this past fall. They’re generally a Lawrence-centric crew, but starting this Saturday, they’re broadening their horizons to Kansas City. Westport, specifically, where once a month they’ll be throwing a Bear Club party at the Union. We caught up with head dude Phil Canty (also known as Morri$) to chat about what to…
Former Missouri Speaker of the House Rod Jetton has admitted that he hit a woman in the face and choked her before and during a sexual encounter in November 2009. The admission came Thursday as Jetton agreed to plead guilty to a reduced charge of misdemeanor assault, the Southeast Missourian reported. The 43-year-old Republican was facing felony assault charges, but…
I first heard the Kottonmouth Kings when I was in high school. One of my friends — cheerleader, straight A’s, not a pot smoker — played one of the band’s albums for me. “Aren’t they great,” she said with a beaming smile, her voice full of excitement. A boy she liked had turned her on to them. Suddenly everything had…
About a year ago, chef Alex Pope got a call from his brother-in-law Mike, asking Pope if he was interested in brewing some beer. “He decided he wanted to do it and asked me because he knows I’m up for anything in the kitchen,” Pope says.”Well, that and I have all the pots and pans.” That casual phone call opened…
CNN’s Anderson Cooper spoke with Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon yesterday to find out why the identification and release of Joplin tornado victims’ bodies is taking so long. In one case, Cooper said that a family was told it would take two weeks for a family to get in to identify the body of their child. Nixon told Cooper that help…
Kanrocksas is shaping up to have a line-up a little deeper than previously expected (the recent addition of the Diplo and Switch dance-hall project Major Lazer certainly bumped me off the fence). But it’s certainly not for everyone. However, for those whose tastes run a little twangier but don’t feel like making the trek to Manhattan for Country Stampede, there’s…
