Image courtesy of Return to Comboland Guitarist and producer Mike Gardner may forever be most renowned as one-third of the ‘80s hard-rock outfit PKM. With bassist Pee Wee Watson and drummer Kenny Soule, PKM managed a timely blend of styles. The band could meet Sunset Strip sleaze and Texas blues boogie, birthing a groove-carving cousin […]
Bryan C. Reed
Bio: Bryan Reed lives in Raleigh, where he nerds out about punk rock and comic books. He's written about music for INDY Week since 2008.Twitter: http://twitter.com/BryanCReed
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Raleigh hardcore bands Last Words and Abuse. ready new LPs for To Live a Lie Records
Since debuting in 2005 with a split 7-inch featuring California’s Godstomper and Maryland’s Magrudergrind, To Live A Lie Records—the one-man operation of Raleigh’s Will Butler—has steadily issued solid slabs of grindcore, powerviolence and hardcore from bands across the globe. Of the 91 titles in its catalog, though, only a few are homegrown. Of particular note: […]
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The week in music: April 24-May 1, 2013
1. DAVE HOLLAND & KENNY BARRON Summarizing the accomplishments of Dave Holland and Kenny Barron does neither justice, but their pasts are worth mention. The bassist and pianist, respectively, have amassed expansive catalogs as sidemen and bandleaders, much of which reads like a who’s who of jazz legends. Holland contributed to Miles Davis’ early forays […]
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Barren Girls’ Hell Hymns
Barren Girls with the Bob Mould Band Cat’s Cradle Thursday, April 18 9 p.m., $18-$20 No matter how faithfully its co-founders have stuck to their sign-who-you-like philosophy, Merge Records is no longer a scrappy little imprint. Rather, approaching age 25, Merge is the sort of large indie label that boasts Grammy winners, chart toppers and […]
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Wavves, washing onto the shore of the Alternative Nation
Wavves with Fidlar and Cheatahs Sunday, April 14 8:30 p.m., $15–$17 Kings Barcade When I was a kid, few albums seemed as ubiquitous as Green Day’s Dookie, the major-label debut for the California punks. For a generation of suburban youth raised with snotty role models like Bart Simpson and Kevin McCallister, Green Day’s snarky, hooky […]
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The Holland Brothers’ Dueling Devils
Billed as a collaboration but arranged as a split album, The Holland Brothers’ Dueling Devils finds identical twins Michael and Mark Holland furthering the strains of blues they’ve exploredtogether and separatelyfor two decades. In the early ’90s, they founded Jennyanykind, which evolved from a hazy rock act to a more recognizably retro roots outfit as […]
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Valient Thorr announces sixth album, Our Own Masters, out in June
Listen up, Earthlings: Valient Thorr, the Venusian (by way of Raleigh) prophets of boogie-metal, are back. On June 18, the denim-vested headbangers will release their sixth album, Our Own Masters, a 12-track platter recorded in Athens, Ga. by Harvey Milk drummer Kyle Spence. That’s the backpatch-ready cover art above. If Valient Thorr has proven anything […]
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Carrboro band Henbrain goes hi-fi with producer Mitch Easter
If there’s such a thing as a lucky break, this might count: In February, Fidelitorium Recordings, Mitch Easter’s Kernersville studio, offered a free weekend of recording with Easter at the helm to “somebody awesome.” That somebody had to respond to a Facebook post requesting a description of “who you are and what you want to […]
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Gray Young’s Bonfire
Gray Young plays Friday, March 29, at 9:30 p.m. at Kings with Wesley Wolfe and The Bronzed Chorus. Tickets are $6. In January, Gray Young planned to celebrate the release of their third album, Bonfire. They’d successfully crowd funded the record and self-released the disc with enough promotional muscle to garner early praise from some […]
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Long a rambler, bluesman Ironing Board Sam has earned a new lease on fun
Ironing Board Sam The Depot in Hillsborough Friday, March 8 8:30 p.m. It’s 3 o’clock on a Sunday afternoon, and Ironing Board Sam is being presented like a relic. The stage lights of The North Carolina Museum of History’s Daniels Auditorium are bright and tawny, and their glow over the seated audiencea motley collection of […]
