Natural Causes tried to make it clear they’re a clean break from Last Year’s Men, the other Carrboro band with the same members. The trio’s pieces switched instruments and attitudes, trading Last Year’s Men’s soul- and country-inclined garage-pop for snotty punk outbursts. Even the Natural Causes origin storyan impromptu jam turned new banddistances itself from […]
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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Live: Rock N Roll Partyfest rages in Raleigh
Rock N Roll Partyfest Slim’s, Raleigh Saturday, June 20–Sunday, June 21, 2015 To some extent, every music festival is an endurance test. But the inaugural Rock N Roll Partyfest in Raleigh somehow kept from becoming a dull blur. Its two nights might have started early and ended late, but a casual vibe and quick sets […]
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Listening to heavy metal heroes with Demon Eye
Demon Eye With Dorthia Cottrell and Grohg Saturday, June 27, 9 p.m., $7–$10 The Pour House, 224 S. Blount St. Raleigh 919-821-1120 www.the-pour-house.com Heavy metal in 2015 doesn’t sound much like heavy metal in 1975, except when bands such as Demon Eye play it. Despite the prevailing trends of so-called extreme metaldeath, thrash, doom, grindcore […]
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Record review: Chaosmic’s Sunborn
Chaosmic Saturday, June 6 at 8:30 p.m. with Pivot, Jonin and DJ FM The Pour House $6–$8 The upstart Raleigh metal quartet Chaosmic have teased the release of their debut album, Sunborn, for months. “We’re super excited about the mastered versions,” they wrote on Facebook in March. “So excited that we wanted to share a […]
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Tonight: The return of US Christmas
Nearly four years have passed since the Western N.C. quartet USX, or US Christmas, released a proper album, 2011’s The Valley Path. A swirling, smoldering 40-minute exploration of heavy psych-rock, haunted Appalachian blues and spartan drone, The Valley Path is a heady journey of a record and USX’s best and most cohesive statement to date. […]
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After a slow start, Blackbeard’s Lost Weekender rallies for garage-rock ruckus
Blackbeard’s Lost Weekender The Cave and Nightlight, Chapel HillFriday, April 10–Saturday, April 11, 2015 On Friday night at the Chapel Hill club Nightlight, the Orlando punk band Golden Pelicans roared through a short set of splattered beer, playful headbutts, larynx-shredding howls from singer Erik Grincewicz and beefy classic-rock riffs from his supporting band. As the […]
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Blackbeard’s Lost Weekender: 10 acts that guarantee a good time
The return of Blackbeard’s Lost Weekender brims with 38 bands and six DJs, plenty to fill three potentially debauched nights. In preparation for the blur, we picked 10 acts that guarantee a good time. FRIDAY, APRIL 10 A GIANT DOG (AUSTIN, TEXAS) A Giant Dog open their 2013 LP, Bone, with a punk-rock burst, riffing […]
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Beyond Blind: An Interview with King Hitter
Raleigh’s King Hitter, a new band of several veteran players, released its debut EP last week, and celebrated on Saturday with a set at Southland Ballroom. Karl Agell, the singer, once led Corrosion of Conformity, just as that band began making inroads to the mainstream. His current bandmates—guitarists Scott Little and Mike Brown, bassist Chuck […]
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Record review: King Hitter’s Self-titled
Karl Agell understands the former power of mainstream rock ‘n’ roll. Agell fronted Corrosion of Conformity when the Raleigh band recorded 1991’s Blind. That album fused hardcore muscle to approachable Southern rock, an admixture that pushed COC from the punk underground to package tours with Metallica. After leaving COC, Agell continued the approach with Leadfoot. […]
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Cantwell, Gomez & Jordan’s Half-Finished Bobcat
Cantwell Gomez & Jordan play Nightlight in Chapel Hill Friday, March 6, at 9 p.m. Whatever Brains, Pipe and Whorecough open. Tickets are $7. After 15 years together, the trio Cantwell Gomez & Jordan play less often than they once did, and their recordings have slowed to a trickle. But if the Triangle’s preeminent skronk-rock […]
