Given the pedigree, it’s hardly surprising that Bustello’s eight-song debut EP is this catchy and sharply written. Frontman Ben Clarke led early-’90s outfit Metal Flake Mother, which released music on Mammoth Records. Bassist and producer John Plymale played with local icons Sex Police and The Pressure Boys before becoming a popular local studio man with […]
Chris Parker
Bio: After a fond stint in the Triangle, Chris Parker lives in Cleveland, Ohio, where he writes about music and politics for a variety of newspapers and magazines. He has written about music for INDY Week since 2002.
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The Honored Guests finally value the process, not just the product
See Related Events below Perfection is better in concept than practice, as most anyone who’s lived with a perfectionist will tell you. Reconciling one’s ideal world with the reality we inhabit is a daily struggle, one that’s even more vexing when it comes to a work of art over which you’re presumed to have complete […]
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Femme Feast expands to three clubs
The Cave, Talulla’s and West End Wine Bar host Femme Feast Friday, Aug. 20–Sunday, Aug. 22. For the complete schedule, see Related Events below and www.caverntavern.com. “Bigger than ever” might not be a term of endearment for most women, but it keenly summarizes the ambitions of the third annual Femme Feast, the Chapel Hill celebration […]
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Pagan Hellcats’ Wild Place
Wild Place, the Pagan Hellcats’ debut LP, straddles the line between reflective, easygoing roots and supple rock sinew, not unlike Neil Young. At times, the Hellcats are content to let the country-folk twang drift like a summer breeze, abetted by Dave Rutter’s gruff baritone and Diane Rodelli’s soothing alto croon. During the ballad “My Side […]
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Rat Jackson’s Midnight Get Right
Rat Jackson’s got a one-track mind as bent toward carnality as Ron Jeremy’s, and that’s the nudge-nudge, wink-wink thesis behind their satirical rock. The libidinous id runs wild across these nine tracks with the playful indifference of a juvenile delinquent on a four-inch joyride. From “Slippery Slope” to “The Two Minute Sweat,” intimations and double […]
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Shooting at The Eagles, or being over it
The Eagles play RBC Center at 9 p.m. Thursday, June 17. Tickets are $55-$195. Building a better mousetrap only gives the haters your home address. Seeing as how success and worthiness are, sports excepted, often mutually exclusive, it’s no surprise that creative dominance engenders raspberries from the cognoscenti. There will always be bands more deserving […]
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Fan-Tan’s Age of Discovery
Fan-Tan releases Age of Discovery Friday, May 14, at Local 506. Citified opens the $8 show at 10 p.m. Romantics make better bedfellows than irascible rebels, so how did emo become enmeshed with punks? When Sunny Day Real Estate crumbled into ragged, four-on-the-floor rumble, someone should have suggested that welding a heart to the sleeve […]
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You can’t be Sharon Jones because, well, you weren’t
Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings play with Fitz & the Tantrums Tuesday, May 11, at Cat’s Cradle. The 9 p.m. show costs $25. Chiseled with a rugged, timeworn demeanor that shouts “don’t gimme none of your lip,” Sharon Jones’ voice has enough character to exist in a Coen Brothers film. It’s not one of those […]
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Instro Summit rumbles with the instrumental jams
Visit The Cave’s website for the complete lineup and details for the Instro Summit, Friday, April 23–Sunday, April 25. You might call them unsung. It’s not so much that they don’t get respectthough there’s a little of that toobut mostly, there is no singer. But one of the advantages of an instrumental band is, of […]
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Bruised from breaking rocks all day, Alice in Chains returns for some easier work
Alice in Chains plays with Shooter Jennings Wednesday, April 21, at Raleigh’s Memorial Auditorium. Tickets for the 7:30 p.m. show are $45. I come not to praise Alice in Chains but to bury them. What’s that? You thought they were already dead, since frontman Layne Staley died in 2002? Think again. I’m being flip, of […]