Prog is tough. For the casual rock fan, it’s over-flamboyant, overindulgent stuff that’s too difficult to follow, though it may, on occasion, yield a gem of “Tom Sawyer” stature. For the serious rock fan with a natural allegiance to one of several hundred subgenres, it’s either pure anathema or pure bliss. There’s rarely any sort […]
Grayson Haver Currin
Bio: Grayson Haver Currin was the music editor of INDY Week and the co-director of Hopscotch Music Festival.Twitter: http://twitter.com/currincy
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Homebrew
If you’ve been secretly hoping that Des Ark and Bellafea–the Triangle’s two fem-front/boy-back bands that also happen to be two of the Triangle’s absolute best–would end up being intra-city rivals, you’ll doubtlessly greet this review with disappointment. Indeed, instead of attempting to drum up rival factions and followings, these two co-ed duos have taken their […]
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Mmmm, donuts
Dick Hodgin would make a revolutionary politician. After all, the locally legendary producer and manager for Cravin’ Melon, Hootie & The Blowfish and Corrosion of Conformity has the flair that many modern politicians conspicuously lack. He’s zealous, opinionated and informed, full of personal anecdotes about the place you’re from, the places you’ve been or the […]
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Without missing a beat
If someone were suing me for $75 million, I wouldn’t write, talk or appear in public. I wouldn’t eat, sleep or drink. Rather, I would spend my time in a bathroom stall, fretting losing an amount of dollars equal to the number of years dinosaurs have been extinct. But when R. Kelly opted to sue […]
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in M,M, & W
Billy Martin grew up in New York City. His mother, a professional dancer, had him tapdancing to vinyl before he was 11, when he moved with his parents to a New Jersey suburb. From there, he caught hip hop in its primordial stages coming over the NYC airwaves, adjusting his dial to keep up with […]
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in kickin’ it
If, as it’s said, there ain’t nothing like the real thing, then there ain’t too much like Brooklyn’s R&B, funk-and-soul powerhouse Sharon Jones and The DAP Kings. They’re an integrated, heated powerhouse of eight, packing a three-piece horn section guided by a rhythm chassis capable of shaking the floor and the asses until the break […]
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Music and politics
In this election year, a special note of thanks to Kings, who spent at least 30 nights of the last 11 months publicly and financially expressing its ire with W. Since last December, owners Steve Popson, Paul Siler and Ben Barwick have graciously lent their downtown rock ‘n’ roll space to local organizations hoping to […]
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Uh, vote, dude
If last week’s Vote for Change concert in Asheville proved anything, it’s that arena-packing bands certainly don’t pull through that bottled Bohemia of a downtown every Wednesday night. Minutes before an advertised 8 p.m. showtime, nearly half the crowd struggled to squeeze in through one of the venue’s few narrow doors. Of course, such delays […]
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in rapid strumming
Less than a week after Sam Bush hit the Lincoln Theatre, Bush’s progressive mandolin peer Jamie Masefield will roll through Raleigh with his Jazz Mandolin Project. The outfit’s name is an apt description, as Masefield alternately picks perfect melodies and their incumbent variations from his eight strings or reigns down sheets of stereophonic psychedelia most […]
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In Carrboration
Some of the Triangle’s best acts will be playing in one relatively small town for free at the Carrboro Music Festival. The stages are everywhere: Cat’s Cradle, The Speakeasy, Armadillo Grill, Open Eye Cafe, RBC Centura Bank, Temple Ball, The Wine Market and a half-dozen other spots. The tastes are everywhere, too: there’s the catchy […]