Sir Richard Bishop with Tashi Dorji Friday, Aug. 29, 6 p.m., $8 The Pinhook Sir Richard Bishop is not a knight. He has never met the Queen. But many years ago, Bishop one of the best and least predictable instrumental guitarists to emerge in decadesbegan adding the honorary title to his solo records. It was […]
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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From Raleigh’s Franklin Street to Chapel Hill’s Franklin Street, by bike
Getting your bike from Raleigh to Chapel Hill requires only a little planning, not a lot of perseverance. If you’ve got three dollars in your pocket and a clock that tells good time, you can do it in an hour and without breaking a substantive sweat. Simply arrive at the downtown Raleigh bus hub between […]
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Bombadil’s Tarpits and Canyonlands reissue
Bombadil Tarpits and Canyonlands (Reissue) Bombadil with The Tender Fruit Thursday, Aug. 14, 6 p.m., free americantobaccohistoricdistrict.com Even if you’ve never encountered the tragedy-to-triumph tale of Durham quartet Bombadil, the band’s second album, the brilliant and newly reissued Tarpits and Canyonlands, stands as a reflecting pool of the bittersweet. In a gentle but jilted ballad, […]
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Ghostt Bllonde/The Pilgrims’ Home & Home Split 7″
The reputation of young Raleigh quartet Ghostt Bllonde is that of a delightful mess. In their brief past, Ghostt Bllonde’s glistening pop-rock odes have submitted to the lo-fi production inherent to several early singles and a wonderfully ragtag debut album. And they’re best known for the post-adolescent enthusiasm of wild house shows in their former […]
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Nathan Golub’s Ellerbee River Blues
The seven-song cassette Ellerbee River Blues marks the debut of Durham instrumentalist Nathan Golub, but he’s been collecting the skills that shape this set for more than a decade. A longtime sideman in various rock bands and a pedal steel player in John Howie Jr.’s The Rosewood Bluff, Golub steps to the fore here. His […]
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Live: Merge 25 ends hot, humid and with a silly Neutral Milk Hotel kowtow
Merge 25 Day 4: Neutral Milk Hotel, Caribou, Teenage Fanclub, Bob Mould, Mikal Cronin, Ex Hex, The Love Language, Vertical Scratchers Cat’s Cradle Parking Lot, Carrboro Saturday, July 26, 2014 Jeff Mangum wants your money, and he’d like your memory, too. On Saturday evening, as the sun began to settle on the fourth and final […]
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Live: Longevity, liberty and Imperial Teen at Night 3 of Merge 25
Merge 25 Night 3: Hospitality, Imperial Teen, David Kilgour & the Heavy Eights, the Mountain Goats, Wye Oak, Destroyer Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro Friday, July 25, 2014 Sets get cut short at music festivals, especially at events such as Merge 25, where bands gather to celebrate something besides boosting their own signals. Acts accustomed to having […]
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Live: Superchunk rules Night 2 of Merge 25
The night had been stacked against Superchunk’s success. Five bands preceded the Merge flagship to the Cat’s Cradle stage on Thursday, creating a rollercoaster of momentum that seemed to dip deep past the point of recovery before Superchunk could even play well after midnight. Parts of the venue’s PA and lighting rig lost electricity during […]
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Live: Merge 25 begins with Lambchop, Mount Moriah and William Tyler
No one seemed to care that the first letter of “MERGE 25” needed to take a nap last night. At the opening show of the label’s quarter-century summit, seven large and well-lit characters that spelled out the event’s name had been propped against a stage right wall. They served as subtle stand-ins for the sort […]
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Working for you: Merge Records at 25
If the weather is copacetic and the summer afternoon showers stay out of Carrboro, organizers of Merge Records’ 25th anniversary events estimate they might accommodate 3,000 people for Saturday’s finale in the Cat’s Cradle parking lot. The indoor events sold out almost instantly, so the makeshift asphalt amphitheater represents the only chance most people will […]