For The Rosebuds, Sand + Silence represents a way outof North Carolina, of Merge Records, of post-divorce chatter, of the stylistic stalemate that’s stalled the career of the once-ascendant pop sweethearts Ivan Howard and Kelly Crisp. A decade ago, Howard and Crisp emerged as a young, married and exuberant couple who’d relocated their racing pop-rock […]
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
Posted inSports
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 […]
Posted inMusic
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, […]
Posted inMusic
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 […]
Posted inMusic
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 […]
Posted inMusic
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 […]
Posted inMusic
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 […]
Posted inMusic
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 […]
Posted inMusic
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 […]
Posted inCulture
Local bearded man attends beard competition, flees in mortal terror
The long, curling tips of the moustache the man sports while standing outside of the rock club on Saturday night droop and dangle, like alien testicles responding to Earth gravity upon first contact. But he shows no shame: As the several dozen contestants and about 265 attendees of the inaugural Oak City Beard and Mustache […]
