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Frank De Blase on March 17th, 2010
Boston-based folky Meg Hutchinson has gotten all sorts of attention and won all sorts of awards for her lyrically powerful music, including the John Lennon Songwriting Competition and the Billboard Song Contest. Interestingly, Hutchinson cites wordsmiths like Yeats, Eliot, and Frost more than musicians in her list of influences. Musically,
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 17th, 2010
British Columbia band Brasstronaut plays stripped-down sunshine with a smattering of clouds. R&B and other assorted traditions hang as faint as an impending rainbow. It's simple and sparse, so when it gets weird, there is all sorts of room to dodge or dance with the sonics as they ricochet and
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 17th, 2010
Barrence Whitfield loudly and ferociously plays rock 'n' roll from that classic era when it was still a predominantly black menace to the white gentry (despite its overwhelming appeal to white kids). It was musically bodacious and lyrically salacious. Whitfield's unparalleled voice is big and baritone (incidentally, his real name
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 10th, 2010
Growing up on the island of St. Lucia, a young Taj Weekes was exposed to all kinds of music on the radio - music that wasn't segregated, gentrified, or defined as anything other than just good music. Church played an influence as well as his Caribbean surroundings. Weekes moved to
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 10th, 2010
The Monologue Bombs started out as one lone Monologue Bomb - Raleigh, North Carolina's Scott Phillips. Phillips did his thing on the piano, accordion, and guitar, but has since fleshed out the duties to include a full band. The music is uniformly rarified by Phillips' vocal strength and gentle nonchalance.
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 10th, 2010
It's not that Wilkes-Barre dark heavies Breaking Benjamin are letting up on the gas with the 2009 release "Dear Agony." It's just that you can't easily lump the band in with all of the other Korn disciples or Tool-inspired bands anymore. Years on stage mashing melody into minor-keyed metal have
Music Articles
Frank De Blase on March 10th, 2010
SLT is a band that has earned a second chance. It first burst on the scene in 1991 with a raw and menacing stab at classic punk rock. The music was direct, uncompromising, and incendiary, played by musicians that loved it and lived it. There were wild slash 'n' burn
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 3rd, 2010
Characters both splendid and ordinary get their wings through Lisa Bigwood's rural-rooted folk. Bigwood continues on a path of lyrical majesty cloaked in a projected simplicity with her latest release, "Intrepid," on which the music runs the spectrum from minor haunt (on tracks like the eerie ballad "Mountain Man") to
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 3rd, 2010
Eyes may bug and jaws may drop at this Kansas City cat's ability to play three parts on the same guitar at the same time, but the real seduction is in Dan Bliss' voice. Sounding considerably older than he appears, and even a little Burl Ives-y at times,
Choice Concerts
Frank De Blase on March 3rd, 2010
The live-fast-die-young maxim has taken its toll on hair metal, both literally and philosophically. And though Western civilization continues to decline, Bang Tango marches on with one original member remaining. Formed in Hollywood in 1987, Bang Tango got lumped into the hair-metal heap despite the band's injections of funk and
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Frank De Blase on March 18th, 2010
Wednesday night at The Club @ Water Street wasn't nearly as bad, since the majority of the St. Patrick's Day yahoos did their spewing-o'-the-green the previous weekend. Coming off a bad case of pneumonia, Kristen Maxfield belted a powerful set with her new back-up band, Troyka (with a little fleshing
Music Blog
Frank De Blase on March 12th, 2010
New York Route 89 ain't much; it twists and winds its way like so many rural thoroughfares through the Great Lakes region. There's scenery to be seen (when there's daylight), all sorts of critters to crush, assholes and their hi-beams coming at you, patches of horseshit...just another black ribbon across
Music Blog
Frank De Blase on March 1st, 2010
Four more big concerts have been announced for area venues:
ALT-ROCK: OK Go Sunday, April 25. The Haunt, 702 Willow Ave, Ithaca. 8 p.m. $15. dansmallspresents.com.
METAL: Mastodon w/Between the Buried and Me, Baroness, Valiant Thorr Tuesday, April 27. Water Street Music Hall, 204 N Water St.
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Frank De Blase on March 1st, 2010
Alan Whitney and The Beekeepers live at Saxon Studios on Saturday night may have been one of the most intimate performances I've ever seen. This wasn't just a performance, but a limited-seat concert, recorded live. In my experience, the studio can be both a beautiful and an ugly place; lots
Music Blog
Frank De Blase on February 22nd, 2010
I walked into Montage Music Hall Saturday night as Deviant was serving up a crushing, bottom-heavy metal groove as part of a multi-band build-up to Michael Graves' set. I say "bottom heavy" because the guitar was so loud, it wasn't put through the P.A. Now, fat-bottom bands do make
Music Blog
Frank De Blase on February 11th, 2010
It wasn't a huge crowd, but I was still impressed with the hundred or so who braved the outdoor suction to catch the Cheetah Whores with Velvet Elvis at The Club at Water Street Wednesday night. "I'm here to support the Whores," I overheard a girl say
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Frank De Blase on February 3rd, 2010
I saw State Radio years ago at Milestones, playing to a modest crowd that dug the band without having too much background, exposure, or access to the lyrics. Now on its "Lefty Rides Again" tour, the Sherborn, Massachusetts, trio has road worrior'd itself a following. I guessing 500 people (including
Music Blog
Frank De Blase on January 24th, 2010
Some of you probably expect me pan "Rain," as I'm not one to champion tributes and covers. However the show Friday night at the Auditorium was incredible --- not just in the dead-on mimicry, but in the way it presented The Beatles' beginning, middle, end, and eternal legacy. The music's
Music Blog
Frank De Blase on January 18th, 2010
How do you jam without staying at the party too long, or getting the jam all over you? You follow Pia Mater's lead. I've heard these cats in acoustic situations more than I've heard them plugged in, so I know the tunes at their barest. When a song remains funky
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Frank De Blase on January 13th, 2010
They were generating a mushroom cloud of steam heat last night at the Bug Jar for what was supposed to be the UV Rays' last hurrah. Singer, leader, co-conspirator Kevin Wilcox is moving to Las Vegas with his lovey-dovey this week to work with atomic energy in some way. Last
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