Courtesy of Rip It Up Magazine Seattle sunshine blazing off the back-alley cobblestone leading to Pearl Jam’s clubhouse doesn’t shine quite intensely enough to brighten its interior. Neatly labeled cases are shelved to the ceiling, walls are lined with instruments, and unique fixtures adorn each corner of the cozy studio. The couches in the kitchen area are soft from use, and there is not an iota of echo in the air. There is nothing to do in this space but create, and the five members of the mysterious, enigmatic band have done just that over the years. Their new project is a soulful testament to the unification of great minds, innate talent, and social consciousness - beyond the walls that they appeared to build around th...
Britta Phillips Short Bio: Britta grew up in Bucks County Pennsylvania and was a model student until she tired of horse farms and antique shops and left home at sixteen. She moved to NYC a few years later, supported herself as the singing voice of 80's cartoon character JEM, and dabbled in film and television before joining indie-guitar band, Belltower, and moving to London. Belltower enjoyed a moment of glory in the British music tabloids before signing a big fat recording contract and promptly disappearing into seclusion. Since then, Britta has played bass with Ultrababyfat, Ben Lee, and is now a member of Luna. Interview: Mike: How would you define your music to somebody who has never heard your new music? Britta: I'm not very...
This Toronto band is known for continually mowing down audiences with unabashed high energy rock. Affectionately dubbed "The Bag" by fans, the band openly shows influences of classic rock as well as the new school of heavy guitar based music. Bag fans cited the band's no nonsense approach to playing rock music as the reason for the group’s growing popularity. Principle songwriter Eric Bridenbaker has spent a great deal of time crafting songs that let his offbeat personality and considerable guitar skills fuse within them. All the members of Plastic Bag are veteran rockers with Dylan Parker from The Lowest of the Low (bass), Mitch Cruickshank (drums) of the Toronto area band Shortfall and Cam Bull (guitar) having played various instru...
"After a show, I had this nightmare, due to stress and how exhausted I was. It wasn't fire and hell or anything, it took place in a chemistry classroom, but it was huge, and the anti-Christ was Marilyn Manson. The entire dream was me taking off parts of his face and injecting things into his face and all this disturbing crap." Will Wiesenfeld, who's solo project is under name [Post-Foetus], is perhaps one of the weirdest, but bizarrely appealing musicians I have ever come to terms with. His hunger for development and social freedom has leaded him into a genre of music he can truly call his own. "I just want to spend the night in a dumpster with a flashlight and write about that feeling where you can't sleep. I've only had that feeling...
In 2001, around the time that his first child was born, Thom Yorke took the habit of spending the early evenings driving alone around the fields and by-ways surrounding his home just as dusk was drawing in. "I've got one of these cars with the natty blue headlights and the colours of the headlights got mixed in with the wild-life running into the bushes. The twilight invoked a dream-state within me. It's incredibly beautiful where we live but I used to listen to this Penderecki tune that's really ominous and scary and I'd just get this perverse sense of foreboding." These solitary drives helped inspire the ideas that bolster up much of what would eventually become Radiohead's 6th album. "I wrote a lot of stuff quickly: pages and pages of...
Anything as controversial as religion gets an instant sticker slapped across it, but music is about expression, not about keeping everyone happy. "As cheesy as it sounds, it's easy to sing songs about your heart from your heart. Its definitely tagged us with the 'Christian Band' image. Some people hate that, some love it, others don't care. I guess we fall under the 'don't care' category. says Matt Thiessen, Relient K's singer/guitarist. “We write about personal stuff, but it's usually not addressed to an audience. I feel like people definitely get a message out of our stuff though. And I enjoy that. The message most people probably get is one of persevering through all the rough things in life." And in...
Hi guys, thanks for taking the time to do this interview. I'm sorry we couldn't talk in person, maybe next time I'll have the equipment for it. Anyway, I wanted to start by asking what's it like to be the biggest band out of Stratford? Well Stratford isn't to big so it wasn't to hard. I made my home in Burlington around 5 years ago, and Burlington is a much harder place to become the "biggest band". So I hear you guys are gearing up for a Canadian tour this November? Yup Nov. 6 it starts in Montreal. Basically we wanted to go out right away and tour. The record isn't out till January or February but we thought we'd jump start the fun. Why are you skipping over Toronto? Don't you like us (ha ha)? Well, we'd like to Toronto...
Jacques Brautbar is the newest member of Something for Rockets, previous guitarist of Phantom Planet and a steadily rising photographer. Jacques, at this point, is mostly known for his affiliation with Phantom Planet, a Los Angeles pop rock band signed to Epic Records. "I was in it (Phantom Planet) from 1994 to 2004, and you know, my relationship with the guys, might feel a little strained, because of the situation. There is no good way to leave a band. It was just time to go, for me. It wasn't as fulfilling as it once was and well, you change a lot. It was just time for me to move on." The members of Phantom Planet are connected to other successful bands in the Los Angeles area and are included, even key members, of the Los Angeles s...
Mike: How would you define the SuperDrag sound to a newcomer to your music? John: For the most part, I'd describe our music as melodic, energetic, Southern Power-Pop/Rock'N'Roll. With the occasional 6-minute Psychedelic jazz odyssey or 60's-style Country tear-jerker thrown in there for good measure. We tend to swerve into a few different seemingly disparate musical territories on records, but I'd say our bread and butter is the three-and-a-half-minute Power Pop number. Our drummer Don has his very own patented Rock Formula: loud drums, loud bass, loud guitars, and doubled vocals. So there you have it. Mike: What types of music and which musicians/groups influenced the band members growing up? John: All kinds of stuff. Dinosaur Jr, Husk...
From Hennessey to Hollywood Tash, J-Ro and E-Swift may very well be the hardest working men in show business. After ten years in the spotlight, several successful albums, numerous cameos and solo projects, and months upon months of touring, Tha Liks have yet to let the vicious industry jade their good-natured approach to music. The old adage ‘work hard, play hard’ is exemplified in the trio’s new DVD film X.O. The Movie Experience. The independently produced DVD bears the testimony of those fun-filled moments when the world isn’t watching, and Tha Alkaholiks crew lets loose for the camera at every turn. The DVD combines live show footage with backstage antics and one-on-one interviews with each member of the...
Mike: Your word imagery is so powerful! As a boy, what led you down the path to becoming a poet? Saul: hip hop, theater, and lot's of exposure through travel and exploration. as a kid i had no intentions of becoming a poet. i wanted to act and i wanted to rhyme. those were my only aspirations. Mike: How did your time in Brazil influence you? Saul: brazil was the place that put everything into perspective. not because it was brazil, but because it wasn't the u.s. and having grown up as an african-american, taking certain injustices and several liberties for granted i was forced to realize that there was a whole world beyond our doorstep that didn't neccesarily correspond with what i was learning at home. beyond that, brazilian culture, ...
Rob Swift, Roc Raida, Total Eclipse and Mista Sinista are turning the tables on an industry full of emcees. These vinyl vikings are bringing their raw deejay skills into the limelight and giving turntablists an opportunity for mainstream attention. With respect for those who came before them, The X-ecutioners are putting their own spin on success. With each member of the group proving their worthiness to be inducted, the brotherhood of deejays didn't happen overnight. 1996 ITF World Champion Total Eclipse breaks the group's biographical timeline down succinctly. "The X-ecutioners started in '96 when we got the deal with Asphodel Records, but the crew in general - the X-Men - was founded in 1988 by Steve Dee, Roc Raida, Johnny Cash, and D...
There’s no-one in pop quite like Kelli Ali. A straight-talking Birmingham girl with exotic good looks, a rock chick who first found fame with an understated trip hop band (Sneaker Pimps) and a singer/songwriter who has recorded with a diverse selection of artists from the king of funk, Bootsy Collins to Skate punks, Linkin Park and experimental dance giant, Satoshi Tomiie. Ask Kelli about the six months she spent working on her new album and she’ll tell you about magical days and nights on a beach in Malaysia with an acoustic guitar, playing vintage synths and computers in bedrooms in London and meeting psychic cats in California. It’s no wonder Kelli’s sound isn't easy to pin down. But then, that's just how s...
When it comes to Detroit, they say I yell it too much/ And yo, when you think about it, I ain't yelled it enough/ Everybody loves Detroit, they always selling us stuff/ We been hurting, though, since Berry Gordy bailed on us. - "313" Detroit native, Alley Life, is in a precarious position. His mission is to put his hometown on the map in an "aggressive, but non-offensive" manner. But there are some things to consider: Detroit already has a name as the Motor City and musically, there's a small legacy called Motown. Oh yeah, and there's hip-hop's biggest star, Eminem, who happens to be signed to WEB Entertainment, the same production company to which Alley, who also goes by ALKI (Alley Life Kurupt Individual), is signed. Alley's self-ti...
Antibalas is the spirit of Afrobeat reincarnated as a hard-hitting collective of musicians in New York City. The group carries on the soul of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, founder of the unique Afrobeat sound, which unites highlife, jazz, funk, and traditional African elements with unabashed political messages. Antibalas-which means "anti-bullets" or "bullet-proof"-shoots out monstrous horns and bass layered over polyrhythmic beats coupled with furious lyrics inciting insurrection in English, Yoruba, and Spanish. Antibalas formed in 1998 from members of Desco Records' Soul Providers and the Daktaris. They were quickly joined by like-minded New York musicians active in the worlds of jazz, rock, improvised music, and traditional drumming from Cuba ...
It is the year of a Jungle Renaissance. It’s about good vibes, funk, vocals, monstrous anthems and lyrics to go. Just ask DJ Aphro aka Aphrodite. Whoever you ask, you'll get the same answer: 2002 is all about Shaking Yer Booty to jungle stylings, and Aphro's leading the pack. His last album sold 100,000 copies worldwide. That’s over four times what Baby Spice scraped. People, don’t call it a comeback: he’s been here for years. AphroditeLondon-based DJ/producer Gavin King began his musical career during England's 1988 "Summer of Love," smack-dab in the middle of the country's Acid House clubbing explosion. King and a partner ran a club night called "Aphrodite." The "Goddess of Love" theme fit the Summer of Love...
Ben Jorgensen- Vocals/GuitarPJ DeCicco- GuitarAnthony Dilonno- BassNash Breen- DrumsEvery band waits for their moment. They wait for that one moment where all of their talent and hard work suddenly pays off and they stand on the brink of something huge...at the precipice of great opportunity. This is where New Jersey foursome Armor For Sleep stands now, clutching in their collective possession a dynamic, compelling third addition to their ever-evolving catalogue of music. The record, Smile For Them, a vastly diverse assortment of 12 tracks, is the i...
Tim Wheeler – vocals, guitar Mark Hamilton – bass Rick McMurray – drums Charlotte Hatherley – guitar In 1989, Mark Hamilton and Tim Wheeler, two thirteen year olds in Belfast, begged their parents to buy them guitars. They honed their skills daily and when they got good enough, they formed a band. They spent all of their free hours after school playing death metal riffs at decibels imperceptible to the human ear. They called themselves Vietnam (and sounded just as chaotic) and they were determined to be the next Megadeth. Lucky for us, the teenage mind is easily swayed. Had they stuck to that lofty goal, they never would have evolved into the hitmakers they are today- a band known as Ash. So, maybe the desire to front a met...
Cedric Bixler-Zavala – lead vocals Jim Ward – guitar, keyboards, backing vocals Omar Rodríguez-López – guitar, backing vocalsPaul Hinojos – bass guitar Tony Hajjar – drums, percussionAt the Drive-In is an influential post-hardcore band from El Paso, Texas, from 1993 until 2001 and now reunited in 2012 after 11 years. Influenced primarily by the likes of Fugazi and Drive Like Jehu as well as their native Texas hardcore scene, At The Drive-In craft epic, musically complex songs, each one laced with cryptic and strongly metaphorical lyrics. At The Drive-InIt takes barely a minu...
At a time when most hardcore punk bands wouldn't dare be tagged as "heavy fucking metal," Orange County-based AVENGED SEVENFOLD could not possibly be pegged as the atypical O.C. hardcore punk band. In fact, the fiveman act (who hail from the same locale of highly-successful labelmates, THRICE) went as far as stripping their true identities for assumed names to place the emphasis on what matters most - the music. And it's those almost-overwhelmingly technical arrangements that make AVENGED SEVENFOLD so musically important. Ranging anywhere from glam rock (vocalist M.Shadows cites Guns 'N' Roses frontman W. Axl Rose as one of his musical mentors) to melodic Bad Religion-esque skate punk to church-burning Scandinavian black metal, AV...
"We wanted to make music that moved you on the dancefloor as well as at home. Everything had to be emotive, whether it made you angry or made you swoon. But it also had to funk. We wanted it to be about feeling rather than thinking -- that was our vision," says Badmarsh, of Badmarsh & Shri, about "Signs", the pair's latest release on Nutone Records. With a sound that was already placed between Bombay and the East End, "Signs" continues to explore a fascination with musical migration--a path they've followed since their collaboration on the debut album, "Dancing Drums". When the Badmarsh & Shri remix of Ananda Shankar's "Dancing Drums" was released in the summer of 1997, it was a huge hit with dancefloor crowds everywhere. Shortly afterwa...
As the first white rap group of any importance, the Beastie Boys received the scorn of critics and strident hip-hop musicians, both of whom accused them of cultural pirating, especially since they began as a hardcore punk group in 1981. But the Beasties weren't pirating -- instead, they treated rap as part of a post-punk musical underground, where the D.I.Y. aesthetics of hip-hop and punk weren't that far apart. Of course, the exaggerated b-boy and frat-boy parodies of their unexpected hit debut album, Licensed to Ill, didn't help their cause. For much of the mid-'80s, the Beastie Boys were considered macho clowns, and while they dismissed that theory with the ambitious, Dust Brothers-produced second album, Paul's Boutique, it ...
Their music has been described as beguiling, haunting, rustic, ambient, hobo-erotica, and goth-folk. They are Frazey Ford, Trish Klein, and Samantha Parton. They first met in the mountains of BC, at tree-planting camps and open-stages. After traveling separately they met again one particularly dark rainy, dismal winter in Vancouver. At Trish's Chinatown house they would get together to share songs and stories over red-wine and Chinese tea. Here they were joined by fellow-traveler, singer/fiddler, Texas-born minstrel Jolie Holland. Jolie introduced them to the songs of another mad traveler Obo Martin from whose song Be Good Tanya their name was culled. Bonded by their passion for old-tyme music and their love of vintage clothes they soon be...
Cantar Para Espantar La Soledad Victor Talamantes – Keys, Vocals, Guitar Sebastian Troll – Guitar, Vocals, Keyboards Gabe Colugna – Drums Gabe Acevedo – Bass BellakunThe band Victor Talamantes is the songwriter/singer/guitarist/keyboardist for EGON. EGON has released 3 albums and toured multiple times (including Japan) in their 8-year existence. Sebastian Troll currently plays bass for EGON and he played with local El Paso band START ON THE READY. Gabe Acevedo played bass with a local rock/blues band THE EXILES. Gabe Colugna played with EX-IMPETUS (a band containing Clint and Kiki from Rhythm of Black Lines and Matt Miller from Sparta, who did a split 7� with Egon back in ‘97). The music ...
After a long journey of distillation from song concept through the final mixes, the self-produced third album from The Beta Band has arrived. Patience pays off: Heroes to Zeros is as true on record as it sounds in the imagination of band members Stephen Mason, Robin Jones, Rich Greentree and John Maclean. Inspired by the reverent response received during their shows, the band set out to capture the intangible live element and marry it with the ritualistic digital process. "We always felt our songs grew enormously after a few months playing them on tour, so we tried to get that ignition happening in the studio by recording huge parts of the record live", says bassist Rich Greentree. After two albums, three EPs, four singles, and a wor...
In the 1960s, after the Beatles and the Rolling Stones began to take the world by storm, there was a term in Denmark used to describe this new loud and ragged brand of rock and roll: pigtraad. Loosely translated, it means barbed wire, barbed wire music. Some four decades later, the term works as good as any to describe the avalanche of electrified R&B delivered by Danish quartet The Blue Van, who derive their name, appropriately, from the vehicle known in Denmark for collecting the mentally ill, the loonies. Steeped in the rough riffing bested by The Kinks, and schooled on such blues luminaries as Howlin’ Wolf, the band harks back to a time when the guitars were best raw and the drums went Biff-Bang-Pow like firecrackers. In...
More proof of Blur's infinite horizons is provided by Think Tank, their seventh album and their first recorded as a three-piece. While defying the rumors that it would be either 1) their "dance" album or 2) their "world music" album, it is their grooviest so far, with an eclectic variety of rhythms and textures underpinning melodies to melt the heart and wobble the lower lip. The spirits of Can, Joe Strummer, Eno and Orchestra Baobab hover, but the result - though unexpectedly languid and sunny - is pure Blur. It is their first - hopefully not their last - cabriolet record. Blur Its story begins in November 2001 when, with Damon Albarn's Gorillaz commitments on hold, the band convene...
Breakbeat Era, a.k.a Bristol based singer/songwriter Lennie Laws, DJ Die and Roni Size, finally release their debut album, a record which has been eagerly anticipated by those in the know ever since the classic and ground breaking "Breakbeat Era" track, first laid down as a template a couple of years ago. Breakbeat EraAt a time when Drum and Bass seems to have driven itself down a dark and dead end alley,Breakbeat Era Breakbeat Era take hold of the reins and prove that they can push the genre further than anyone ever believed it could go. As Melody Maker recently wrote, "Breakbeat Era are a welcome antidote to pre-millenial darkcore, injecting some humanity back into the equation. Best of all though, it ain't coffee table." Even the muta...
Since the release of By The Way, Brundlefly's sophomore album, the band has been seen on screens across the country with their video and live performances. MuchMusic launched Revolution in their Indie Spot light program and the video is being spun on MTV Canada. MM's Going Coastal featured the band for their album release with an interview in May and the band appeared in studio on MTV Canada, CTV's national morning show Canada A.M., and The A Channel in pretty much every city in Canada that has one (Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Regina). BrundleflyTheir current single, Revolution can be heard across Canada on commercial radio stations and their video for the single can be seen on MuchMusic and MTV Canada. Plans are in the works for a seco...
"I'm sick of everything feeling like a Gap ad. Where's the danger? I want to be scared and moved and turned the fuck on!" Dimitri Coats on "Fall of the Plastic Empire" With their raw power, gargantuan guitar riffs, and balls-to-the-wall live performances, Philadelphia's Burning Brides most often evoke comparisons to hard rock forefathers the MC5, the Stooges, and Black Sabbath. Yet, with their innate melodic sense, complex dynamics, and broad musical references, it's the latter-day rock royalty- Nirvana, the Pixies, and Sonic Youth- the band is most often likened to. But the Brides themselves come from an entirely different school of music one that few bands - if any- will know a thing about. Burning BridesLong before being saved b...
