Issues: Issue 263 - November 2010
Local Reviews: Soft BleR
ElekHztro, from Orem’s Soft BleR, is an album that doesn’t show its true colors until most listeners have pushed skip on their iPods. Electronic wizard Sam Davis places a formidable road block with the first half of the album that could alienate listeners without the patience to wade through the headache-inducing minimal chord progressions and pummeling house beat. … read more
Local Reviews: Timothy Hay
This Wreckerd is all over the place as far as genre, bouncing back and forth from blues to folk and everything in between. However, this roots cavalcade hits all the right spots to make an interesting record. With over a dozen players featured, the record becomes epic in scope. … read more
Local Reviews: Victims Willing
I couldn’t be more impressed with a band I hadn’t heard a thing about until I had the CD in my hands. This is hardcore punk rock with just as much vibrancy and attention to melody as brutality, and it has as much viscosity as anyone can handle. … read more
Local Reviews: Wings of Normandy
Hailing from good ol’ Salt Lake City, Wings of Normandy have been busy with a brand new album, Bitterroot, released on their own label, Narwhal Records. … read more
Please Take Me Off the Guest List
Over a decade ago, Nick Zinner, Zachary Lipez and Stacy Wakefield were just three people living in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, playing in bands. This burgeoning Brooklyn music scene is how the three initially met, and how over time, they would eventually collaborate on four different books together—No Seats on the Party Car, Slept in Beds, I Hope You Are All Happy Now and, most recently, Please Take Me off the Guest List. … read more
Jimmy Plants Corn and I Don’t Care
Everything you think you know about professional skateboarding is wrong. That is, unless you know James Atkin. James has been quietly ripping for a long time now. James has style and consistency that have never gotten the justice they deserve from footage and photos. But if you see James skate in person, it’s a whole other story. He has every trick you can think of on lock, can land all his bangers in lines and even Utah’s most famous pro told me he was envious of James’ flip tricks. … read more
Localized – Marinade, Uncle Scam and The Vision
This month’s Localized features the female-fronted, male-backed stylings of jammers Marinade, funky-rockers Uncle Scam and opening band The Vision. Come check it out on Friday Nov. 12 at Urban Lounge for only $5. … read more
Two Cow Garage
Looking at the routing of Two Cow Garage’s current tour reveals many gigs taking place at bars, pubs, lounges, and even the odd brewery or tavern. If there was any justice in the world, these Ohio natives would have broken out of the bar scene and gained the same level of popularity as like-minded bands like The Hold Steady and The Gaslight Anthem. Injustice notwithstanding, one must admit that Two Cow Garage’s songs make a lot more sense after a few beers. … read more
Pretty Lights: Fuckin’ You Up Every Time That I Drop
Derek Vincent Smith, the mastermind behind Pretty Lights, has a vision: beautiful, emotional, hard-as-shit dance music. His dedication to digging through old vinyl for samples, constantly producing fresh, soulful, banging beats and putting on live shows to melt your face off has fueled a well-deserved rise to success in the electronic music world. … read more
Red Bull Rampage
Rolling up to the event, it appeared that some type of futuristic soldiers were hurling themselves down a mountain on two-wheeled gravity sleds. Then I realized it was the Red Bull Rampage—the premier free-ride mountain bike event in the world. Since 2003, Red Bull Rampage has been bringing riders from all over the planet to the southern Utah desert to ride a remote area near Zion known as Virgin, Utah. … read more