Month: December 2012
Top 5: Eagle Twin
The fable of the crow continues in this year’s release, The Feather Tipped the Serpent’s Scale. Guitarist and vocalist Gentry Densely is a master storyteller, guiding listeners through his dark, mythical narrative with low, throaty vocals. On some tracks, he sings the part of the narrator, while in others, he sings in first person, detailing Crow’s battle against the sun and Crow’s metamorphosis into a snake … read more
Top 5: Evoken
“I will diminish those centuries and persecute those with quiet desperation,” bleeds a grumbled death roar from the title track off Evoken’s fifth album. Not only do the gloomy lyrics set the tone of the album with the starting song, but the music does as well. Atra Mors’ biggest success as an album is its gutsy equality of atmospheric, obliterating doom and brain-stem-carving memorability. … read more
Top 5: Japandroids
Celebration Rock is the musical equivalent of getting shitfaced with your friends and talking about past successes or ex-girlfriends, ending the night with drunken optimism about the future. Somewhere between post-rock and pop-punk, they are never trying too hard to be cool—it all seems genuine. … read more
Turn Off the TV, Turn On the GV!
Welcome to GigViz, the live-streaming “virtual venue,” bringing the show to your screen in real time! There is no better birthplace than SLC, home to a thriving music and art scene. Sean Cochrane, the founder of GigViz, began formulating the project a little under a year ago. It was an invitation from a friend in Santa Monica to see a live show that ignited this mission. … read more
Top 5: Purity Ring
Shrines is a beautiful contradiction of icy, synthetic start-and-stops created by Corin Roddick, and the sugar-dipped ghost vocals of Megan James dissecting through the cold mass of chimes with awkward, gut-wrenching lyrics. Though the choppy hip hop beats, dubstep wobbles and breathy witch house elements initially draw the listener in with exterior superficiality, a few more close listens reveal a poetic push-and-pull between the instrumentals and songwriting that beg for deconstruction. … read more
Top 5: White Lung
Where much new punk music is conflated with hardcore, stoner metal, indie, folk or pop-punk, White Lung have managed to pick up where mid-aughts bands left off, to push a straight-up punk sound into a different realm without interlacing their tunes with conventions from other genres on their sophomore release, Sorry. … read more
Photo Feature: Parker Duke
Often overlooked is the Private Investigator skillset that snowboarders (and skateboarders) develop to put themselves in the dangerous situations they often find themselves in. The Salt Lake Public Library, for example, is pretty much the Disneyland of spots in this town, but it can also be compared to Fort Knox for its security. … read more
Voilé and the Splitboard: Pioneers of the Backcountry
In 1991, Brett Kobernik brought an idea to Mark Wariakois, founder of Voilé, to combine the snowshoe and the snowboard into a single revolutionary tool for accessing and shredding the thousands of acres of snow not found within the boundaries of any ski resorts. That tool is known today as the splitboard. … read more
A Tale of Two Shops: Twin Peaks and Inkline Foot...
The ski and snowboard scene in Utah is vibrant—A diverse landscape provides the perfect backdrop for athletes to hone their skills. But it isn’t enough to just get out and do it day after day—your equipment needs to be able to keep up, too. A core shot here, a blown edge there, or a pesky hot spot on your ankle can ruin your afternoon. Twin Peaks Rentals and Repair and Inkline Foot Science, these shops have you covered from the ground up. Literally. … read more
Skateboarding After 35: Do It For Fun or Don’t Do...
In April of 2012, I decided to give skateboarding another go. I had made a conscious decision to abandon the sport in the late ’90s in favor of pursuing music after skating almost non-stop, beginning in the late ’80s. Skateboarding never really left my heart, though, and I felt the time had come to get out and have fun on a skateboard again. Simply picking up the latest Thrasher, Low Card or Juice magazine and pushing around on a cruiser board as I have done for the past few years just wasn’t cutting it anymore. … read more