Music
Slash featuring Myles Kennedy and the Conspirators, Hillbilly Herald, Zengrez
If you grow up playing guitar as I did, Guns N’ Roses, and thus Slash, are essential reference points for your musical cultural education. What’s more was that my dad came of age during the height of butt rock, so driving in his Jimmy, I became well acquainted with Appetite for Destruction and GNR’s covers, like “Nice Boys,” which would shape my sense of guitar listening. With that sense of rock tradition, I was stoked to share this experience with my dad. Needless to say, I was MEGA STOKED to see Slash’s stylings on the axe. … read more
My Ticket Home with Sights Sounds, I Am King, Night...
For SLUG’s end-of-the-year wrap-up last year, I chose My Ticket Home’s To Create A Cure as one of my Top 5 albums, and I’ve been watching the news for a while, waiting for my chance to hear them live. There’s just something about them that I loved right away, especially after watching the video for “New Breed.” Plenty of bands do the heavy-and-light mix, but I thought there was a genuine passion in their take, an earnestness that stood out to me. Touring to promote their new album, Strangers Only, they finally announced a Salt Lake show in the second half, bringing along Night Verses and I Am King to round out the bill. … read more
Wavves with Koala Temple
Wavves sound meaner live than on record, more taut, as if they’re being jerked around by strings suspended from the rafters. Audience members lap it up. There’s a vibe here. My girlfriend calls it “snotty indifference” but I’m not so sure. They’re with it—they’re bashing it out hard. It seems genuine. They’re saying to us, “You fuckheads really wanna know what happened to Milo Aukerman? He didn’t go to college! He moved to Tijuana and started huffing a bunch of copier toner! Then he killed his girlfriend and buried her in the desert! BWAHHHH.” … read more
RUSH @ USANA 07.31
Nearly 20,000 faithful devotees put their lives on hold Wednesday night to gather together in a very large venue to sing praises to three men whom many hold in near diety status: the RUSH concert at USANA Amphitheater. … read more
Gogol Bordello, VIZA @ In the Venue 08.05
The lights went out and the stage was flooded with blue light. Then, I saw the silhouetted figure of Eugene Hütz, followed by the rest of Gogol Bordello, walk out on the stage and take their places. Hütz started singing into the mic and with compliance from the audience and the rest of the band, Gogol lit up the stage with “Wanderlust King.” From then on, the madness continued throughout. … read more
Soft Metals @ Kilby Court 07.31 with Beachmen, Kyle Luntz
Portland’s electronic pop duo Soft Metals, after a recent move to L.A., have just released their second full-length album, Lenses, on Brooklyn’s Captured Tracks imprint and have embarked on a massive American tour to support it. They played a short but entrancing set last Wednesday at Kilby Court. … read more
Parlor Hawk, L’anarchiste, Young & Old @ Velour 07.26
I learned two valuable lessons in my adventure to Provo’s Velour on Friday night. The first, with Velour shows, the opening acts are often just as impressive as the headliner … So, be there at 8, when doors open. The second: You can’t just park wherever the fuck you want in Provo, even if it is a deserted bank well after business hours. … read more
Adam Ant @ The Complex 07.23 with Prima Donnas
The man is on top of the world on his own terms and he seems happy about it. No bosses. No record labels. No shitty deals and scams. Just a man and his creative will to do something bigger. … read more
David Bazan @ Big Cartel 07.23
Seeing someone I’ve admired from afar in such a cozy setting came welcome, as Tuesday night I found myself in a room with David Bazan no more than 15 feet away, sharing the space with around 50 people for his Living Room Tour at The Big Cartel. … read more
Pitchfork Music Festival 2013
Another Pitchfork Music Festival has come and gone, leaving in its summer wake a fantastic tangle of performances, pictures, #hashtags, tweets, Instagrams and glistening memories. … read more
Heartless Bastards @ Urban Lounge 07.19 with Writer
Since releasing their sublime fourth album, Arrow, in February of last year, Heartless Bastards have been on a mean hot streak, so it only seems fitting that the Urban Lounge was also a sweltering mess inside on Friday night. … read more
Peter Murphy, Ours @ Urban Lounge 07.17
Allow me to give a bit of a precursor to why I love the music of Bauhaus/Peter Murphy more than most people in their mid-20s. To begin with the most obvious point, I grew up listening to Bauhaus a lot. My mother was a participant in Utah’s then-thriving industrial/goth scene in the late ’80s, and one of the things I inherited a strong background of industrial music. Bands like Skinny Puppy, Revolting Cocks and KMFDM were part of my playtime music, so I’ve had an instinctual draw to industrial music from the beginning. Fast forward 12 years, and I’m sitting in a crowd of sweaty midlife crises as Mr. Murphy ambled onto the raised platform and, from what I could tell, looks pretty good for being in his 50s. … read more
