Madlib sounds better when you’re stoned. This is a pretty widely known fact, one that I have personally verified over several years of dedicated empiricism. Sure, there have been detours over the course of his eight years of rapping/producing/DJing. In particular, the Shades of Blue jazz record only sounded better if you were high and […]

Few have done better than the Def Jux crew in capturing the twitchy fractured neurotransmitters of the George Bush/Paris Hilton American schizophrenia of the ‘00s. Carving out a subterranean fiefdom out of odd-ball eclecticism and non-conformity, the Jukies have less in common with other rap labels than they with another chain-smoking bohemian NYC-based collective, one […]

While the blogosphere hyperventilates about the leak of the new Devendra Banhart album, Smokey Goes to Bear Mountain, Grows a Beard and Has an Orgy with 14 Girls Named Rain Who Have Hairy Arm Pits and Went to Vassar, another, far better folk album has gone practically unnoticed: Tung’s Good Arrows. I attribute the lack […]

There was no garage rock revival.The Strokes made a great first album, but the only garage those kids have ever seen houses six cars or more. The White Stripes had and continue to have a brilliant career but they’re not exactly beer-swilling teenagers cranking out Stooges riffs in the basement. The Hives? Well, they’re Swedish […]

Passion Play is a sometime column designed to highlight exceptional unsigned acts. This does not mean you should send me your demo. In all honesty, I probably won’t listen to it. Unless of course, you are in EPMD and the demo includes the song “Please Listen to My Demo.” In that case, rock rock on. […]

I wish I had the time to give Blockhead’s Uncle Tony’ s Coloring Book, the full review treatment, as its one of best hip-hop instrumental records I’ve heard this year (along with Wax Tailor and Madlib’s new Beat Konducta record). But rest assured, if you enjoyed his first two albums, the sorely underrated, Music By […]

I suppose it’s fitting that I didn’t even remember that today was the 12th anniversary of Jerry Garcia’s death until a friend of mine reminded me a couple hours ago. That’s what I get for not checking Hidden Track first thing every morning. Sure enough, when I finally checked in on the duo of Ace […]

One of the main reasons why I blog is to get the opportunity to write headlines involving the phrase “Free Sunset Rubdown.” Because nothing says “indie rock” more than vaguely creepy band names that may or may not involve a happy ending. (See also Man Man and The Strokes). But really. Let’s talk Random Spirit […]

1967 was 40 years ago, but judging from the way Rolling Stone deified it this anniversary Summer, you’d think it occurred during the Renaissance. You know the tired spiel. “LSD! Hippies! The Beatles! Vietnam! The Monkees! We changed the world, man….One Toke at a Time” Right? Wrong. The myth that hippies changed the world is […]

Since day one, Camp Lo have always been Hollywood. Their technicolor tales could only fit on the big screen: blaxploitation fantasies of bloody Bronx shoot-outs, slick diamond heists and jet-black getaway cars gunning it 100 miles per on the Bronx Expressway, plane to Aruba waiting at Teterboro. All matinee style: swaggering in fly panama hats, […]