Apr 01, 2008 By Matt Fink Spring 2008 - Flight of the Conchords

Part musician, part ethnomusicologist, Pablo Díaz-Reixa isn’t your average sample-obsessed laptop artist. Growing up in the Canary Islands, an African archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean where the language is Spanish and the music is joyful, he noticed an apparent contradiction. Why were songs that were often recounting tales of devastation and oppression so happy? More

Apr 01, 2008 By J. Pace Spring 2008 - Flight of the Conchords

It’s hard to be a romantic anymore. Rationality has invaded nearly every facet of our lives. Feelings can be explained away as a set of chemical reactions, an anomaly to be treated pharmaceutically. We’re losing our connection to the natural world, to ourselves even. But remember, it’s a choice. More

Apr 01, 2008 By Chris Drabick Spring 2008 - Flight of the Conchords

Meric Long and Logan Kroeber are The Dodos. If you didn’t know this heading into a listen of their excellent second record, Visiter, you might be shocked. Vocalist/guitarist Long and drummer Kroeber kick a pretty large sound for just two guys, with Long’s deadpan, folksy vocals juxtaposed with a highly rhythmic base. More

Apr 01, 2008 By Matt Fink Spring 2008 - Flight of the Conchords

There’s the “next big thing” buzz band, riding a wave of hype that becomes more important than the music they make. And then there’s the band with a hard-earned indie rock pedigree that is making the integrity-risking move of jumping to a major label, a move that is greeted with suspicion by anyone from the keeping-it-real old guard that equates corporate involvement as a contaminant that endangers any honest expression. In 2006, Death Cab for Cutie learned that having a story that’s too good to ignore can drown out all other subplots. More

Mar 31, 2008 By Frank Valish Spring 2008 - Flight of the Conchords

Noah and the Whale have been together for less than a year, but the London five-piece is on the verge of something big. More

Feb 01, 2008 By J. Pace Winter 2008 - She & Him

A Place to Bury Strangers' singer/guitarist Oliver Ackerman builds guitar effects for a living: unpredictable, cacophonous contraptions with names like Supersonic Fuzz Gun and Total Sonic Annihilation. Ackerman lived in Providence, Rhode Island when he began the company, appropriately dubbed Death by Audio. "There was a really big noise scene, so I think that helped influence that aesthetic of trying to get sounds that you can't get from normal effects," he says. "Sounds that are maybe dangerous for your amplifiers, and cats and dogs." More

Feb 01, 2008 By Frank Valish Winter 2008 - She & Him

Scottish up-and-comers Glasvegas have made a name for themselves through the classic pop-inspired demos that have been circulating online and a couple of limited run 7" singles. But it is the band's latest track, "Daddy's Gone," a poignant commentary regarding an absentee father, that has garnered Glasvegas the most attention. More

Feb 01, 2008 By J. Pace Winter 2008 - She & Him

Friendly Fires, hailing from St. Albans, England, burst on the scene with a rousing, danceable cover of Jamie Principle's infamous house cut "Your Love," a far cry from their beginnings as a hardcore band. More

Nov 01, 2007 By Matt Fink Web Exclusive

Now 27 years after their first release, Einsturzende Neubauten might not be attracting the attention they received when they were creating a pioneering blend of industrial, noise, and avant-garde pop music in the 1980s. But having released no fewer than ten albums over the past four years, the German band have certainly never been more prolific, and, by creating a unique system by which their projects are essentially funded by subscribers to their website, they may be again changing the future of popular music. More