Jun 30, 2011
By Mike Hilleary
Youth Lagoon
Like a lot of songwriters, Trevor Powers has learned that the best musical inspiration often comes at the expense of a broken heart. For four years the young native of Boise, Idaho had been with a girl—as he saw it, the girl. Last year, however, things began to unravel, and Powers, who had typically spent his free time jamming with various friends, had suddenly taken to a more solitary outlet. More
Jun 21, 2011
By Matt Fink
Tokyo Police Club
It’s an oft-repeated maxim that most musicians secretly want to be comedians and comedians secretly want to be musicians, and it often follows that drummers are seen as the most reliable resources of humor within bands. Looking over the history of rock music, there seems to be some truth to this. More
Jun 10, 2011
By Matt Fink
#36 - Music vs. Comedy
Under the Radar’s Music vs. Comedy Issue, which is on stands now, features an article entitled “A Mutual Admiration Society: Where Comedy and Music Meet.” For that article we interviewed The Rosebuds’ Kelly Crisp, among others, and included a few quotes from him. Below is the full transcript of our interview with Crisp. More
Jun 06, 2011
By Matt Fink
Les Savy Fav
Despite the fact that musicians and comedians appear to share a healthy respect for each other’s crafts, it’s still rare that an established artist in one art form makes a serious attempt to cross over into the other. Rarer still is the artist who can do both well, an exclusive group which includes Tim Harrington and very few others. As the lead vocalist and kinetic focal point of art-rockers Les Savy Fav, Harrington and his bandmates have earned a place in the indie rock panoply with a series of increasingly ambitious releases, but in 2008 he took a considerably larger risk. He started Beardo, a sketch comedy show for Pitchfork.tv where he writes, arranges, and performs in skits that range from the absurd (a vampire whose sexual conquests are foiled by flaccid incisors) and the satirical (an indie all-star charity song to benefit the rich) to the darkly cynical (a man ghostwriting a suicide note for a friend who uses it to score points against his ex-girlfriend). In so doing, Harrington has proven that with comedy, a little bit of audacity goes a long way. More
Jun 01, 2011
By Matt Fink
#36 - Music vs. Comedy
Of all of the comedians who traverse the landscape stretching between the music and comedy scenes, it’s possible that none has become more synonymous with that intersection than Neil Hamburger. Wearing a tuxedo and a greasy comb-over, the alter ego of Gregg Turkington emerged in the early ’90s and became a curiously cranky counterpoint to the sardonically detached underground comedians of the era, delivering question/answer jokes in poor taste and with bad timing. More
