by
John Flynn on December 9, 2015
East bay rapper Opio has gray hairs winding through his twisty locks. The tenured spitter has been a pillar in the Bay Area underground since the early ’90s, operating on his own and with the Souls of Mischief as part of the hallowed indie hip-hop collective, Hieroglyphics. With his most recent project, Sempervirens,…
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by
Karla Kane on December 9, 2015
Forty years ago, the Palo Alto-raised, Stanford-educated Will Ackerman would often play his guitar for passersby under an archway at the Old Union building on campus, where the acoustics were just right. “I never meant to draw an audience, but when I would open my eyes I’d find that four, then 15,…
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The lights went out and the cell phone screens lit up, as Abel Tesfaye—b.k.a. The Weeknd—took the stage at The SAP Center Sunday night. Under a brooding, red-light-district-red spotlight, the mad king of R&B appeared—standing inside a cage and behind a string of velvet ropes—like a cordoned off work of art, or…
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by
John Flynn on December 2, 2015
G-Eazy paid his dues. In the last seven years, the Oakland rapper shotgunned 11 projects at the Internet, starred in mega-popular music videos and established himself as a social media somebody—all before putting ink to a contract. His Web-based rise epitomizes the way recording artists get big nowadays. His proponents paint him…
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by
Nick Veronin on November 25, 2015
One might presume that while playing alongside three of the most revered musicians in all of rock & roll history, the biggest concern anyone would have would be staying on beat. But according to Jason Bonham, the most important thing is far more abstract than that.
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by
Nick Veronin on November 25, 2015
The Phenomenauts are not unlike The Justice League or The Avengers. This rocket-fueled collective of rockabilly punks have been featured in their own comic books, each member of the group has an alias, and they hold meetings at a home base, known as The Command Center.
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by
Christopher Rios on November 18, 2015
Musicians draw inspiration from so many different places-other musicians, major events in their personal lives, political movements, drugs and spiritual experiences. Barrett Richards, who makes murky and experimental electronic music under the moniker Kastle, says one of his earliest inspirations came in the form of Herbie Hancock performing “Rockit” on Sesame Street,…
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by
Nick Veronin on November 11, 2015
Kutt Calhoun isn’t just going solo. He’s an army of one, and he’s going to war. The no-coast rapper and co-founder of Missouri independent hip-hop label Strange Music, has a new album, a new label and a bone to pick—with his former colleagues and overzealous police.
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by
Nick Veronin on November 11, 2015
Eric Early, frontman and primary songwriter of the Portland-based Blitzen Trapper, doesn’t shy away from a challenge. In fact, he often goes looking for one. In 2010, he followed up the freak-folky Furr—his band’s pastoral, dreamy and critically acclaimed 2008 Sub Pop debut—with a sweeping, prog-rock throwback. Destroyer of the Void, which…
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by
Karla Kane on November 6, 2015
Growing up in Utah’s Salt Lake Valley, songwriter Rob LeCheminant found himself inspired by the natural wonders surrounding him. “Having been so close to areas like Canyonlands, Arches, the Grand Canyon, etcetera, has definitely affected my focus on sound and lyrics,” says the man whose most recent record, Giant, which he recorded under…
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