A few months ago, I did a concert review of Stars and Track of Field when they played at Middle East Upstairs in Cambridge, MA. I really dug the opening act, who I referred to as “mystery noise man.” Well, good news, we tracked him down to see what he’s all about.
His real name is [...]

I’m no expert here. I’m simply and honestly telling you the songs that I loved this past year – polls, charts, blogs, magazines aside. I avoided adding/removing songs just to reach some practical number, so there are only 24.
Here we go with the very subjective and biased Top 24 Songs of 2009!

I’ve been hearing a wide range of opinions about Animal Collective’s Fall Be Kind EP, which leaked last week before its December 15th debut.
For me, I give it an instant thumbs up.
It’s like a little treat, getting a five-song bundle from a these three crazies less than a year before their release of Merriweather Post [...]

All Cheeming Boey needs is a Sharpie and your standard styrofoam cup to make absolutely spectacular pieces of art. Talk about using your resources.
According to the Metro’s blog The Ridiculant, Boey started drawing on cups in 2006, and they’ve gained increasing popularity ever since. It seems like a simple concept, but the designs are nothing short of complex [...]

You do a lot of questionable things with a few beers in you walking down Boston’s Commonwealth Ave. at 3 a.m. Sometimes you think it’s good idea to down a giant 5-dollar sausage from Che-Chi’s or piss in a public alleyway… I don’t know, sometimes it just makes sense.
It was one of those nights, and my [...]

If you’ve never been to the Middle East in Cambridge, MA, it’s an absolute must. I had the privilege of squeezing into the Middle East Upstairs, which was about the size of my apartment’s living room, to see Stars of Track and Field open for Lights.
There was also an opening one-man act before Stars of [...]

Keeping it short and sweet here.
I just really like this track off of Atlas Sound’s Logos released earlier this month. Atlas Sound is the name of Deerhunter frontman Bradford Cox’s solo project.
Spin magazine described ‘Walkabout’ as the following:
Bradford Cox’s blissed-out fantasy of an Animal Collective song playing on a merry-go-round at Panama City Bead [...]

What to you get when you take Conor Oberst, M. Ward, Jim James and Mike Mogis?
Oh for Christ’s sake, you must be living under a rock if you didn’t know that the answer is Monsters of Folk!
How to describe this collaboration… Monsters of Folk is a glorified sort of hillbilly rock that leaves room for [...]

It beats me how it happened, but America has developed this ridiculous propensity for blood-sucking entertainment.
Without decent explanation, I can’t bring myself to see the Twilight movie nor do I want to read the books. But the soundtrack for New Moon (the next movie of the Twilight trilogy) has just been finalized, and the track [...]

A new situation can really shut me up sometimes. I remember sitting in a circle of 10 or so staff members as the newly selected Promotions Director of Syracuse University’s radio station WERW 1570 AM. Being one of two freshmen among upperclassmen experts, I thought, What the hell am I doing here? It was petrifying. [...]