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F2K Presents: The Nine Worst September 11 Response Songs
Today is the 11th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, a moment in American history that was pretty horrifying for reasons that have been enumerated countless times. Their effects on pop music weren’t as tragic, to be sure, but they were pretty unfortunate—artists on both sides of the aisle manned their battlestations and put forth […]
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Neon Marshmallow Bring the Noise
“We really do think about this nonstop. All day. Wake up, go to sleep thinking about this,” says 30-year-old Matthew Kimmel, co-curator of Neon Marshmallow, the three-day experimental music orgy set to vibrate the mortar from the walls of Brooklyn’s Public Assembly this weekend. Assembling the 20-artist bill was a labor of love for scene-boosters […]
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Geoff Barrow’s Sour Rhymes
Portishead’s Geoff Barrow is in Bristol’s State of Art Studio and standing in the exact same spot where he recorded the lugubrious scratch solo to the trio’s 1997 hit “Only You.” He starts an anecdote about playing the song on Saturday Night Live but interrupts himself when he hears music throbbing in the other room. […]
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Anthrax and Joey Belladonna Keep It In the Family
Anthrax’s tenth album, Worship Music, should rightfully be seen as a triumph. Its 11 apocalypse-gazing, zombie-gouging tracks pick up where 1990’s Persistence Of Time left off—the staccato stomp, caffeinated chug and skywalking screams that made the Jams®-shorted hooligans NYC’s most famous metal exports. The day after Worship Music‘s national release, Anthrax will enjoy a victory […]
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F2K Presents: The Nine Worst September 11 Response Songs
Today is the 11th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, a moment in American history that was pretty horrifying for reasons that have been enumerated countless times. Their effects on pop music weren’t as tragic, to be sure, but they were pretty unfortunate—artists on both sides of the aisle manned their battlestations and put forth […]
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O SUPERJAM
Manhattan’s wildly underappreciated jazz/improv hub Roulette has finally planted roots on some artier, earthier soil, scoring a cavernous Art Deco theater in downtown Brooklyn. The four-day celebration boasts appearances from the usual gang of avant-legends, including Marc Ribot, Zeena Parkins, and Fred Frith. But the clear highlight is tonight’s performance of “extreme improvised music” and […]
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The Men, Pop. 1280, White Suns, and Pygmy Shrews Regrease Pigfuck
“Living in a city where you’re face-to-face with the best and worst aspects of humanity, I think that’s inspired me to reach new lows with music,” says Kevin Barry, guitarist/yelper for Brooklyn-based industrial-strength corrosives White Suns. “To make happy music and pretend that America is this great place where we elected a black president and […]
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Elks
Local sludgonauts Elks are a gunk-caked rumble in the Cape Canaveral parking lot: the orc-stomping gallop of High On Fire, the sky-fucking twin-leads of Iron Maiden, and an asphalt-scraping guitar tone straight from Brooklyn’s puke-drowned gutters. Tonight is the release party for their long-awaited debut EP, Destined For The Sun (courtesy Tee Pee Records, natch), […]
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The Necks
For 20 years, Australian improv titans the Necks have dealt in a sui generis ambient-jazz hypnotism, enrapturing audiences with hour-long rituals of circular riffs that evolve with the speedy pace of mountains eroding. 16th album Mindset (their vinyl debut!) has a little more hustle and bustle than usual, the renown slowpokes building an agitated, uplifting, […]
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Jozef van Wissem
An afternoon performance showcases NYC-via-Holland picker Jozef Van Wissem, easily the world’s hippest lutist. This rising talent has plucked (haw!) the instrument from its Ren Faire stigmas in order to create a pastoral, meditative world that owes equal parts to John Fahey shimmer, Steve Reich minimalism and the field recording techniques of Fennesz. With Christopher […]