While Converse’s Represent SF concert series at Slim’s was meant to function as a promo for the brand’s grand opening of its flagship store in the city last Friday, the ad was ambitious, to say the least. Running the course of the entire business week, each night was loosely devoted Read More…
If there’s one problem plaguing the creative output of NYC trio Yeah Yeah Yeahs (and rest assured, there is likely more than one problem), it’s that they don’t have much to prove anymore. After ascending to notoriety with their gritty, minimalist debut Fever to Tell, they managed to conjure up Read More…
The Flaming Lips have become something of a flanderized band. That is to say, much like Ned Flanders from “The Simpsons,” time has turned them into a caricature of what they once were. With each new release, this group of esoteric psychonauts becomes more exaggeratedly esoteric and psychonautical. Their 2009 Read More…
Justin Timberlake releasing new album Tuesday In a contemporary R&B world increasingly obsessed with obscure production tricks and emotional overindulgence (see “PBR&B”), only one panty-dropping powerhouse of Caucasian soul can save the genre from pretension: naturally, Justin Timberlake. Seven years after his massively successful record FutureSex/LoveSounds, JT makes a glorious Read More…
When an artist as iconic as David Bowie announces an album, expectations of something along the lines of a Second Coming tend to circulate. It was no help that Bowie’s announcement was coupled with the release of a new single, “Where Are We Now?,” a characteristically extraterrestrial ballad emanating the Read More…
Every March for the past 30 years, the festival has showcased hundreds of films, proving to be the country’s most vital source for Asian cinema. This year the festival seems to offer a healthy balance of documentaries, shorts and narratives. Read More…
For Foals’ third record, the band of English math/dance rockers settled on a name apparently referencing an annual miracle observed under Greek Orthodoxy in which a flame descends from a church dome. The album Holy Fire is no miracle itself. But pretensions aside, it serves as something of a vibrant Read More…
If there’s one thing that wields the power to firmly establish or brutally shatter a band’s creative endurance in a transient music scene, it’s the sophomore release. Colossal amounts of hype tend to build over successful debuts – see The Strokes’ Is This It, Interpol’s Turn On the Bright Lights Read More…
It can be hard for a band to tastefully reinvent itself in the middle of an already promising career, seeing as virtually every sub-genre has been all too well-traversed if not beaten past death via retro rehash. Such changes often come across as unnecessary, and unfortunately for Ra Ra Riot, Read More…
With his second official release since his debut LP in 2010, Chazwick Bundick, under the multilingual moniker Toro y Moi, manages to secure his place as one of the leaders of the enduring if self-loathing chillwave movement. Anything In Return features few stylistic changes from Bundick’s previous work. However, this Read More…
