Monday, December 30, 2019

2019 Concert Recap - Part Four

Here is the last instalment in our 2019 Concerts Recap series. This kind of feels like one of those shitty sitcom clip shows doesn't it? Click HERE for part one, HERE for part two and HERE for part three.


Friday, December 27, 2019

Friday's Playlist: Blues Classics


2019 is drawing to a close, and we feel submerged by a feeling that's hard to describe... Something akin to nostalgia, but not quite. Not sadness, although there is some of that in there too. You know what it is? It's the Blues.


2019 Concerts Recap - Part Three


This is the third instalment in our 2019 Concerts Recap series. Check out part one HERE and part two HERE.


Monday, December 23, 2019

2019 Concerts Recap - Part Two


This is the second instalment in our 2019 concert recap series. Click HERE for part one and make sure to click on the links to access the full gallery and review. Happy holidays and happy new year!



Friday, December 20, 2019

Friday's Playlist - Trip-Hop, Techno, Electronica


Yeah, I know. We usually like to focus on Rock and Roll. Hard Rock. Punk Rock. Hell, Jazz Rock even. We've been known to do the odd Jazz setlist. And we're really into Blues and Funk as well. Electronic music isn't usually our glass of beer.

Monday, December 16, 2019

2019 Concerts Recap - Part One

We're nearing the end of 2019, and we won't be attending any more shows this year. So this is as good a time as any to look back at this past year's concert experiences. We'd be hard pressed to rank them, or even extract a top ten list, so we're just going to do a recap of the last year.


Friday, December 13, 2019

Friday's Playlist: New Jazz


"Jazz isn't dead, it just smells funny"
Frank Zappa

Jazz has been declared dead every year since hard bop. Jazz Nazis refuse to acknowledge its evolutions and mutations. This American tradition has used European classical music, Rock, Funk, Latin, Electronica to rejuvenate, adapt, survive and today, the idiom is richer than ever.

Monday, December 9, 2019

Rhiannon Giddens & Francesco Turrisi @ Café de la Danse, Paris - December 9th, 2019


Rhiannon Giddens is probably the best ambassador of American roots music today. Through her various projects and the multitude of instruments she masters, including her spellbinding voice, she tells the stories of the people and the myths that have informed America, wherever they may be from.


Friday, December 6, 2019

Delain @ Cabaret Sauvage, Paris - December 6th, 2019


The Netherlands are one of the world's foremost purveyors of the musical style that has come to be known as Symphonic Metal: epic, heavy riffs, soaring (usually female) vocals, and bombastic arrangements that evoke the string and brass sections of an orchestra. Check out our playlist HERE if you want to hear what that sounds like. 

In the decade-plus since their creation, Delain has become one of the front bearers of a genre that include such acts as Within Temptation, Nigthwish and The Gathering.


Friday's Playlist - Awesome Guitar Solos (pt. one)



This Friday's Playlist is the first of several instalments. Most of the solos featured here are classics. Some might call them overplayed. Don't listen to them. You don't need these people in your lives. The next instalments will feature more obscure ones but in the mean time, feel free to rock out to these fist pumping, head-banging, face-melting, air guitar-wielding solos.


Thursday, December 5, 2019

Butt Rock is back, baby!


"The Stadium Tour" was just announced a few days ago after weeks of speculation thanks to new Black Crowes' manager (I use the term "Black Crowes" loosely...) Mark Didia, who spilled the beans on the Live Nation venture a little too early.

Joan Jett & the Black Hearts, Poison, Def Leppard and Mötley Crüe. Here we are. Hairspray, mascara, bandanas, ugly pink guitars and sophomoric songs about strippers and cocaine are bankable again.




Tuesday, December 3, 2019

ENOUGH WITH THE BACKING TAPES ALREADY!


This trend is getting out of hand. Sure, it's nothing new. But it's getting worse. It used to be that bands used tapes, DATs, samples, triggers, etc. to help replicate the sound effects on their records. That's perfectly acceptable. Some use it to flesh out their sound. Add some soundscapes here, a little infra bass there... no harm done.


Sunday, December 1, 2019

Eluveitie @ Élysée-Montmartre, Paris - December 1st, 2019


Headlining this diverse Metal package, with support from Infected Rain and Lacuna Coil, is Swiss Celctic/Folk/Pagan Metal outfit Eluveitie, touring in support of their latest record the epic Ategnatos.



Lacuna Coil @ Élysée-Montmartre, Paris - December 1st, 2019


A very interesting line-up, with three very different Metal bands, each prominently featuring a female vocalist. First was Infected Rain, a Metalcore band from Moldavia. We were a little late, therefore didn't get to take any pictures but still were able to see the whole set.