This Halloween weekend, I had the pleasure of attending the Suwannee Hulaween music and arts festival in Live Oak, Florida. A “feel-good” festival of sorts, the artists were mostly categorized as either jam bands or electronic acts/DJs, with a fair number of hip-hop artists interspersed throughout. Besides the expertly cultivated lineup/musical experience, the three main stages are situated around the ‘Spirit Lake’- a forested area full of art installations, live performances, workshops, and hammock spots with a beautiful Florida lake centerpiece. The inspiration I was able to reap from the weekend was unreal, as festival-goers were decidedly there to kick back, connect with like-minded humans, and express themselves at their fullest.
It’s been twenty-seven years since the formation of the seminal Massachusetts metalcore outfit Converge, and twenty-three years since their first album. When bands this heavy and aggressive stay around for…
Esketit. Yeezys. YOLO. Twerk. Absolutely none of these phrases, and many more, would’ve made any tidbit of sense 20 years ago. Whether it be Lil Pump, Kanye West, Drake, or multiple other artists, hip hop has begun to encompass more and more of our language, interactions, and views on the world.
Primitive Man is a band that’s always specialized in creating dense, incredibly harsh textures. 2013’s Scorn, the band’s debut full length, is about as sonically oppressive and ugly of an album as you’re likely to find in modern metal, and it introduced the heavy music world to Primitive Man’s unique blend of noise, sludge, death metal, and blackened doom. But believe it or not, Primitive Man just came through with an even uglier and more oppressive release with Caustic.
LCD Soundsystem performing “oh baby” (photo courtesy of the author)
LCD Soundsystem’s show at Nashville Municipal Auditorium on October 20th for their american dream tour was one for the books. They’ve played the festival circuit last year and several shows in Webster Hall and Brooklyn Steel in New York, but haven’t had a formal tour to themselves since their 2016 reunion. The band announced their breakup in 2011 and proceeded to play a legendary string of shows in Madison Square Garden documented by the film “Shut Up and Play the Hits”. Their triumphant return last year was fully brought to full realization with the release of the album american dream on September 1st, put out by DFA Records, the label of LCD’s frontman James Murphy.
First and foremost, it would be downright irresponsible of me to make any substantive claim, analytical, theoretical, or otherwise, about Eminem’s BET freestyle without first addressing the obvious. Like the pristine river that guides an untamed eye across the canvas, through dark mountain valleys and up into the great blue unknown—that archetype of the transcendental, that ineffable sublime—Eminem’s beard is nothing. And yet it is everything.
On Tuesday, September 26, 2017, Memphis rapper Young Dolph was shot near the Loews Hollywood Hotel and hospitalized in critical condition. Two weeks later, Dolph is on the road to…
At only 20-years-old, Jorja Smith has gone from a high school student and part-time Starbucks barista to releasing tracks on Spotify that garner millions of listens in only a couple of days. Smith hails from Walsall, West Midlands, UK where she met her manager at the age of 15. Despite her youth, she has already worked with some of the most prominent names in the R&B/Hip-Hop such as producer Black Coffee. She was even featured on two tracks (“Get it Together” and “Jorja Interlude”) off Drake’s recent mixtape, More Life. Let’s take a look at her past and present.
BROCKHAMPTON returned with a bang on their third release, Saturation II, off their own label Question Everything, Inc this past August 25th . The group has a sound as unorthodox as their origin story, the majority of the members having met on a popular Kanye West forum before ever meeting in real life. Coalescing under leader Kevin Abstract and taking up the all-caps moniker BROCKHAMPTON, the group of 15 moved to South Central Los Angeles in 2015 to be the next great American boyband. Following their two previous releases, Saturation II creeps, crawls, and roars its way into your sonic sphere with the youthful energy of a group of 19-23 year old men that have something(s) to say.
The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die (TWIABP) has been a powerful presence in the ’emo’ community since the release of their debut full-length album Whenever, If Ever (2013). Last week, the band released their third album, Always Foreign, a phenomenally composed album overflowing with cynicism, chaos, and an unadulterated sense of vulnerability.
“She’s just trying to reach you,” Protomartyr singer/lyricist Joe Casey chants at the climax of “A Private Understanding,” the opening track on the Detroit post-punkers’ fourth album Relatives in Descent.
Through the pages of history runs a river of interesting and often tragic narratives concerning rock’s forbearers and transportation mishaps. Duane Allman, Buddy Holly, and Otis Redding, among others, met…
Moses Sumney’s debut full-length Aromanticism, released Sept 22nd on Jagjagwar, is a shimmery showcase of Sumney’s smooth-as-butter voice that marks an artistic departure from his 2016 EP Lamentations. While the EP revolves around layers of Sumney’s vocals and guitar, his latest release incorporates a much wider color palate, replete with beautiful orchestration and swirling synths. There’s a higher production value, which in turn sacrifices some of the intimacy of his earlier releases which made his music so powerful.
There’s no denying that Soundcloud has become the birthing ground for new hiphop artists. Some of the biggest names today, Chance the Rapper and Lil Uzi Vert to name two, began their record-breaking careers on the platform. Soundcloud’s accessibility has made it easier than ever to enter the game, but just as easy to be buried under a million other users (talented or not). How do you set yourself apart? Lil Pump’s Answer:
Freudian, Daniel Caesar’s debut album, released August 25, 2017 on Golden Child Recordings sparked discussion among music fans across all genres. It’s variety of production, a seamless fluctuation of emotion between subtle elegance and bold passion, is reflective of the intricate message the love-ridden Caesar is trying to convey. Throughout the 10 song album, Daniel Caesar spills his heart out about the complexities of love, ranging from despair to pure ecstasy.
It took Rolling Loud Festival less than three years to become the largest Hip-Hop festival in the world. After three consecutive sold out festivals in Miami, FL, co-founders Tariq Cherif…
The National’s most recent album, Sleep Well Beast, released September 8, 2017, is characterized by a tracklist that can be compared to a morning commute. “Guilty Party” resembles the melancholy of waking before the sun has risen, a sheet of morning dew still covering the hood of your car. But the sun does rise and the gloom quickly turns into anger and frustration. “Turtleneck” embodies the morning drive itself — the agonizing slow burn of exit after exit, when you begin to tailgate cars just to feel like you’re making progress. Unlike previous albums, where each track transitions from one to the next like the tranquil flow and ebb of a stream, Sleep Well Beast is a complete mishmash.
Bleachers, a project of Jack Antonoff’s (guitarist of the notable group FUN. made popular by the hit “We Are Young”), has made an huge splash in the indie pop world in the 3 years they’ve been active. WRVU Nashville had the pleasure of sending two lucky concert-goers free of charge to see Bleachers at their September 13th show at Marathon Music Works.
