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(11/21/05 5:00am)
Something's up with Andrew Bird. Despite the obvious being-named-after-a-class-of-animals thing (check your taxonomy, kids), the man lives on a farm with chickens and he named his new record "The Mysterious Production of Eggs." Physically, he has a nose like a beak, and he's really skinny, meaning he must eat like a bird. Plus, the guy can whistle better than most parakeets. His mother must have been a blue jay or something.
(11/17/05 5:00am)
Like other biopics of its ilk, Fox's "Walk the Line" comes oh-so close to being fantastic, but inevitably fails to live up to the hype of both the subject and the film itself.
(11/10/05 5:00am)
Oh, the Super Furry Animals. It's difficult to describe the music of a band with a penchant for five-part songs and futuristic cartoon creatures. A sizable crowd shuffled into D.C.'s 9:30 Club Tuesday night, hoping that seeing these eccentric Welsh rockers live would clear up the confusion.
(10/13/05 4:00am)
The stage at the Black Cat was crowded before the band even came on. With 33 instruments (everything from trombones and keyboards to zithers and novelty noise makers), there was precious little room in which to fool around. When the members of Architecture in Helsinki finally hit the stage, they were all business - the most fun, entertaining and danceable business around.
(10/03/05 4:00am)
Though not necessarily a genre unto itself, many of the bands that rose out of the Pacific northwest in the '90s shared a common sound, and even shared some members. For example, Sleater-Kinney drummer Janet Weiss also played drums for ex-husband Sam Coomes in Portland, Ore., band Quasi. The late great Elliott Smith also helped out on that project, which could serve as the launching point for some great indie-rock degrees of separation game. How many can you string together?
(09/26/05 4:00am)
Countless are the bands who keep going well past their expiration date, devolving into sad, depressing shades of their former selves (ahem, R.E.M.). On Friday night, John Davis, Harris Klahr and Chris Richards of D.C.'s Q and Not U did what few bands can find the guts to do: they ended with a bang, not a whimper.
(09/12/05 4:00am)
This year American University's student-run radio station, WVAU, will launch its new format, aimed at making the station run more smoothly and professionally.
(04/14/05 4:00am)
The AU Gospel Choir is one part choir, one part ministry, one part cultural group and one part family. On Saturday in the Kay Spiritual Life Center, the choir performed one of its last shows for the semester, marking the end of another wonderful season.
(04/11/05 4:00am)
Ah, The Tavern. What can the bands that play here possibly think when they step into the fluorescent lights and whirring blenders of the beloved eatery. It seems like a place where good music would be impossible to hear and where quality would have to be checked at the door, as the idea of hearing great music opposite a Chick-fil-A and next to a Jamba Juice is a little weird.
(04/07/05 4:00am)
The office is on the second floor of a Glover Park office building. In the foyer is a huge plastic short-stack of pancakes. There is a cupboard along the wall filled with everything from Alice Cooper vinyl to videos of Saturday morning cartoons. A hipster's apartment? No, this awesome pad is where local D.C. children's variety show "Pancake Mountain" is produced.
(04/07/05 4:00am)
Ah, The Tavern. What can the bands that play here possibly think when they step into the fluorescent lights and whirring blenders of the beloved eatery. It seems like a place where good music would be impossible to hear and where quality would have to be checked at the door, as the idea of hearing great music opposite a Chick-fil-A and next to a Jamba Juice is a little weird.
(04/04/05 4:00am)
Imagine, if you will, walking down the mall gawking at the beauty of little pink flowers. What's in your iPod? The following is a list of suggestions for making picturesque things sound that much more enjoyable, making it that much easier to throw your hands (or hat) up like Mary Tyler Moore, enjoy your life and the things in it.
(03/31/05 5:00am)
Our journey has thus far been a rocky one. Scheduling became a problem early on. We six kids are busy, like everyone else, I imagine. Rehearsing and arranging music is, though enjoyable, a chore, but getting everyone in the same room at any given time is a task in itself.
(03/31/05 5:00am)
"Mr. Holland's Opus" this is not. Yet there is something incredible about having a professor or teacher who is musically inclined. They manage to become human while still maintaining that air of inspiration. It seems like a rare treat to discover something personal about a professor, such as finding out he or she is an accomplished musician, or shares a common obsession with an obscure group or that he or she spends any given weekend shredding in some garage band.
(03/24/05 5:00am)
The Old Crow Medicine Show, a bluegrass six-piece band based out of New York City, knows how to put on a show. In the years before they were signed to a record label, the band traveled the country as street performers. They cut their teeth the way they were meant to cut: On the hard life of modern-day minstrels. During this time, the band honed their driving bluegrass style, becoming incredibly tight and exciting performers.
The band didn't hold back at their show last Wednesday at the 9:30 club. During their two 45-minute sets, they kept the intensity up with smoking tunes like "Fall on My Knees" and "Hard to Love," and didn't lose a soul in the room when they showed their slower side, with ballads like the touching "We're All in This Together" and crowd favorite "Wagon Wheel."
The stage was wonderfully crowded and busy with the six member band, armed with a rotating cast of acoustic instruments, including banjos, dobros, guitars, upright bass, fiddle and harmonica. Between some songs, the members switched instruments, which always makes a show interesting. Main guitarist and singer Willie Watson added to the stage antics when he broke a couple of strings, quickly re-stringing his guitar mid-song. Fiddler, harmonica player and singer Ketch Secor's mock slime-ball salesman banter got the crowd fired up throughout the show, dubbing his band mate "The Fastest String Changer this side of the Chesapeake Bay." Secor's fiddle is a major driving force of the band. He plays with great intensity, probably going through multiple bows per night after shredding the hairs to bits during each song.
The whole band plays with an admirable intensity. Bassist Morgan Jahnig, banjo and dobro player (whose ballads "Big Time in the Jungle and "Take 'Em Away" were other highlights of the show), Critter Fuqua, gitjo (a six-string banjo tuned like a guitar) player Kevin Hayes, and a guest banjo and dobro player kept the driving rhythms so crucial to bluegrass. They didn't talk much, opting to blend in and let the more vocal Secor and Watson do the talking, but they did very well, contributing to both the mystique and energy of the show.
It's easy to picture the OCMS as a street band. Secor's between-song banter was reminiscent of old showmen, keeping the audience's attention focused and energetic. In some respects, the band would probably have been more at home on some street corner or carnival rather than in the cavernous 9:30 club. The 1,200-occupancy club has a tendency to suck up the sound of more intimate acts. The Old Crows played with all acoustic instruments, opting for a more natural sound. It was a good idea, but unfortunately because of that some of the sound was lost.
Also notable at the show was the lack of dancing. While there were a fair number of mid-week drinkers, no one got down as much as the music insists. But this may be more due to the venue than to the band's performance. If the show was in a smaller room with sound more conducive to picking up un-amplified instruments, everyone in the crowd would be have been letting it all hang out like they all knew they wanted to.
The Old Crow Medicine Show proved that the fire of bluegrass is still burning in the hearts of a younger generation. After they cleared the stage, the band left nothing but true believers and a large pile of bow hair.
(03/21/05 5:00am)
Sometimes things just fall into place. And sometimes you need to push real hard to finish the puzzle.
(03/03/05 5:00am)
Read any biography on Ray Raposa, leader of San Diego band Castanets, and it'll mention how at the age of 15 he placed out of school and began traveling the country on and off for four years. And how a Castanets show, which graced the stage of George Washington University's Ivory Tower Community Center on Wednesday, relies on improvisation and chaos.
(02/24/05 5:00am)
The Washington Performing Arts Society hosted the Prague Symphony Orchestra last Sunday at the Kennedy Center for the first time in 20 years. Indeed, it was a long overdue return, as the orchestra brought to D.C. the spirit and passion of the great Czech city.
(02/17/05 5:00am)
The Davenport Coffee Lounge played host Wednesday to a night of poetry and hip-hop sponsored by AU's Student Organization for African Studies. Themes for the night ran the gamut of politics, war, love and sex. But the strongest message of the night was empowerment and positivity.
(02/17/05 5:00am)
These are the times of great struggle, of either great victory or shameful defeat. The truth, one finds, is that one begets the other. There is no war without peace, and no peace without war.