On a sweaty June night, in the Byward Market of the Nation’s Capital, I had the chance to chat with someone who I’ve wanted to interview for a long time – David Bazan. Due to his insane touring schedule and rigorous work ethic, he is a hard man to track down (as I’ve been trying for...

It’s hard to look outside the umbrella of the Arts & Crafts label these days as its spread seems to be rather all-encompassing. With an army of able-bodied and hyper-creative musicians at their disposal, it’s hard not to get sucked into the vortex-like vibe that A&C projects as it...

When the boys in Sloan asked their manager “Chip” Sutherland if they should rerecord their whole album Twice Removed for the marketing purposes of Geffen Records back in 1993, Chip told the boys to tell Geffen to ‘go and f**k themselves.” Chip passionately pleaded with Sloan to...

After writing formulaic reviews for many publications, it gets tiring to achieve the same sort of goal in constructing a music review. Every once in a while, a writer needs to be set free. Micah Dalton’s ‘Pawn Shop’ is the perfect forum within which that can happen. So a while ago,...

Wolf Parade; A youngling gang of aspiring musicians from the Quebec region who were dedicated to a specific sound from day one (and whose premiere album hit it big). What could be a cooler rags to riches story? To add a layer of subtext to the already riveting plotline of Wolf Parade, let’s back...

Van Morrison is something of an enigma. Over the course of his illustrious career that nearly spans half a century, he has refused to be pinned down within any certain genre of music and his closest followers are often just as confused as the rest of us who hear his work. He has been cited as an influence...

Michael Stipe, when asked about the creation process of his lyrics for the newest R.E.M. album ‘Accelerate’, stated “When the empire is going down the toilet, it’s easy to write great, angry songs.” Although that may be true, I would recommend that R.E.M.’s newest...

Like most people involved in record labels, music magazines and other forms of music promotion, Dave Ullrich has seen the business from both sides. He has spent time behind a drum kit playing for The Inbreds and working in a singer/songwriter vein as part of the collective Egger, and has been publishing...

It feels like I have been to this place before. The place I speak of is one of distrust, malcontent and utter irritability with the status of modern music review. It’s almost as if these writers (probably due to a corporate agenda) have to achieve a certain preconceived slant and could care less...

If I could write music the way Stephen Malkmus does, in his raw, original and multi-faceted form, I would. The problem is I don’t have the musical abyss of a mind that he does…and I wasn’t a History major in school. For many, the first time they heard a Pavement or Stephen Malkmus track...