You might know him as the frontman for The Starting Line, but Gainesville is about to get a new picture of Kenneth Vasoli.
Gainesville is the cradle of startup bands. As new bands pop up left and right, there inevitably comes a point, at which they must drift on. After the diplomas have been handed, the career pressures start to pile on, bands are left with three choices: stay put, break up or leave the nest.
If you do anything this summer, go to a music festival. The summer's music festivals are kicking off soon, and they are competing to have the biggest little bands, host the greenest event and to all in all be the one festival that will be worth your time and money. Who will win this winner-take-all fight? No one knows yet, but these shows are sure to be the most blogged and bragged about events of the summer.
With his eyes closed and guitar pick cradled loosely between his index finger and thumb, Tony Centurione stands on a white-lit stage, covering a song by the band he sports on his T-shirt.
Most would call a mass of people swaying to music in a tiny building with a broken air-conditioning system on a day where the heat index put the temperature at over 100 a circle of hell.
The eighth annual Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival wrapped up Sunday evening after hosting more than 120 acts varying from the hard rocking Nine Inch Nails to the old-school jams of Bruce Springsteen and Phish.
Stars are out of 5
In a music scene littered with bands that sound and dress alike, Philadelphia experimental rockers mewithoutYou have made a name for themselves, straying from the norms of today's doomed "emo" culture.
Downtown Gainesville will be swingin' to the sounds of live jazz Friday night.
Here's something to sing about: Your classes are winding down, the air is getting warmer and, to top it off, all of your favorite musical artists are coming to a town near you this summer. If you can break away from the beach (or your summer job, you overachiever), you won't want to miss these gigs.
Mosh pits and skanking aren't usually associated with helping the needy.
"Who's Tebow?" asked Michael Murray, lead guitarist of the band The Banner Year.
Noisy, surging guitars; octopus-arm polyrhythms; Bono hollering on like a hopped-up Pentecostal preacher; spectacularly transparent declarations of purpose whooped in flailing whoa-oh frenzy. These are the first sounds of "No Line On the Horizon," U2's new album, and they combine to say what, with this band, goes without saying: This is a statement.
What do you get when you mix Fugazi with The Beach Boys?
Emil Svanängen is moving on up, literally. Having recorded his first album on a laptop microphone and CD-Rs in his mother's cellar, the Swedish popsmith now makes a big enough name for himself to afford real studio equipment, a high-end computer, and presumably, his own home. In keeping with the little-guy theme, "Dear John" comes off like techno-fied Belle and Sebastian - Svanängen sings in breathless, hushed tones, as if trying to carry on a conversation in a library after running a marathon. Most of these songs flirt with electronic chamber pop, veering at alternate forks into "Phantom of the Opera"-esque theatrics ("Harm") and somber, Postal Service dance tunes ("Summers," which would fit snuggly on "Give Up"). If there's a turnoff, it's that a lot of these tracks are too prettily twee for their own good, like a good-looking guy who never makes the first move. And winds up living in his parents' basement.
Aside from an obvious flair for album titling (makes you want to shout, "'Ray Guns' are now, bitch!" doesn't it?), vocalist Inara George and soundboard extraordinaire Greg Kurstin also have a way with swinging '60s pop music set to fantastically modernized, yet still retro, production. Does this make sense? If not, think of "Ray Guns" as the aural equivalent to Disney's Tomorrowland - both create a future that will never exist by looking to tail-finned Cadillacs and moon landings as points of reference. This record awaits the mythical Year 2000, and in so doing, delivers groovy neo-psychedelia ("Ray Gun"), doo-wop era Motown complete with seductress spoken word bits ("Baby"), and breathy cocktail lounge balladeering ("Meteor"), all in a sleek electronic shell. "Diamond Dave," George's irresistible tribute to the great David Lee Roth, is not only the most catchy song here, but the only appropriate evidence by which to date this offering. It's Van Halen hero worship dressed in spacey beats and a plat-blond 'do, and as such, cooler than Judy Jetson in a discotheque.
If the election of President Barack Obama was a big can't-we-all-just-get-along inquiry to the good people of America, then "Gutter Tactics" is a scathing, unqualified "Hell no!" Or "not yet," anyway. Atop corrosive grooves tangled in haywire electronic beats, this Garden State duo spits tales of torture, war, civil rights abuses and the like, exposing every closeted sin, protesting all the wrongs that still need be righted. "Armed with Krylon" and "Who Medgar Evers Was" make up a suite of continuously devolving ambient rap that taps a well of run-for-your-life paranoia. The latter track works off a big, beefy drumbeat, spiraling feedback and lyrics about assassination. Indeed, this is dark stuff that takes nerve to slog through, and that's speaking nothing of the introductory monologue - a caustic, hell, fire and brimstone throwdown from the Rev. Wright himself. Or as Dalek likes to call it, "feel-good music."
A.C. Newman is a silent killer. Left to his own devices, the New Pornographers' evil genius retreats from hook-a-second power pop to fiddle around with a less potent arsenal - off-kilter rhythms, tuneless guitar riffs, minor-key progressions. They're all here in one form or another, though working only as masking agents, attempting in vain to veil Newman's intoxicating melodies. Preferring slow burn to out-and-out explosion, "There Are Maybe Ten or Twelve" and "Prophets" qualify as growers by Newman standards, but in time each reveals itself as seductively charming as "Mass Romantic" or "Mutiny, I Promise You." "Changeling," on the other hand, is a throwback in this regard. Thriving on a big, obvious, harmony-laced chorus, it's further proof that Newman strikes two ways - in his own words, "Like A Hitman, Like A Dancer."
For whatever reason, "40 is the new 30" doesn't necessarily hold in the world of rock 'n roll. Seems the Glimmer Twins have so wrecked all notions of aging gracefully that success in AARP terms simply means not embarrassing oneself. Naturally, the Boss holds to a higher standard - bosses always do - and so "Working on a Dream" plays like another of Springsteen's "best album since…" candidates. Of course, it's not, because it's like the last handful of great songs about gritty underdogs and the power of love, E Street themes through and through. "Life Itself" and the Beach Boys nod "This Life" feels like Asbury Park, 1975, but the goosebumps stuff is in "Last Carnival," a campfire hymn about picking up early and moving on, no matter the circumstance. It's a potent reminder from an ageless guy who still knows best: we gotta get out while we're young.
Solutions by The State News
