Running With Scissors

Let’s face it, Weird Al is a comic genius, he really is. I doubt there is anyone out there who hasn’t laughed out loud to a Weird Al song. From “Like A Surgeon” to “Eat It” to “Amish Paradise” he is everywhere and as usual he is side splittingly funny. Running With Scissors is his latest effort and once again he is right on the money with his parodies.

“The Saga Begins” is a brilliant take on “American Pie” but based on Episode 1 of Star Wars. This is the funniest comedy song I’ve heard in a long ass time. “My, my, this here Annikin guy, may be Vader someday later now he’s just a small fry…” Read the rest of this entry »

You Am I: Saturday Night ‘Round Ten

“Tim comes up with some arse kickin’ songs and we’re just lucky enough to get to play ‘em” -sentiments of Russel ‘Rusty’ Hopkinson on the enigma that is YOU AM I.

“Damn Straight” immediately springs to mind in affirmation!

In a decade of rock n roll, few other bands have emerged with as many accomplishments and genuine accolades as this once little known rock band from Sydney. With their relentless touring and ever highly charged live shows, they are an act that must be seen to be truly believed. Nevertheless, it is only fitting that an attempt has been made to capture the raw power and energy so definitive of YOU AM I – “LIVE”. Read the rest of this entry »

Youngster: Here Diagonally

This NYC-based power pop band, Youngster, put out an infectious, tuneful slice of bliss that most major label bands in the modern rock idiom would die trying to make, but wouldn’t even come close. It’s one of those low-key, unpretentious, out-of-left-field surprises that writers like me try + find, but never do. Records like this one usually find their way to me instead!!

This charming band (to paraphrase The Smiths) consists of singer/guitarist Marc Dinkin, drummer Jared Nissim, lead guitarist Steve Cannarelli, and female bass player Anne-Marie Stehn, and their songs are infectiously tuneful, yet offbeat enough, that they don’t sound like anybody else. Marc’s singing voice is Read the rest of this entry »

Aerosmith

Seventies Rolling Stones copyists whose career was revived when they guested on a 1986 hit remake of their funky-rock oldie “Walk This Way” by hip-hop pioneers Run-D.M.C. The song helped Run-D.M.C. (and rap generally) cross over to a white audience and introduced Aerosmith to a new generation of record buyers.

Reinvigorated, the band, led by ageless, rubber-limbed singer Steven Tyler (b. Steven Tallarico, 1948), cranked out a string of polished, lascivious hits (among them 1989′s “Love in an Elevator,” “Dude [Looks Like a Lady]“) that put them squarely back on the charts and MTV.

Even as the ’90s Aerosmith has grown stale and Read the rest of this entry »

924 Gilman

Graffiti-decorated warehouse space in Berkeley, California, that provides a stage for the area’s punk performers. With minimal promotion and no signage, this collective (founded 1986) only rarely makes the news: Jello Biafra was beaten up in May 1994 because he “sold out” and pop-punk band Green Day incurred the clientele’s wrath because they “went mainstream.”

(February 1994, the San Francisco Chronicle reported a “Destroy Green Day Now” graffito in the club.) 924 Gilman is adamant about its version of punk ethics: Read the rest of this entry »