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The 11th Annual UMS Starts Today – So do DenverThread’s lists – here’s day one
July 21, 2011 Off

The 11th Annual UMS Starts Today – So do DenverThread’s lists – here’s day one

By Billy Thieme

It’s here! And it’s definitely THE highpoint of Denver’s summer music season! A full Red Rocks schedule, the Warped and other festival tours, multiple nights of Widespread Panic – even the monster U2 show in Invesco Field at Mile High – all pale in comparison to the magnitude of this weekend’s pinnacle. The 11th Annual Underground Music Showcase (UMS) starts this Thursday evening, and will dominate a few square miles of South Broadway for the following three nights.

This year’s show features close to 300 bands, comedians , singer songwriters and other talents, and will be housed in a huge number of venues, restaurants, bookstores, skateboard shops and t-shirt shops along South Broadway (here’s a handy listing, with a MAP!) – including two major outdoor stages – from 6th Avenue at the top to Cedar at the bottom.

Needless to say, the choices for live music abound – heck, they’re pretty overwhelming. Let’s face it: there’s no way anyone can possibly see all that the UMS has to offer, and it’d be a miracle to see everything you’d like to see. So let us at DenverThread take a little of the pressure to decide off of your shoulders, with our daily preview lists for this year’s festival.

Through the weekend, we’ll be listing our choices of the best things to see – for a lot of reasons. Whether your tastes run into the sludge-stoner-metal quagmire, meander through dreamy twee-pop or get hypnotically lost in psychedelic shoegaze, we’ll get you where you want to be, and make sure you’re catching something you’ve hopefully never seen before while we’re at it.

Threading Now – Denver Day of Rock uses local musicians to create community, still needs volunteers
May 3, 2011 Off

Threading Now – Denver Day of Rock uses local musicians to create community, still needs volunteers

By Billy Thieme

On Saturday, May 28th, Concerts For Kids will be presenting Denver Day of Rock, now in its third year, in downtown Denver. With a slew of bands – both local and national acts – that cross genres from pop/rock to Zydeco, the all-ages event is a perfect opportunity to get everyone in the family out in front of some decent live music.

Denver Day of Rock was put together by Concerts For Kids for the first time in June of 2009 as an all-day outdoor music event designed to raise awareness of children in the Denver community, and the many charities that exist that help them. In just three years, the show has grown from two stages in two completely separate parts of town and a show at the Fillmore, to five stages along the 16th Street Mall and more than twenty bands.

New Threads – Inactivists release “The War on Jazz Hands” to a hungry public at the Walnut Room
April 1, 2011 Off

New Threads – Inactivists release “The War on Jazz Hands” to a hungry public at the Walnut Room

By Billy Thieme

If there’s one thing we need less of in this world, it’s got to be those annoying flapping fingers at the end of swirling hands, and a more worthy cause for war probably doesn’t currently exist. And yet, as a country, we’re dang near broke. But I already digress . . .

This sentiment comes from the title of The Inactivists’ latest record, “The War On Jazz Hands.” The Denver band remains one of the local scene’s hidden treasures, and the title’s an adroit summation of their personality and style: playful like They Might Be Giants with an adult humor that hovers around that of Ween, but remains more explicitly juvenile. And yet, they’re always musically complex, diverse and accomplished, in the only way that would ever allow a true theremin artist – in this case the accomplished and extremely talented Victoria Lundy – to fit in.

Golden’s Erik Husman records sophomore effort @TheWalnutRoom Thursday night
March 22, 2011 Off

Golden’s Erik Husman records sophomore effort @TheWalnutRoom Thursday night

By Billy Thieme

One of the more popular new trends lately has been a band’s live rendition of an influential record from their past. It’s a pretty cool thing, too, to see bands like Pixies play albums we all grew up listening to, live, in their entirety.

It’s not often, though, that we get to share the stage with the performers to help create a recording that just might become one that everyone remembers years from now. This Thursday, local troubadour Erik Husman and the Walnut Room are offering just that opportunity. Husman, a brand-spanking new addition to the scene, out of the city of Golden – will be playing a set of all new material that night, and recording the entire affair, and will produce the result as his second release.

“I’m kind of freaking out, really,” said an almost giddy Husman when I sat across from him in a Golden bar recently. “It’s not like preparing for a gig. I’ve got to do about 180 hours of studio performance [about the time it took to record his first album] free-form, live, in one take. There’s no going back,” he added. “But it’ll be the most genuine thing, the only way to capture the real me.”

Husman’s style ranges from rough spirituals and anthems that recall Woodie Guthry and Pete Seeger with heavy influence from classic country, to a solid indie feel with a little more more than a nod to the Radiohead crowd.

What/Where This Weekend? The “Love Project” debuts, and Sunder plays at the Larimer Lounge
February 11, 2011 Off

What/Where This Weekend? The “Love Project” debuts, and Sunder plays at the Larimer Lounge

By Billy Thieme

This weekend’s one night stand will feature some photos from the “My Life” project, but is focused on “The Love Project.” As the Denver Post’s John Moore reported recently, “The Love Project” came out of De Giovanni’s deep desire to “… figure out how to recognize real love,” as a result of her last breakup. The methodology of each shoot is to open the shutter quickly, again and again and again, for one minute, and one minute only, as the couple in question attempts to show her their love. One and only one photograph is chosen to represent the couple, and becomes a vision of their connection.

Strings & Wood, local music and art non-profit, throws a 2-year anniversary tonight at the Oriental
February 4, 2011 Off

Strings & Wood, local music and art non-profit, throws a 2-year anniversary tonight at the Oriental

By Billy Thieme

If you’re unfamiliar with Strings & Wood Concerts, and your tastes run towards the more melodic and folksier side of acoustic rock, this weekend may be the perfect opportunity for you to get to know the local promoter and community advocate. Strings & Wood is celebrating their second anniversary in business with a concert and benefit that features a stellar lineup of local solo artists and musicians at the venerable Oriental Theater (44th and Tennyson in NW Denver) on Friday night, February 4th. The show will feature some of Colorado’s best acoustic and vocal bands, singer/songwriters and collaborations, as well as visual and design artists, silent auctions and even a professional on site massage therapist.

Founded by – and still run by – local professional photographer Art Heffron, Strings & Wood Concerts’ non-profit mission, according to their bio, is to promote “… live music, visual arts and social justice in the local Denver community.”
“Strings & Wood produces intimate, living-room style concerts at Denver’s top venues while striving to support the featured artists. Musicians take home 90% of the total ticket sales and 100% of merchandise sales. . .”