Category: Reviews

Record reviews of local and national records of any age and genre

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.

New Music Threads – Local heroes Veronica & The Raven & The Writing Desk offer up fun and surreal tunes, and live shows to fill your holiday nights
November 28, 2010 Off

New Music Threads – Local heroes Veronica & The Raven & The Writing Desk offer up fun and surreal tunes, and live shows to fill your holiday nights

By Billy Thieme

Three veteran Denver artists, all previous members of bands that have long since passed into legendary status – and that enjoyed that status off and on during their active years as well – have pooled their talents and love of straight ahead punk/indie rock with a simple aesthetic and an indelible stripe of mischievous humor and made a record that just about everyone can fall in love with, and have loads of fun through all of its just over 30 minutes.

Ted Thacker and John Call – wicked guitarist and gigantic drummer, respectively, who both played in Baldo Rex in the ’90s – joined with Andrew Koch , formerly of Tiger Beat, on bass to finally record 12 songs, many of which have been mainstays for the trio’s sporadic shows over recent years, and have released it independently. The title is apropos, as they’ve all three been immersed in the ephemera of becoming while the band has frequently taken a back seat. But, thanks to their dedication (and maybe a little help from the gods of awesome rock), the album has finally come together – and it’s worth every week of the time it took.

The debut from Denver band The Raven and The Writing Desk, “Recidivist,” took time to grow on me – but I’m glad I let it. On first listen I thought the record’s 8 songs would have some trouble floating out of a typical too-folky, hip and indie vibe – something Denver has plenty of, and too much of it is depressingly average. After setting the collection aside for a while, though, I found myself haunted by some of the music’s undercurrents, and succumbed to further exploration. Good thing, because the record has grown on me after delving further in and, though it still suffers at times in the way most freshman efforts do, I’m intrigued, more satisfied, and look forward to watching them grow in Denver.

Gangcharger and Smoothbore – two Denver bands release new tunes, noise in a new direction
October 17, 2010 Off

Gangcharger and Smoothbore – two Denver bands release new tunes, noise in a new direction

By Billy Thieme

There aren’t too many bands that can withstand an entire personnel change and keep going. There are even less that come back stronger for it – but Gangcharger is one that has. Ethan Ward’s love child – with huge emphasis on the love – has not only rebounded after being abandoned by virtually every member of the band over the course of late 2009, he’s driven the rebuilt band beyond anyone’s expectations, maybe beyond his own – and definitely miles beyond the previous lineup’s promise – with their latest release, “Free Exhaust.”

New Music Threads – Murder Ranks and St. Elias add new life to Denver music
August 26, 2010 Off

New Music Threads – Murder Ranks and St. Elias add new life to Denver music

By Billy Thieme

Reaching back to the tradition of dancehall, the updated, stripped down and visceral outgrowth of reggae that revitalized that already tired genre, Murder Ranks uses its basic musical tenets to distill a sweet, strong and minimalist – but sickeningly catchy – punk/dub concoction, and layers it upon modified (sometimes completely transfigured) dancehall riddims. But, where dancehall deejays may use horn sections, other instruments and/or background singers to enhance riddims that they chant and toast over, Murder Ranks reworks these parts with their instruments, and with Scratchie’s vocals, to fit their own aggressive and fun style.

DenverThread New Music Reviews – The Lumineers, Salesman
April 3, 2010 Off

DenverThread New Music Reviews – The Lumineers, Salesman

By Billy Thieme

Two new bands, both associated with Colorado, unleash some damned good EPs on the scene. The Lumineers just moved here from the insanely creative hotbed of Brooklyn, NY about 5 months ago, and we’re ecstatic to have them. After all, the flow of musicians and great music has seemed to be going in the opposite direction of late. Musically, their seven-song, self-titled EP often approaches Radiohead’s signature quiet, tied-up desperation, then moves towards the Avett Brothers’ brilliance in composition and lyricism, and channels that through rhythms that often recall civil war marches.
Salesman brings a huge, flailing guitar sound, strong vocals and soft, driven rhythms, based in Austin-by-way-of Cañon City. This four-piece answers the question: “What would’ve happened if Jeffrey Lee Pierce hadn’t died, and instead invested in a little voice coaching?” Or – maybe a lot of voice coaching.

The “Denver Sound,” long dead, makes room for lighter, noisier, funner genres in the scene
March 3, 2010 Off

The “Denver Sound,” long dead, makes room for lighter, noisier, funner genres in the scene

By Billy Thieme

The world-famous “Denver Sound” has petered out.

Which is not to say that the beautiful, often over-the-top and heavy handed gothic alt-country sound isn’t significant anymore – not at all. That sound helped put Denver back on the musical globe in the ’80s and ‘90s, and still attracts its fair share of fans. It’s still appreciated world-wide, and many remain ravenous for it – especially in Europe.

But it exists currently in a type of atrophy in Denver – it’s taken a back seat that has allowed an insurgence of more than a few different genres to begin to flourish, or re-flourish, as the case may be. Denver has a strong music scene – perhaps the strongest in the US (at the moment) – and part of its strength comes from its wide variety. So if the sometimes overbearing popularity of the “Denver Sound” – indeed the often overweighted nature of the sound itself – is waning, it can only be good news for the lighter, the more pop-y, the innovative and indie, or the more aggressive and punkier genres.

And that’s exactly what’s happening in the bar, dive, club, backyard and warehouse scene right now.

Live DenverThread Review: The Inactivists provide some sweet, sickly heartbreak for the love-challenged
February 9, 2010 Off

Live DenverThread Review: The Inactivists provide some sweet, sickly heartbreak for the love-challenged

By Billy Thieme

Scott Livingston isn’t someone you want to wrong, particularly in the arena of love. As frontman of Denver band The Inactivists, a band known for its nerdy humor mixed with artsy rock, he’s got a soapbox that’s pretty tall. And with the band’s latest record, “Love Songs and Other Songs About Love,” they’ve taken the heartbreak of a dissolved relationship and bent it into an aural sculpture on a framework of sardonic and geeky wit, and Livingston is the mouthpiece.

Even more extreme than the record, Inactivists’ live show is one to be reckoned with, and they showed it off last Saturday night (January 30) at the Walnut Room in front of an impressive crowd. Behind his electric ukelele, Livingston cuts an impressive figure that belies the internal strife his lyrics portend. He’s more than well met by Victoria Lundy’s wild and earthy performance on the theremin and Pattie Melt’s smooth, punky saxophone and accordion, Matt Sumner’s bass funk and Kelly Prestridge’s complex rhythms.