Record Store Day this year was even sweeter than usual for Built To Spill fans thanks to the release of the much-anticipated new album Untethered Moon, a resounding and reassuring return to form that put to rest persistent rumors of band retirement. (Next-most-recent album There Is No Enemy came out ages ago in 2009, and […]
The Twilight Zone
Every so often, the people at Stages like to travel to another dimension—a dimension not only of sight and sound, but of mind. That’s right: next stop, three theatrical adaptations of The Twilight Zone! The line-up includes “To Serve Man,” arguably the most iconic Twilight Zone episode ever, as well as the minor classic “Back […]
The Lovely Bad Things
Let’s not say La Mirada’s Pixies-punkers Lovely Bad Things are back, because they never really went away—they just had to slow down for a second. But don't you worry because they’ve got big things ahead. Out now is a teaser for those big things: their new single “Space Waste” / “Always Lazy,” which is two […]
Mexico: Fantastic Identity
The world-renowned FEMSA collection— held by the titanic FEMSA beverage company—is already an ambitious survey of Latin American art, but this carefully curated splinter exhibition is an even more ambitious attempt to distill the bold and multifaceted history of modern Mexican art into a few dozen pieces. So naturally: Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo—with her famous […]
Raiders of the Lost Ark
There aren’t many movies more appropriate for this sort of big-screen resurrection—well, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, of course, but maybe that’s a little too literal? Besides, Raiders is the strong stuff, with a face-melting scene that most likely introduced the entire concept of faces being melted to world culture and plenty of unrestrained […]
De Lux
You couldn’t exactly say the just-out Generation is the heaviest record yet from L.A.’s introspecto-disco duo De Lux—they’re still all about those lighter-than-air synthesizer sounds, not cranked-up heavy metal guitar—but there are still new levels of personal revelation and perception on display here, thanks to some fortuitous discoveries in the used-records bins (like the fearless […]
Jonathan Richman
Jonathan Richman’s shows with erstwhile drummer Tommy Larkin are absolutely one-of-a-kind events where generations of too-casual claims about “the power of rock ‘n’ roll” (or similar hyperbolic hollowness) suddenly come to life before you and make perfect eternal sense. Richman’s still got a preternaturally precise sense for melody and overpoweringly confident musicianship, just like he […]
How to Be a Rock Critic
Lester Bangs was more complicated than he gets credit for, but then aren’t we all? As Robert Quine explained his longtime friend: “He was really bright, really smart, a really great soul, and he happened to be totally obsessed with music.” And from that came both the idea of the “world’s greatest rock critic” and […]
Adult Books
Adult Books are sorta one of the building blocks of the growing Lolipop Records empire and their punk-but-pop sound surely inspired a lot of littler Lolipops toward tape debuts of their own. Books have a sound that adds the Undertones’ committed hookiness to the Wipers’ relentless beat and ever-present anxiety, and if that sounds to […]
Retrofest: An Evening at Madame Wong's
What’s that saying—history repeats first as tragedy and second as a high school theatrical production? Because the L.A. punk (well, “new wave,” more correctly) scene is reincarnating for a moment at the Huntington Beach Academy for the Performing Arts’ Retrofest: An Evening At Madame Wong’s, in which the long-defunct Chinatown venue is brought back to […]
The Bangles
The Bangles had a little bit of a renaissance in the fall of last year with their self-reissued Ladies And Gentlemen… The Bangles! compilation, which documents the too-long-obscure punk and paisley days that came way before anyone was walking like an Egyptian. Prior to the big hits and the major labels, the Bangles—nee the Bangs, […]
May the 4th Be With You Star Wars-themed Metal Show
You may have sensed a great disturbance in the Force lately, and we’re not talking about the release of a certain movie trailer—or that OTHER possibly more exciting movie trailer unveiled at the Star Wars Celebration last month in Anaheim. Those titanic psychic rumblings you’ve been weathering are probably just the distant indicators of the […]
The Soft Moon
Luis Vasquez is back with a new Soft Moon album, recorded at the appropriately-named studio Hate in Italy. And whether it was the location, the atmosphere or simply a bolt of inspiration, the month-old Deeper is one of his sharpest releases yet. At heart, Deeper still has Soft Moon’s characteristic darkness, and the same bleak […]
Litronix
Litronix is Kevin Litrow, the longtime synthesizer visionary whose local music lineage runs back through N O W, 60 Watt Kid and Dance Disaster Movement all the way to the Radar, with each project its own intense exploration of dissonance and rhythm. (Believe it: Litrow will command a room with just a few key presses […]
Smart Patrol: Ultimate Tribute to Devo
In the beginning was Devo, born in an Ohio basement and cursed with twin abilities to recognize and remember, which led them to produce a searingly clear vision of our crypto-dystopic future disguised as the songs that happen when some record exec goes, “Yeah, love the outfits, but we need you to do something that […]
Wet Hot American Summer… The Play?
Wet Hot American Summer was one of those low-budget high-inspiration movies that was so far ahead of its time that it might have well as been a crashed UFO. Could the people of 2001 even comprehend the true power of a sarcast-o-tastic summer-camp film starring Amy Poehler, Paul Rudd, Janeane Garofalo, Ken Marino and … […]
Second City 55th Anniversary Tour
The Second City is opening up their vaults and giving you the ultimate peek behind the curtain! See the best of the best comedy created by some of the biggest names in the biz— mixed up with brand spankin’ new material performed by the red-hot talent of today! You’ll laugh ‘til your face hurts at […]
Joel Jerome, Will Sprott, La Luz, Thee Commons
They don’t call former dios (malos) frontman Joel Jerome “Papa Joel” for nothing—in fact, they call him “Papa Joel” because he’s recording and producing some of the best new wave of greater L.A.-area bands, because he’s got a magic ear and the experience in music to back it up, and because he’s just about got […]
Rikk Agnew Band
Rikk Agnew is probably best known for his tenure in the Adolescents—where he contributed mightily to the pop-turned-punk guitar sound of Southern California punk, which of course still endures today—but there’s a lot more in his discography, too. Like: Christian Death, D.I., Agnew’s underrated solo LP with its standout “OC Life” track and then stints […]
Long Beach Comic Expo
Back in 1987, Alan Moore was famously pitching a never-made comic series called Twilight of the Superheroes—but in 2015, a twilight for superheroes seems farther away than ever. (In fact, is this a good time to ask when we’ll get a New Gods movie series?) This is the era of the nerd triumphant, and Long […]
Cinema Orange: Maker
Once America used to make things—perhaps the older people in your family once held those jobs? But then the old world dissolved, and the production of actual objects was supplanted by the production of various butt-related indentations in cheap office chairs. So enter the so-called Maker Movement, where people one-by-one work to revive a little […]
