Boston Globe

  • Horse Lords The week ahead: Pop & rockThursday, April 28, 2016 DOPAPOD Last year’s three-night homestand by this charismatic Boston-born jam band ended with a nearly hourlong Pink Floyd cover that twisted through reggae, trance, and disco mutations. Will Dopapod attempt to top that feat? Find out here. April 28-30, 8 p.m. Tickets: $20, advance

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  • Julien Baker, by Ben Sklar/The New York Times The ticket: Pop musicSunday, April 24, 2016 JULIEN BAKER She just played Cafe 939 in January, and already this Memphis singer-songwriter, who specializes in sweetly voiced memories and intimacies, is back again to play a bigger room. Listen to her latest album, “Sprained Ankle,” and the appeal

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  • Slum Village The week ahead: Pop & rockThursday, April 21, 2016 THE KING’S COURT TOUR: A TRIBUTE TO J. DILLA It’s been 10 years since James DeWitt Yancey, the gifted, influential Detroit hip-hop producer better known as J. Dilla, died of a rare blood disease at age 32. A prime mover behind neo-soul’s syncopated bump,

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  • Tom Carter The ticket: Pop musicSunday, April 17, 2016 Due to space concerns, these listings were trimmed in print. These are the untrimmed versions. MICHAEL HURLEY This roots-music maverick taped his 1964 debut LP on the same reel-to-reel machine used to capture Lead Belly’s last session; seems entirely plausible that some rare element stuck to

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  • Melvins, by Mackie Osborne The week ahead: Pop & rockThursday, April 14, 2016 PRINCE RAMA A near-death experience on an Estonian island, a mountaintop album debut, a Central Park raccoon attack. . . hard to know where mythology ends and reality starts for psychedelic pranksters Taraka and Nimai Larson. One thing we know for sure:

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  • Esperanza Spalding The ticket: Pop musicSunday, April 10, 2016 RIHANNA The most surprising thing about this arena date with the potent Barbadian R&B star is that tickets can still be had. Don’t take it as a sign that Rihanna’s star has dipped since her last solo trek in 2013; view it as proof that her

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  • Cloud Cult, by Graham Tolbert The week ahead: Rock & popThursday, April 7, 2016 2016 ROCK & ROLL RUMBLE Long viewed as the World Series of Boston rock, the Rumble rolls through the second half of its preliminary round, pitching heated battles among four worthy acts on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights. (Semifinals will be

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  • Gogol Bordello The ticket: Pop musicSunday, April 4, 2016 2016 ROCK & ROLL RUMBLE Long viewed as the World Series of Boston rock, the Rumble rolls out its preliminary-round shows on Sunday night, pitching heated battles among four worthy acts every night except for Wednesday. (Semifinals will be held April 15 and 16, and the

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  • Tau Cross The week ahead: Rock & popThursday, March 31, 2016 SAVAGES Having put itself on the map everywhere with the short sharp shock of 2013 debut “Silence Yourself,” this explosively innovative London postpunk quartet broadens its perspective on the newly issued “Adore Life.” The musical attack remains edgy and lacerating, but the sentiments now

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  • Flatbush Zombies, by Theo Wargo/Getty Images Since last week, when Boston Globe staff music critic Sarah Rodman departed for sunnier climes, I've taken over writing the paper's twice-weekly concert picks in the pop and rock category. Anyone who knows about the 13 years I spent at Time Out New York also knows that I've had

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  • Courtenay Budd, David Del Tredici, and Gil Rose with BMOP, by Kathy Wittman "Rose, BMOP wax ecstatic in glorious, unsettling 'Alice'"Boston Globe, February 27, 2016 There are times, and they are not infrequent, when I worry that I've lost my knack for doing the things I used to do regularly at The New York Times,

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  • Coheed & Cambria, by Ben Stas for the Boston Globe "Coheed & Cambria, unmasked but still heroic at House of Blues"Boston Globe, February 24, 2016 Long months after I spoke with Claudio Sanchez about The Color Before the Sun, the revealing newest album from prog-punk quartet Coheed & Cambria, for the Rolling Stone website last

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  • Ben Ratliff; photo by Kate Fox Reynolds Last night I had the welcome and happy opportunity to interview Ben Ratliff, the New York Times music critic and a longtime friend and colleague, for an attentive audience at the Harvard Book Store in Cambridge. The subject was Ben's new book, Every Song Ever: Twenty Ways to

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  • Best of Boston Music 2015.

    Right now on the Boston Globe site, you can read a couple of pretty great team-sourced lists of the best recordings released by local artists in 2015. There's one for pop music and one for classical music; naturally I took advantage of my editorial access and contributed to both lists. Here are my five small

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  • Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats, by Ben Stas/Boston Globe "Uncle Acid dispenses mystery, melody at Royale"Boston GlobeSeptember 16, 2015 A fun show with a solid bill, top to bottom. Keep an eye out for a report with copious photos from Globe shooter Ben Stas at metal e-zine Invisible Oranges; meanwhile, read what Ben wrote about

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  • Album review: Iron Maiden, The Book of SoulsBoston GlobeSeptember 4, 2015 Another one from last Friday…this actually shared a page with my Scorpions feature story, which made for a rather interesting impression on folks who mostly knew me for my work in The New York Times, which was about 99.99999995 percent about classical/concert music. @nightafternight

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  • Scorpions, by Oliver Rath "Scorpions celebrate a half-century, on record and onstage"Boston GlobeSept. 4, 2015 Did you know that the venerable German metal band Scorpions turns 50 this month? Neither did I… and according to this interview (and others I've read), neither did founding guitarist Rudolf Schenker until he went looking for an old tape

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  • Jack DeJohnette (center) and Made in Chicago, by Wes Orshoski/ECM Records Even when looking back, Jack DeJohnette forges aheadBoston GlobeMay 17, 2015 For the featured jazz story in today's Summer Arts Preview issue of the Boston Globe, a brief but event-filled article about jazz drummer, bandleader, and composer Jack DeJohnette, who brings his legend-studded quintet

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  • David Torn, by Wes Orshoski/ECM Records David Torn soars through 'only sky' at RegattabarBoston GlobeMay 12, 2015 Scanning social media recently, Torn came across a journalist who was crowd-sourcing questions to ask him in an upcoming interview. A common reply: Ask what he’s been doing since “Cloud About Mercury.” That’s Torn’s most famous album, sure,

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  • Keith Lockhart, by Suzanne Kreiter/Boston Globe "After 20 years, Keith Lockhart keeping the Pops youthful"Boston GlobeMay 5, 2015 My front-page story about Keith Lockhart and his eventful journey to the Boston Pops, with which institution he celebrates his 20th anniversary in a spring season that starts tonight (May 6) with a swanky concert featuring Bernadette

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