Death Cab for Cutie is leading the mainstream charge for its underground brethren. Photos by Laurie Scavo.
For the past couple years, I always got a little anxious when people started talking about Death Cab for Cutie. Just the thought of telling someone I thought they peaked with “Transtatlanticism” was enough to make me dread the whole topic of indie pop. Is there no surer way to come off like a bad cliché, like the biggest pile of stereotypical hipster trash this side of Brooklyn, than [...]

Owen Ashworth’s set lived up to his bands name at the Hi-Dive on Wednesday. Photo from ACertainRomance.com.
When I went to go see Casiotone for the Painfully Alone at the Hi-Dive on Wednesday, I was half-heartedly expecting to see Owen Ashworth’s one-man-band beefed up by some of the formidable folks who occasionally join him on strings, flutes or organs. But it was just him — and a peculiar crowd that looked like they were ditching their junior prom. This was better, I think. I wanted to [...]

Flobots’ star is rising — and fast. Photos by Reverb contributor Brian Carney.
You know that VH1 show “Best Week Ever”? (Sure you do, it’s as addictive as it is inane.) Well, Denver hip-hop group Flobots are having one of those weeks. Their album “Fight With Tools” moved up to No. 15 on the Billboard charts this week from No. 183, selling 30,000 copies (a nearly 700 percent increase). It’s impressive considering the band is basically just re-releasing the disc on Universal Republic, but unsurprising given [...]

Keyboardist-singer Amanda Palmer wasn’t all flowers at the Dresden Dolls’ show at the Ogden Theatre on Tuesday. Photos by Laurie Scavo.
It’s not easy being the Dresden Dolls.
The coy, self-referential two-piece calls its music “Brechtian Punk Cabaret” – a nod to their theatrical stylings and their dramatic music. But how long can a band honestly maintain that constantly brewing dramatic tension?
Something about the Dresden Dolls’ Tuesday-night show at the Ogden Theatre tells me that their expiration date is nearing – that is, unless they makeover their [...]

Stanton Moore and his able band showed the Bluebird Theater how it was done on Wednesday night.
It’s 10 p.m. on a Wednesday. Barely 100 people mill about the Bluebird Theater. “Won’t go later than midnight tonight,” says a bartender in the middle of a yawn.
Three hours later, Stanton Moore is standing behind his four-piece green Gretsch drum set, sweat steaming his thick-rimmed glasses. Will Bernard is hunkered over his hollow body guitar, channeling the most pungent funk. Wil Blades is leaning back on a [...]

The Von Bondies’ overcame a host of problems on Monday night to rock the Falcon Bowl. Photos by Glory Breitweiser.
On Monday night the Von Bondies visited Denver to play the modest Falcon. Showing up promptly at 8:59, and parking in the Gothic Theatre lot, it was hard not remember the first time I saw the band over five years ago.
In a packed theater, the band played to hundreds of kids, hyped by the then-burgeoning Detroit scene and added to by press from a recent scuffle [...]

Yes, the Cure’s Robert Smith looks a little scary these days. But he and his band still sound as good as they did in 1987. Photos by Laurie Scavo.
I spent Wednesday morning writing about a legendary show at Red Rocks 25 years ago – U2 recording “Under a Blood Red Sky.”
I spent Wednesday night watching a legendary show at Red Rocks, in real-time from the 17th row – the Cure playing a career-spanning retrospective that came in 10 minutes short of 3 hours.
Not that [...]

One of the best live bands out there? Your bet your ass. Photo by Doug Beam.
About halfway through Cloud Cult’s first show at the Larimer Lounge on Saturday night, I noticed that my face hurt. From smiling. Constantly. And even though I was aware of the omnipresent goofy look on my face, I couldn’t stop. It was literally plastered there, as authentic as the music hurling off the stage from the large, Minneapolis-based chamber pop collective.
The band sounded so tight. Their music is absolutely essential, [...]

M.I.A. and her big, foreign beats will help you forget your cares and responsibilities, even if you were the one reviewing her show at the Fillmore on Saturday. Photos by Laurie Scavo.
I’m not going to lie. I was supposed to review M.I.A. at the Fillmore on Saturday in this space.
But that was a decision I made before I ended up seeing eight shows in four days, starting with the Flight of the Conchords at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House and the BellRays at the Larimer [...]

Sea Wolf’s Alex Brown Church narrated the proceedings on Tuesday with a sense of melodic melancholy and revelation. Photos by Doug Beam.
The members of Sea Wolf walked onto the Bluebird Theater’s stage Tuesday night like they were your old friends. They had no fear of you, and they had something very important they just realized and needed to share with you. It was then that singer Alex Brown Church and his indie folk outfit began presenting those “ah-ha!” moments, observations and conclusions, each song a [...]