Destroyer is the nom de rock of Dan Bejar, who's a songwriting member of the much more successful New Pornographers. Bejar's fey brand of louche is not everyone's cup of tea, but he rides it to ecstatic choral heights at least once or twice per album. His latest, Kaputt, was released on Jan. 25.
With their slackerfied-Blondie sounds, California trio Best Coast have a lot of potential as an up and coming band to get big on their first time around.
The Budos Band share a label (Gabriel Roth's Daptone Records) and a musical philosophy with the breakout Dap-Kings, but they play much smaller venues and evince a hairier, warmer vibe.
Lauded '00s Queens rapper is touring in front of a new Album, "W.A.R. (We Are Renegades)", due to hit your neighborhood record store (you have one, right?) Sept. 14.
A hung-over Tourfilter feels much better after a morning of Norwegian black metalists 1349 on the Grados. We think their constant volcanic shreiking and triple-time beats may have cleansed our brain of all humanity. Thank god, that shit was just slowing us down!
Roger Waters will be performing Pink Floyd's awesome 1979 double-album The Wall in its entirety.
Backed by a swooping organ, Asheville, NC's Reigning Sound are (inspiringly) in love with jangly, soulful singer-songwriters of the past: Van Morrison, Elvis Costello, Bruce Springsteen.
Aziz Ansari earned a place in Tourfilter's heart with his depiction of a Pitchfork-terrorizing "Indie Marketing Guru" in a send-up of the dawn of the MP3 blog era; he tours regularly with a hilarious conventional stand-up act.
Atmospheric Montreal rockers signed to Jagjaguwar, Besnard Lakes have featured guest appearances from members of Stars and Godspeed You Black Emporer.
Along with Elvis Costello and Joe Jackson, Graham Parker was one of the so-called "Angry Young Men" of '70's UK New Wave. With some of his early LPs often ranked in lists of the top rock albums of all time, getting to see Parker at the small clubs he currently visits will be a treat. Tourfilter's favorite Graham Parker song is the eerily-Spoon-like 1979 single "Local Girls" (check the absolutely classic video), but many may know him for "Discovering Japan," from the same record.
