A couple years ago, Milwaukee rapper Stricklin told us he was tracking songs for his solo debut with a then little-known Australian producer he met on tour with his group eMC called M-Phazes. Though Strick's album still doesn't have a release date—w

Summerfest is one of the most coveted gigs for many local bands. Unfortunately, it can also be one of the most elusive, given the festival's preference for familiar faces over newcomers. The festival does accept applications, though. Each year Summerfest

Prolific Memphis garage-rock songwriter Jay Reatard was found dead in his home this morning, several sources have confirmed. He was 29. Reatard's sometime label Goner Records issued a brief statement on its Web site today: "It is with great sadness t

No country’s music scene is completely immune from unwarranted hype, but I get the sense the problem is particularly bad in the U.K., where it seems a new band of college students is decreed the next U2 every other week, most of them faceless facsim

Ever on the pulse of these things—or at least a swift beat or two behind—Philadelphia pioneer Diplo is the latest DJ to ride the Gucci Mane gold rush, offering a remix mixtape that gives the club treatment to cuts from the white hot (and oft-i

Looks like Pavement fans hoping to catch one of the band's reunion concerts might not have to travel as far as New York or Europe. As Matt from You Ain't No Picasso notes, Pavement drummer Bob Nastanovich seems to have confirmed to his hometown paper in L

The Baltimore dream-pop duo Beach House titled its upcoming third album Teen Dream, though they might as well have named it Merriweather Post Pavilion 2010 for the universal accolades it's going to receive. Bolder and more direct than the hushed Beach Hou

Lotus Land Records owner Andy Noble has respectfully requested that I not make a big deal about the closing on his Riverwest record store. I'll try my best to comply while putting out the necessary info: The shop, at 832 E. Clarke St., which specializes i

Wisconsin's most famous music studio, Smart Studios in Madison, will shut down this spring, the Shepherd Express has learned. An employee of the recording space confirmed the news. No final date has been set, though March 1 has been discussed. The reason

Here's some welcome news: Passion Pit, one of 2009's breakout bands, will play the Turner Hall Ballroom on April 3 as part of their spring tour, the band announced today. The group's debut album, Manners, a electro-pop record so assured it played like a s

I'm not sure if this is a reflection on the interest surrounding Vampire Weekend, the aggressive promotional campaign behind their new album, the growing distance between Milwaukee's East Side and Bay View neighborhoods, the gentrification of the city or

Legendary soul producer Willie Mitchell, the architect of the classic Hi Records sound heard on records from Al Green and Ann Peebles, died yesterday morning at age 81. Green and Mitchell spent the 1970s making literally some of the best records of all ti

January was a traditionally slow time for CD releases, but that’s changed over the last several years, as more bands see the opportunity for their albums to stand out during a month when there isn’t much else going on. This January’s rel

Schadenfreude fiends won’t find much excitement here: Vampire Weekend’s sophomore album, Contra, isn’t the Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! flame out that the buzz band’s detractors might have hoped for. It’s an amiable follow-up th

Ryan Schleicher and Ryan Matteson from Muzzle of Bees and WMSE were kind enough to invite me and Steven Hyden from the A.V. Club Milwaukee to sit in on their latest joint podcast. If you've got 55-minutes to spare, it's worth checking out: We share some o

Most of Milwaukee's pre-Internet punk scene has gone under-documented, some of it lost to the ages. The Web site MilwaukeeHardcore.net has helped fill in some of the gaps, offering biographies of many of the city's forgotten bands, but it wasn't until the

Most readers are probably well past their "end of the year" list saturation point by now, but there's one more that deserves special attention: Passion of the Weiss's The 50 Best Hip-Hop Songs of 2009. The blog has compiled a fantastic downloada

Almost, the first record from Milwaukee’s transgressive trio Crappy Dracula, isn’t nearly the endurance test the band wants it to be. “This record is over-the-top intentionally stupid, silly AND obnoxious power garage punkish rock!&rdquo

"Who says mutants don't celebrate the holidays?" Milwaukee's most impeccably branded hip-hop crew, House of M, asked on its Twitter account today.The superhero-themed collective, named after a Marvel comic series, is celebrating Christmas by giv

The Chicago area (and one-time Milwaukee-ish) indie-pop band Kid, You'll Move Mountains are promoting their upcoming show at the Metro in Chicago on Jan. 2 with the not-so-modest URL http://www.greatestshowever.com and a ton of freebies: The show itself i

There's a nice rap show tonight that's flown a bit under the radar outside of radio station V100, where ads have been running regularly: Atlanta swag enthusiasts Fast Life Yungstaz (F.L.Y.) are performing at Club Passions, 2579 N. Teutonia Ave. Best known

Milwaukee’s long-running RiverSplash festival won’t be returning next year, organizers announced today. The news comes after the event has suffered several years of bad weather and, especially following a 2008 shooting, even worse press.

2k Treasures, a series revisiting some of the decade’s overlooked and underrated albums, continues today with a look back at Bun B’s 2008 album, II Trill. Bun B’s narrative arch is one of the most touching i

For the past couple decades, contemporary R&B has suffered an image problem. Hip-hop is largely to blame for that. In by the late ’80s, the genre had adopted most of rap’s bad qualities: the tougher-than-thou attitude, the sterile, mechani

This is traditionally the slowest time for live music, as touring bands take a sabbatical for the holidays that lasts until mid-January, when college students start returning to campuses. The upside of that downtime, though, is it allows local bands the s