http://www.expressmilwaukee.com/articles.sec-216-1-music-feature.html Few bands seem to have more contempt for the structural formality of sheet music than San Francisco's Deerhoof, a trio whose rhythms waver with all the precociousness of lead singer Satomi Matsuzaki's schoolgirl voice. So it was with some irony that the first taste of Deerhoof's latest work was a single released as sheet music well before a recorded version surfaced. ]]> Though his band's name seems pretty self-explanatory to him, Dead Confederate bassist Brantley Senn is amazed at how often it's misinterpreted.   "We're supposed to play this show sponsored by a cigarette company that rhymes with 'mammal,' and they refused to even put our name on the tickets," Senn says with a sigh. "They had a writer that refused to even write about us, because he said the name was racist. How dumb is that? We're Dead Confederate. It's not like we're Alive and Well and Retired in Florida Confederate."]]> Peter Hammill first made a name for himself in the 1960s as the singer-songwriter for prog-rock innovators Van der Graaf Generator, and since that band broke up in the 1970s has gone on to record literally dozens of shape-shifting solo albums, including his most recent, 2006's Singularity, his first since a Van der Graaf Generator reunited in 2005, and also his first since a near-fatal heart attack. The Shepherd Express' Mark Krueger interviewed Hammill this September, in advance of Hammill's Oct. 5 concert at Shank Hall. ]]>    Our conversation is painful, marked by enough long pauses to fill an entire season of "The Office." Pharrell Williams, the singer and public face of N.E.R.D., is normally the chatty one, but right now he's so disinterested in my questions that he's making his less talkative bandmate Shay answer them from a third phone line. Though he struggles to be polite, Shay prefaces many of his short answers with a barely disguised sigh.  "Hey, P, you still there?" ]]> Though he cautions that two of his band mates who once lived there might disagree with him, Andy Kavanaugh doesn't have many kind words about Green Bay. "We went up there in the middle of winter to record our latest album," he says of his band, The Goodnight Loving, "and it was just kind of a sober experience. ]]> After years of vetting vintage R&B records at his Riverwest store, Lotus Land Records, and spinning rare funk 45s at his monthly "Get Down" event, Andy Noble says he's pinpointed the qualities that make a song stand the test of time. "I'm in touch with how music ages," he explains. "There are certain elements of music that hold up, like rhythms. Good dance rhythms hold up forever. ]]> You aren't anybody if you aren't recording with the Black Keys. Producer Rick Rubin, himself a somebody, recently tapped the band to back Billy Gibbons for a few songs on ZZ Top's next album. Gibbons and Rubin join R&B legend Ike Turner and super-producer Danger Mouse on a growing list of The Black Keys' recent collaborators.]]> Almost seven years ago to the date, on Sept. 14, 2001, The Flower Kings, now arguably one of the world's leading progressive-rock bands, played what just might rank among Shank Hall's most memorable and cathartic shows. "I remember that gig, and I remember those days vividly," says guitarist, vocalist and head Flower King Roine Stolt, when reminded that the Swedish band was on a rare U.S. tour as the tragedy of 9/11 unfolded. The Flower Kings opened their penultimate show of that tour with "Last Minute On Earth," the lead track from . . . ]]> Mark Waldoch had saved up the necessary money, prepared himself emotionally to leave behind Milwaukee, his home of 15 years, and was ready to start a new life in New York. What he hadn't planned on, though, was developing a kidney stone the size of a golf ball shortly after his arrival. "I was in and out of the hospital for two months, put under anesthesia and all that," Waldoch shudders. "It was rough. I mean, talk about insane, they put a laser up my wang to blow up the kidney stone. I had to wear a catheter." With no health insurance to fall back on, Waldoch quickly exhausted his savings. In considerable debt, he returned to Milwaukee . . .]]> It's a stirring story, one that wraps Justin Vernon's album into a neat package. It starts when Vernon's first band breaks up, and it ends in the Northwoods. Jobless and sick, with nowhere to live and a desire to be alone, Vernon stayed (rent-free) in his father's hunting cabin through the winter. He chopped wood, brooded for a while, and then created a spectacular solo debut. Vernon's For Emma, Forever Ago doesn't merely capture a desperate Wisconsin winter, it captures a man resigned to its snowy, woodland loneliness. That's the true-to-life legend of Bon Iver-the dreariness of life expressed through an album full of dreary optimism, written by a man whose stage name is a play on the French words for "good winter." At least, that's the true-to-life legend that people keep telling . . . ]]> One would think that a 64-year-old blues musician who performs sitting down due to ongoing recovery from a hip broken in 2000 wouldn't be hard to track down. But it took several weeks and numerous trans-Atlantic phone calls before Johnny Winter finally surfaced in a club in a suburb of Rome, Italy. Winter and his three-piece backup band were on the last leg of a southern European tour, having just finished a late-night set performed before what the Albino blues guitarist thought was a fairly reserved crowd . . .]]> The Supersuckers are the greatest rock 'n' roll band in the world. It says so right on their Web site. And album covers. And merchandise. "At least 25% better than the next best band," says Rontrose, the band's one-named guitar player, tongue firmly in cheek. Some time around Thanksgiving, Rontrose and crew will celebrate their 20th anniversary as punk's answer to hedonistic, cowboy-hat wearing, meat-and-potatoes American rock 'n' roll. Twenty years is long enough for the band, born in Tucson, Ariz., to have moved to Seattle before the grunge movement took full steam . . .]]> Katy Perry’s single “I Kissed a Girl” has just topped the Billboard pop chart, and the 23-year-old’s schedule for the day is booked solid. Later today she’ll be shooting an insert for Blender magazine, doing an interview with Rolling Stone, signing autographs for an hour and a half, then performing as part of the Warped Tour. Right now, though, she’s doing phone interviews through an earpiece as she sits in pajamas and hair curlers, getting her nails done in a St. Louis strip mall. “I didn’t even care where we went,” she says, amused by the unglamorous salon. “I was like, ‘I’ve just got to get these cuticles cut!’ ” ]]> Local band Wooden Robot couldn’t be more mysterious. First, there’s their undeniably spooky sound: Think haunted Old World carnival or, better yet, a vodka-drenched dance party with your dead Polish-babushka grandmother. Then there are the places they usually play: dimly lit bars, crowded houses of friends and dark corners in cramped basements. The band’s performance at Turner Hall Ballroom on July 26, opening for Secret Chiefs 3 with The Demix, will mark a rare appearance in the spotlight. ]]> Gavin Rossdale was never a particularly convincing tortured soul to begin with, but with each passing year of domestic bliss with his superstar wife, Gwen Stefani, each picture of the photogenic couple and their beaming son, and each celebrity tennis tournament, it became even harder to buy the sun-tanned family man as the embodiment of existential despair. The former Bush frontman gave his old tormented persona one last spin in 2005, teaming with members of Helmet to record a lone album of thrashing, seething alternative rock with a short-lived new band, Institute . . . ]]> The Brahms symphony, considered to be one of the 19th-century com poser’s most emblematic works, gave Lesh a musical appreciation and grounding in a broader compositional discipline unusual to rock musicians. It also led the Berkeley, Calif. native on an impressive musical journey that preceded his chance mid-1960s...]]> Like just about everything in the city, Milwaukee’s hip-hop scenes are divided by racial and geographical boundaries. Populated largely by college students and graduates, the East Side’s hip-hop scene favors conscious and alternative rap, lionizes Talib Kweli and heralds the ’90s as rap’s golden age. Milwaukee’s grittier North Side scene, on the other hand, is more in the moment, drawn toward contemporary club rap, much of it fashioned after hits from the South. Separated by just a few miles, these two scenes exist with little overlap.]]> It’s not hard to get Kenny Wayne Shepherd to talk about cars, especially the Detroit muscle machines of the early 1970s. The Shreveport, La., blues musician, in fact, seems to have as much respect for Chrysler and Plymouth products from the V8 era as he does for some of the blues giants that inspired the searing, rapid-fire guitar riffs that have become his trademark. “I grew up with Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars,” says Shepherd, 31. “As an adult, I’ve had the chance to indulge that interest.” Shepherd’s passion for high-performance autos led him to join the 2008 Hot Rod Power Tour, a public driving event sponsored by Hot Rod magazine that left the Arkansas State Fairgrounds . . . ]]>