Boulder Blues Legend Makes Rare Appearance at Dazzle by Adam Perry for Westword 12/21/2023
Colorado bluesman Otis Taylor, a Chicago native, remembers being at the Rolling Stones’ legendary Hyde Park concert in London back in 1969, but it wasn’t the music he found particularly interesting.
“I didn’t care — I was just chasing girls at the time. I was just doing my miniskirt tour,” he admits. “I didn’t really care that the Rolling Stones were on stage. Thousands of people and all these hot chicks, and I’m, like, ‘Fuck.’ I just had a different attitude about it, but I always had an attitude about that until I got married.”
Anarchy In the Mile High A Conversation with Subhumans Frontman Dick Lucas by Adam Perry for Denver Westword 11/3/2023
Punk-rock stalwart Subhumans burst out of England more than forty years ago, with angry, intelligent socio-political anthems such as “Parasites” and “Religious Wars.” And while fans of hardcore punk might believe Subhumans emerged fully formed from a Wiltshire sewer, singer Dick Lucas (who also fronts Citizen Fish and Culture Shock) says he was actually into Black Sabbath, Frank Zappa and even (gasp) David Bowie, before punk-rock group Crass blew his mind in 1977.
“Feeding of the 5000 was lyrically the most profound record I’d ever heard up to that point, and it just opened this door to a reality where there was such a thing as ‘the system,’” Lucas recalls. “I didn’t know what a ‘system’ was. I didn’t know what capitalism was. I didn’t know what corporate actually meant, and never considered the church to be anything other than dull and boring. Suddenly, [Crass] was a band not only thinking outside the box — they destroyed the box completely, and the music was just right in your face.”
Denver alt-country singer-songwriter Courtney Whitehead, who records and performs under the name Bison Bone, has long been a Baker neighborhood staple, but he’s an Okie at heart. Growing up in Oklahoma, the former jock even had quite the countrified nickname.
“Chicken gum,” Whitehead says, was his “baseball-superstitious” nickname as a teenager.
“Any championship game, any big game, my mom would always make fried chicken before the game. I’d always chew gum during the game; I would always I played third base, the hot corner, so there was a big game where I was playing really well and my coach was just, ‘He’s chewing that chicken gum today,'” he explains. “It kind of stuck.”
Bad Religion (with the Dwarves and Speed of Light) Mission Ballroom, Denver October 12, 2023
“Rock legends stand before you,” Blag Dahlia of the Dwarves told the Denver crowd last night from the big Mission Ballroom stage, just before diving into another of the group’s hardcore tunes, which fall somewhere between the Misfits’ Earth A.D. album and 2 Live Crew.
Nearing its 40th anniversary as a band, the San Francisco-based Dwarves play hardcore songs about hardcore sex, and have a hell of a good time doing it.
“The best-looking band in Denver is the Dwarves,” Dahlia said at one point, but amid the dick references, backseat sex and blazing punk-rock drums, Dahlia also sang the powerful song “I Will Deny,” which cut through the band’s set like an emotional knife.
“Nobody loves me, nobody cares / And when I die, there won’t be nobody there.”
Speed of Light, made up of young siblings from Santa Monica, conversely won the crowd waiting for Bad Religion over without singing anything we could understand. 16-year-old Riley Claire, on bass and raging vocals, led her two brothers through a punk-metal set that reached its unforgettable climax when she jumped into the mosh pit in front of the stage and kept singing.
When it comes to words, I joked repeatedly to several groups of local friends who came to see Bad Religion at Mission that singer Greg Graffin, a PhD in evolutionary biology, taught me a lot of words growing up, from “jurisprudence” to “ineffectual.” When he walked on stage last night, the sight of the 58-year-old immediately reminded me of staying up until midnight in the sixth grade to record Bad Religion’s 120 Minutes performance of “American Jesus” on MTV, because I knew that watching their drummer play it would help me learn it, as my band eventually performed the song at the middle-school talent show.
If Graffin is old, I’m certainly old, too.
Bad Religion played for about 90 minutes, as the sea of people about 10 rows deep in front of the stage swelled, pushed, sang along with nearly every lyric, and watched out for a few folks who considered throwing punches “moshing.” Graffin said at one point, “What’s going on up here is about half of what’s going on down there,” and hailed the guy moshing all night wearing a banana suit with “the masses of humanity have always had to suffer” drawn on the back.
Guitarist Mike Dimkich, very much like a Southern California version of Johnny Thunders, played tasteful punk while his counterpart, the legendary Brian Baker of Minor Threat and Samhain fame, was free to absolutely slay on world-class lead guitar, switching instruments numerous times, and nail the intros to burn-it-all-down hardcore classics like “Fuck Armaggedon, This Is Hell.”
Bad Religion doesn’t have a full-length album more recent than 2019, but many of Graffin’s intellectual and even educational lyrics are forever apt, plus “Infected” resonated in the COVID-era, especially while packed into a sweaty crowd of people struggling for footing, and the biggest crowd-pleaser, “We’re Only Gonna Die,” fit right into our modern times of war and greed. “We’re Only Gonna Die,” in particular, made it obvious how for Bad Religion has come in its 40-plus years as a band, turning songs like that, written when Graffin was a San Fernando Valley teen and released as a beautifully messy piece of seething genius in 1982, into impressive anthems by a band full of musicians who have honed their craft, and seen the world in Graffin’s songs come more to life each year, over all these decades.
Closing with “American Jesus,” Bad Religion made me remember Mike Mills campaigning for John Kerry in 2004, taking a swipe at George W. Bush by saying “I want my president to be smarter than me.” When I see Graffin preaching for a better humanity and against avarice and ignorance on stage, I think how important it is to treasure rock stars who are exponentially smarter than me.
The Smile at Mission Ballroom, Denver 12/10/22 Words by Adam Perry Photos by Mikayla Sanford
Radiohead stars Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood are 54 and 51, respectively, but when the pair took the big Mission Ballroom stage in Denver side by side on Saturday night as The Smile with avant-garde drummer Tom Skinner they seemed like kids in a candy store, excitedly playing their first gig in someone’s parents’ garage.
Skinner, 42, also intermittently dabbled in the synthesizers set up next to his kit. He forged a musical relationship with Greenwood while working on the soundtrack to the 2012 Oscar-winning movie The Master, and started The Smile with Greenwood and Yorke last year – releasing a debut album this year.
At the Mission – following a brave instrumental set by talented saxophonist Robert Stillman, who vowed to “open the space, open our hearts” – Yorke and Greenwood traded off playing bass and guitar on progressive, but enticing and sometimes danceable, Smile tunes that seem like an extension of Radiohead workouts like “Bodysnatchers” and “Burn the Witch.” Skinner’s brilliant polyrhythms and flowing jazz-meets-techno feel clearly energized Yorke, in particular, so much at the 3,900-capacity Mission Ballroom that I wondered what heights post-OK Computer Radiohead might’ve reached with such a creative, visionary drummer essentially playing quarterback.
Yorke – white beard, long reddish brown hair and black sport coat – shook around like David Byrne circa Stop Making Sense and made eccentric, pained faces as the trio’s hypnotic alt-rock pulsed. At times, the English rock legend wandered the edge of the Mission stage egging the adoring Denver crowd on with oddball histrionics – like Gollum cheering on a rock audience – that recalled Kurt Cobain’s iconic MTV Live and Loud antics but somehow seemed altogether joyous, connected and endearing rather than sarcastic or insulting.
Though “Good evening, Denver – we’re the Smile” was the bulk of what Yorke said to the crowd, along with a dad joke about fish during a synthesizer malfunction, his joy was tangible and at times overflowing. The Smile’s music, like Radiohead’s, can range from gorgeously weird, pin-drop quiet hymns to frenzied, even clubby indie-rock bangers – if the club were out of a scene from Naked Lunch.
Greenwood, for his part, initially took the stage in a comically oversized sweater and ridiculously baggy black pants, giving off serious Schroeder (or even Linus vibes) that made him look more 15 than 50. Radiohead’s resident wunderkind – the little brother who quickly became second only to Yorke in Radiohead dynamism and importance – played everything from guitar to bass to piano, synthesizer and even harp, tackling it all like his life depended on it, especially when The Smile hit peaks on songs that featured Greenwood’s lawnmower-sounding guitar straight out of Rust Never Sleeps.
From the set opener “The Same,” Yorke’s lyrics were at least a touch more positive and direct than a lot of Radiohead material. “We don’t need to fight,” he sang, “Look towards the light.” The lyrics fit Yorke’s hopeful, ecstatic feel as he danced around, but by the time he sang “I’m gonna count to three / keep this shit away from me” (“Read the Room”) during the four-song encore it was good ‘ol dystopian-nightmare (in a very English way) time.
When Stillman walked on stage to add saxophone to The Smile’s alt-rock hypnosis, David Bowie’s Outside and Blackstar albums came to mind, with the kind of poignant, beautiful darkness Jon Hassell famously added to the Talking Heads’ Remain In Light.
“We’re doing another record, you know?” Yorked blurted out at one moment, to cheers, and as the crowd throbbed while he sang “Don’t bore us / get to the chorus / and open the floodgates” it seemed obvious that both band and audience hope The Smile is around for a very long time.
Although neither of them are Centennial State natives, there’s not a much more Colorado moment than seeing Nathaniel Rateliff – the most famous musician to burst out of Denver in decades – sing the line “I’m as honest as a Denver man can be” on stage with Bob Weir in the Mile High City.
Photo by Kassidy Paine (@kassidyaaren on Instagram)
CONCERT REVIEW: Florence + the Machine Ball Arena, Denver 10/1/22
A siren, a songbird, an angel, a rebellious medieval princess singing her diary entries – just four things that came to mind as the English singer-songwriter Florence Welch twirled around the Ball Arena stage, under about a dozen white chandeliers, on Saturday night. The tall, redheaded songstress (barefoot in her customary flowing gown and crown) and her incredible band (The Machine) played to a packed house of just under 20,000 fans – many of whom came decked out in flowing gowns and flowered crowns of their own, and not just the ladies.
In all my years, I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many concertgoers cosplay the act they were paying to see, and that includes Mac DeMarco fans. It was honestly unnerving at first – and funny when I jokingly asked a group of girls if they could spare an extra flower crown and was told, without a hint of sarcasm, “No, I’m sorry, we don’t” – but when, as “Dream Girl Evil” kicked in, Ms. Welch leapt into the front of the crowd to sing while held up by the hands of her most devoted, passionate, screaming-and-crying fans, it was suddenly not only sweet but moving.
Welch is just 36, but her debut album, Lungs, was released when she was 22 and her catalog is impressive and extensive. A bunch of songs from Lungs, including “Kiss with a Fist,” hit hard on Saturday in Denver, and found Welch repeatedly punching the air as her band delivered tasteful, energetic rock behind her. It was her first trip to Colorado since before the pandemic began, and while her fashion sense (think Princess Buttercup-as-a-rockstar, or Stevie Nicks) remains intact, her stage set has transformed from hanging white fabric to putting a veritable ice castle behind her instead of her drummer and singing underneath a giant door frame filled with giant white chandeliers.
Though Welch brought Ball Arena to a boil by singing several songs from within the crowd, holding hands with fans or simply walking amongst them, she also sang “Big God,” a powerful and thought-provoking 2018 ballad, within a sort of black-curtain cage that allowed her to play with shadows as she sang.
Welch’s most effectual music has a direct line from Kate Bush’s before-her-time pop-rock and falls somewhere between David Bowie’s pre-Ziggy folk (think “Memory of a Free Festival”) and Madonna’s “Like a Prayer,” with a unique combination of thumping drums, jangly guitar and a twinkly harp added. Half of her band features multi-instrumentalists who astutely support Welch through a plethora of feels, but for all their tasteful, trained musicianship they also know how to rock. Bangers like “Ship to Wreck” got the Ball Arena crowd dancing, and before the final tune, “Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up),” Welch implored the audience to celebrate the end of lockdowns by engaging in “a resurrection of dance” and taking her “Dance Fever Tour” theme seriously.
“Denver!” she shouted. “People in the back, up top, I see you! On the sides and in the middle! You’ve given us so much, but I don’t want you to take anything home with you. Leave everything you have on the floor.” For a moment I thought Welch had turned into some sort of guru who demanded the emptying of pockets as a tribute. “We want every last piece of your energy, Denver,” she explained further. “Can you give that to us?”
The roar was a resounding yes in response. It was my third time at Ball Arena in about a week, having witnessed Denver’s palpable, raucous responses to Gorillaz and Pearl Jam, but Welch’s connection with her fans was on another level – and at times surreal because of her unabashed leaps into pits of screaming, crying girls and boys dressed just like her, at one point donning one of the flower crowns a fan brought. Welch even singled out one young woman in a flower crown and white dress who was literally convulsing with sobs and hugged her tight as they sang together.
Photo by Seth Husk
The opening act, 24-year-old Florida singer Ethel Cain, looked like she might as well have been one of those beautifully hysterical Florence fans in the crowd, but her music – inspired by Christian hymns, indie-pop and, clearly, Florence Welch – quickly earned the respect and support of the big crowd, which made Cain smile continuously.
I joked aloud at one point that the very talented Cain looks like the girl in The Ring who comes through the television, feeling bad about it even as it left my lips.
“But before she died,” I was hilariously reminded.
Perhaps the most touching moment of the night was when Welch brought Cain on stage midway through the headliner’s set to not just sing on but share lead vocal duties on the enchanting and inspiring new song “Morning Elvis.” Both singers were beaming, and both delivered absolutely stunning performances.
If Welch, who thanked the crowd for embracing her “messy, broken, shameful” feelings put to music, inspires people of all ages to do more than dance, I hope it’s what she commanded at one point as the crowd listened intently: “To anyone joining us for the first time, or to anyone chaperoning, asking ‘What the fuck is this? Is this a cult? Is this some kind of British pagan ceremony?’ if you just do what I say you’ll be absolutely fine: Put your phone away!”
Can He Take His Hounds to Red Rocks? Tyler Childers Climbs to Heaven
Halfway through his sold-out performance at Red Rocks last night, Kentucky singer-songwriter Tyler Childers walked right through the middle of the crowd with an acoustic guitar and played a short solo set from about the 20th row. Today’s popular music doesn’t feature many artists who can captivate an audience of almost 10,000 with just one voice and six strings, let alone with the courage to part the sea of concertgoers like Moses, inches from discerning faces and discerning smartphones, to deliver from the heart without a net. Childers, the son of a coal-miner and a nurse, drew from folk music that’s about as old as Puritan America as he belted out “Nose On the Grindstone,” “Follow You to Virgie” and “Lady May” in his weary working-class tenor, which falls somewhere between Hank Williams and Kurt Cobain.
“This is the first time that I’ve ever been in the seats for a show here,” Childers (in a jean jacket, jeans and boots) said between tunes. “It’s pretty nice.”
It was the second of two straight sold-out Red Rocks shows (Childers played two at the legendary Morrison venue last September as well) and the Thursday setlist varied greatly from Wednesday. The gritty singer-songwriter is just 31, but he self-released his first album at age 19 and, other than during the height of the pandemic, has been touring and recording pretty much non-stop since, attracting a devoted following. Childers’ catalog is already extensive and revered (by virtually every corner of Americana except the Country Music Association, which embraces stylized country pop and spurns Childers and Sturgill Simpson), his rough singing seeming to come from somewhere so deep in his body it hurts, but keeps him alive.
“Keep your nose on the grindstone and out of the pills,” the big Red Rocks crowd – a good portion of it in cowboy hats – sang along with Childers as he perched in the center of it, spinning cautionary tales of dead-end jobs and substance abuse. Early in his set, which began at 9pm, his six-piece band (dubbed The Food Stamps) played funky Charlie Daniels and Kenny Rogers covers, ripping solos that would put any jamband to shame, as psychedelic-funhouse visuals swirled. I was reminded of the first Allman Brothers shows I attended as a teenager in Pittsburgh, surprised that Dickey Betts and Greg Allman – who I considered “southern rock” stars – played on a stage draped in images of magic mushrooms and tie-dye.
The best country musicians, I was shocked to learn many years ago, might be the most versatile musicians on earth, not only able to play well in virtually any style but also be depended upon to actually have something to say with their playing when called upon. Childers’ core band – mostly made up of young Kentucky and West Virginia players – brought rock, funk, soul, country, bluegrass and blues to his originals last night, tastefully slaying as he sang tales of the school bus and the holler and farm work.
Hearing a voice like Childers’, that’s worth the price of admission to hear him sing just about anything, in person one realizes why singular vocal talents like Elvis, Johnny Cash and Ray Charles were called upon to record albums of many kinds of music – and they all eventually recorded gospel. After his solo set on the Red Rocks stairs, which he joked about “ziplining back” from, Childers and his band put on suits and were joined by no less than three dozen more musicians (from a string section and a chorus to sitar player) and took us to church for nine soaring gospel tunes, the psychedelic images on the screens around the stage suddenly giving way to visions of stained glass.
Most of the weighty, sometimes foreboding gospel tunes – exhilarating under the Colorado stars on a fall night even for a non-believer – drew from Childers’ new album, Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven?, which drops today.
“Well, this is the album,” Childers told the crowd at one point as the huge group of musicians surrounded him like a preacher’s congregation. To paraphrase “Old Country Church,” that small country boy’s heart seemed to beat with joy as he belted out songs about the glory of at the end of the line with as much passion as he’d just sung about whiskey and the pretty classmate who’d “bring me in and give me some” after school.
At 11pm, Childers’ set ended with the house lights signaling there would be no encore. In his black suit and tie, crew cut and clean shave, Childers – who for many years sported long red hair and a mustache – looked reborn as he thanked the crowd. As Waylon Jennings sang on the Red Rocks PA and the exits beckoned, I didn’t feel saved but I sure felt entertained and inspired.
I let my 12-year-old serve as DJ on the way to the Gorillaz show at Ball Arena in Denver last night, and from Boulder on down they were happy to surprise me with selections from D12, Payday and the Aubreys. They were also happy to be headed to their first big arena show (on a school night, no less) instead of yet another Rockies game…
As Pearl Jam’s two-and-a-half-hour, tour-closing show at Ball Arena concluded last night and the Seattle rock group stood on stage thanking fans and crew, notoriously loquacious frontman Eddie Vedder introduced his bandmates one by one.
“These are the names of the people who love you,” the baritone singer announced. “I love you too.”
Adam Perry 