Articles by Gregory Adams.

Recordings

Loose Change Trio

By Gregory Adams
Unstruck Note (Independent)
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Recordings

Fur Bearing Animals

By Gregory Adams
Fur Bearing Animals (Independent)
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Recordings

Fleet Foxes

By Gregory Adams
Fleet Foxes (Sub Pop)
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Music Notes

Music Waste sees new blood

By Gregory Adams
This year’s edition of Music Waste, which ran June 4 to 8, saw local music fans descend on venues like Hoko’s, Pub 340, and the Astoria to check out the latest punk, folk, and experimental-noise acts Vancouver has to offer. Festival organizer Cameron Reed said venues were busy, and he was excited by the number of unfamiliar faces he saw in the crowds. “People that aren’t going to local shows all the time were coming out four nights in a row,” he told the Straight. “It [Music Was
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Recordings

Millencolin

By Gregory Adams
Machine 15 (Epitaph)
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Concert Reviews

Still awesome to be punk for NOFX

By Gregory Adams
NOFX
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Music Features

Lykke Li, from Sweden with love

By Gregory Adams
The Stockholm indie It Girl is the buzz of the blogs, with her bouncy mélange of electro-pop, girl-group gleefulness, and hipster dance music, but she says she’d rather lose it on the dance floor than surf the Web.
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Music Features

American Steel throws punk-rock curve balls

By Gregory Adams
Chances are American Steel fans didn’t believe it when the group announced it was playing a show last year. After all, the Oakland punk act had been defunct for half a decade, and most of its members had moved on to the decidedly poppier project Communique. There was also the fact that the show was scheduled for April Fools’ Day. Fortunately for punk fans, the show was no joke.
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Recordings

No Age

By Gregory Adams
Nouns (Sub Pop)
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Recordings

Sun Kil Moon

By Gregory Adams
April (Caldo Verde)
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Music Notes

Music Waste festival sifts applications

By Gregory Adams
It’s that time of year again as the organizers of Music Waste, Vancouver’s premier underground music festival, start to sift through the heaps of bands that want to play the annual event. Set to take place June 5 to 8 at a number of venues, including the Astoria, Pub 340, and Hoko’s, Music Waste will try to fit as many acts onto Vancouver stages as possible. “People have been applying since September,” organizer Cameron Reed told the Straight.
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Music Notes

They Shoot Horses Don’t They? put to pasture

By Gregory Adams
After five years of amazing fans with its brash, brass-based sound, local indie outfit They Shoot Horses Don’t They? is calling it quits. Having released two criminally overlooked albums of oompa-laden rock on seminal Pacific Northwest indie label Kill Rock Stars, the oddball outfit will trot on-stage one last time at the Astoria on April 26. “It saddens me,” singer Nut Brown told the Straight. “We love playing together. It’s just circumstances and events, you know.” The vocalis
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Recordings

Mahjongg

By Gregory Adams
Kontpab (K)
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Music Features

Plants and Animals continue to evolve

By Gregory Adams
With successful indie bands streaming out of Montreal over the past couple of years, much has been made about Plants and Animals becoming the next Arcade Fire or Wolf Parade.
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Music Notes

Back on the S.T.R.E.E.T.S.

By Gregory Adams
Good news for Vancouver skate rats: local thrashers S.T.R.E.E.T.S. are back and ready to get rad. The downside, however, is that their upcoming reunion gig is on March 22 at the Cakeshop, a venue in singer Jonny Olsen’s adopted city of New York. “He got married and moved out there,” bassist Mike Payette tells the Straight. It’s been a while since S.T.R.E.E.T.S. has graced a stage, and he hopes the band’s chops are up to snuff by next week.
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Recordings

Ladyhawk

By Gregory Adams
Shots (Jagjaguwar)
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Concert Reviews

Monotonix puts on fiery freak show

By Gregory Adams
If there’s one thing that can be said of Israeli garage-rockers Monotonix, it’s that they definitely know how to wake up a crowd.
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Music Features

Black Halos revisit their roots

By Gregory Adams
Billy Hopeless has been coming to Foo’s Ho Ho since he was a kid. It’s his favourite local restaurant. Situated on the seedy corner of East Pender and Columbia streets, the modest eatery isn’t exactly in the nicest part of Chinatown. But seated in front of a heaping plate of fried rice, the Black Halos vocalist maintains that it’s one of the classiest joints in the city.
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Local Motion

Certain Breeds walks on the creepy side

By Gregory Adams
Certain Breeds loves a good horror flick. Huddled together in vocalist-keyboardist Jen Riego’s Mount Pleasant bachelor pad, the quartet’s members are doing their best to answer questions surrounding their achingly gloomy self-titled debut, but the distraction of Italian splatter legend Dario Argento’s Deep Red playing across the room proves too much.
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Recordings

Rivers Cuomo

By Gregory Adams
A Holy Grail of sorts for nerdy Weezer fans everywhere, Rivers Cuomo’s collection of demos ranging from the early ’90s to now is a solid reminder that the man currently responsible for radio schlock like “Beverly Hills” used to be infallible.
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Recordings

Inhabitants

By Gregory Adams
The Furniture Moves Underneath (Drip Audio)
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Music Features

Silverstein sacrifices for screamo’s sake

By Gregory Adams
Even though he’s been crisscrossing the globe nonstop for the past couple of years, Silverstein drummer Paul Koehler knows there is so much more of the world he could see. While spending about three-quarters of the year on the road with the rest of the Burlington, Ontario–based screamo rockers, the musician admits that between playing shows, travelling to gigs, and speaking with the press, he doesn’t really have much time to sightsee.
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Concert Reviews

The Circle Jerks

By Gregory Adams
Aging Jerks unleash a golden shower of hits
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Music Features

Cave Singers’ Americana spans generation gaps

By Gregory Adams
Derek Fudesco isn’t used to playing classy joints. Growing up on the punk circuit, the Seattle musician has performed in countless dive bars, all-ages clubs, and grungy art spaces for crusty kids worldwide. He figured things would be the same for the Cave Singers, his current folk-oriented group, but a recent gallery show in Seattle has the guitarist bemused by the places his band finds itself these days.
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Recordings

Bastards of Light by Black Mountain

By Gregory Adams
On Bastards of Light, a limited-edition vinyl-only EP, Black Mountain takes a moment or two to chill out
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Recordings

Ire Works by The Dillinger Escape Plan

By Gregory Adams
Featuring seizure-inducing solos and frenetic genre-splicing even headier than anything the Dillinger Escape Plan has done before, the latest mind-bending long player by the tech-metal favourites will have bangers rejoicing worldwide
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Recordings

Place of Decay by In Stride

By Gregory Adams
There is nothing revolutionary about local hardcore act In Stride’s seven-song debut; what more can you ask of the quintet’s choice of genre, other than songs that are short, fast, and aggressive as hell? Place of Decay, fortunately, is all three
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Music Features

The Locust finds new ways to make symponies of destruction

By Gregory Adams
Formed in the mid '90s, the Locust used to specialize in short, shard-strewn blasts of terrifying, synthesizer-fuelled noise. With thousands of copycat acts also playing as if a shrieking litter of kittens had been thrown onto a NASCAR track, the Locust finds itself no longer satisfied with playing jarring salvos of bizarro punk.
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Recordings

Radiohead

By Gregory Adams
In Rainbows (Independent)
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Music Features

Magic motivates melancholy Bat for Lashes

By Gregory Adams
Whether she's wanted to or not, Bat for Lashes singer Natasha Khan has had to talk about herself a lot over the past year. A media darling in her native England, the chanteuse has been grilled about her fashion style–a mix of glittery face paint and hand-me-downs from Sun Ra–as much as about Fur and Gold, her band's mystical dance-folk debut.
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Concert Reviews

Cannibal Corpse

By Gregory Adams
At the Croatian Cultural Centre on Thursday, September 20
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Recordings

Foo Fighters target blue-collar Bud swillers

By Gregory Adams
Foo FightersEchoes, Silence, Patience & Grace (RCA)
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Music Features

No Ager trades textbooks for debilitating tinnitus

By Gregory Adams
For the past couple of years, No Age guitarist Randy Randall has split his time between teaching Los Angeles teens and rocking out for them on the all-ages circuit. This fall, though, the buzz behind the duo's stellar Weirdo Rippers, an amalgam of shoegazing ambiance and trashy punk, has the California native temporarily packing up his textbooks to get in the van. But when reached on his cellphone on the first day of school, Randall admits to having problems leaving the classroom behind.
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Recordings

Liars

By Gregory Adams
Liars (Mute)
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Recordings

The Tranzmitors

By Gregory Adams
The Tranzmitors (Deranged/Stiff)
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Music Features

Psychedelic punk? That's Fucked Up

By Gregory Adams
Things have been going deceptively well for Toronto's Fucked Up. First off, the hardcore quintet has been travelling the globe nonstop since the release of its raging debut, Hidden World, late last year. The epic album has garnered unanimous acclaim, even snagging the group a showcase on Canada's MTV Live. But despite its good fortune, there are major problems in the Fucked Up camp. Big ones include the fact that the group's members hate touring and, quite frankly, aren't even that fond of one another.
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Music Features

Glass Candy duo says "Let's get metaphysical"

By Gregory Adams
You'd hardly guess it from her glossy work with Portland disco duo Glass Candy, but vocalist Ida No is into some heavy metaphysical shit. Rather than prepping for a night under the mirror ball, the singer was stepping out for a past-life-regression therapy session when the Straight caught her at her Oregon home.
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Local Motion

Fake Shark gets little love in its hometown

By Gregory Adams
Like scores of musical artists before them, from the '80s hair-metal atrocity Quiet Riot to former Baywatch hunk (and hamburger-munching drunk) David Hasselhoff, the boys of Fake Shark Real Zombie are tasting success overseas before becoming hometown heroes. Since forming in late 2005, the Vancouver four-piece has done most of its touring in the U.K., and its debut release, Zebra Zebra, has thus far only been released in Japan.
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Music Notes

No music wasted

By Gregory Adams
East Van's long-running outsider music festival, Music Waste, wrapped up last weekend, having showcased more than 50 performances by the city's punk, folk, and avant-garde acts. Organizer Cam Reed , sounding a little the worse for wear, said the fest was near perfect but admitted he'll do things differently next year. "I'm going to rent a car," the planner told the Straight , explaining that he spent much of the weekend hauling gear to clubs.
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Concert Reviews

Arcade Fire

By Gregory Adams
At Deer Lake Park on Thursday, May 24
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Recordings

Joanna Newsom

By Gregory Adams
& The Ys Street Band (Drag City)
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Music Features

Screaming gives way to ranting for Finger Eleven

By Gregory Adams
As Finger Eleven can attest, a lot can change for a band in 15 years. Since its formation, the Bur­lington, Ontario, quintet has changed its image, its musical direction, and, most wisely, its name. This is, of course, the group formerly known as the Rainbow Butt Monkeys.
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Music Features

Everybody wants to rule the world

By Gregory Adams
Well, maybe Jarvis Cocker doesn’t, but the former Pulp singer has a few choice words for those who do.
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Music Features

Pop hooks, classical chops coexist in Rossi's songs

By Gregory Adams
Judging by Anni Rossi's MySpace profile, which bluntly states "It's not a violin, it's a viola," the artist has likely corrected more than a few confused admirers of her avant-folkie work. Despite its lower register and larger frame, it's easy to confuse the viola with its more popular cousin. The statement, however, plays off of the string community's attitude toward her instrument of choice.
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Music Features

New Wave a state of mind for frustrated Against Me!

By Gregory Adams
This will be a disappointing spring for anyone eagerly anticipating New Wave, the fourth offering from Florida political pop-punkers Against Me! Upset as the band's fans might be, none are as bummed as singer-guitarist Tom Gabel about its newly set summer release date.
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Recordings

Arcade Fire

By Gregory Adams
Neon Bible (Merge)
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Recordings

Mutators

By Gregory Adams
Mutators (Grotesque Modern)
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Concert Reviews

Wolfmother unleashes an all-out love fest

By Gregory Adams
At the Forum on Thursday, February 22
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Music Features

Sounds of bygone times haunt Grizzly Bear tune

By Gregory Adams
Last year was an up-and-down one for Grizzly Bear. The Brooklyn, New York, quartet’s sophomore album, Yellow House, garnered heaps of praise for its ambient melding of folk and electronic music. However, bassist Chris Taylor would like to forget having to cut short a European tour after thieves made off with the band’s gear in Brussels. Though most of the instruments have since been replaced, the bassist is choked about one missing item.
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Recordings

The Shins

By Gregory Adams
Wincing the Night Away (Sub Pop)
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