EARLY WORD: A Man Called Benjy

If there’s a middle ground somewhere between the arty scuzz of the White Stripes and the sunny, off-center pop of ELO’s “Mr. Blue Sky,” D.C.-based artist Benjy Ferree has planted a flag in it and claimed it for himself. Come Back to the Five and Dime Bobby Dee Bobby Dee, Ferree’s second and most recent album, hops adeptly from style to style while keeping Ferree’s agile wail at the center and the guitar fuzz around the edges. Just when I thought the music would slip into some faux-soul a la Gavin DeGraw, it turns toward the dreamy, overstuffed style of […]

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PYROMANIA: Cops Nab 2nd Coatesville Fire-Starter

INQUIRER: For week upon week, Coatesville-area residents wondered who was doing this to them. Who was lighting the fires that made national news, left scores of people homeless, caused at least $3.5 million in damage, and left Coatesville afraid to sleep? Was it somebody they saw on the street, somebody who stood beside them in the convenience store? Authorities said yesterday that at least nine of the 24 fires set since Jan. 1 had been the work of a 19-year-old tech student from Downingtown — nine miles away. The suspect had no reported connection to the old steel town, 35 […]

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HEAR YE: Neko Case Middle Cyclone

Now playing on PHAWKER RADIO! Comes out March 3rd. She plays the Keswick Theater on April 10th. PREVIOUSLY: As of 2005, Patsy Cline’s 12 Greatest Hits sold 10 million copies. Not bad for a ghost. She got on a plane to Kansas City in 1963 — just a couple years into her newfound fame as the sweetheart of the Nashville rodeo — and never came back, disappearing into the ether of immortality like Amelia Earhart in spurs. Her ghost has been haunting American music ever since, and any vaguely countryish thrush will have to suffer comparisons. Just ask KD Lang. […]

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THE PSYCLONE RANGERS: Tilt-A-Whirl

Damn, that guy can sing! PREVIOUSLY: Ain’t Goin’ Down TANGENTIALLY RELATED: Touch and Go Records, a pillar of the Chicago music scene and independent music worldwide, announced Wednesday that it is drastically shrinking its business, cutting ties with 20 independent labels and laying off an unspecified number of employees. “The current state of the economy has reached the point where we can no longer afford” to provide manufacturing and distribution services for the labels, including stalwarts such as Chicago-based Drag City, All Natural, Overcoat. Flameshovel and Atavistic Records; Merge in North Carolina,; and Kill Rock Stars in the Pacific Northwest, […]

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NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t

FRESH AIR Journalist Jane Mayer expects that an upcoming Supreme Court case will force the Obama administration to clarify its policy towards fighting terrorism — and to define its stance on preventative detention of suspected terrorists. In her article, “The Hard Cases”, which appears in the Feb. 23 issue of The New Yorker, Mayer details the case of Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, an alleged Al Qaeda sleeper agent who has been held for more than five years in an isolation brig, despite the fact that he never stood trial or was convicted of a crime. Though Marri was seized and […]

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THE EARLY WORD: Headbangers Ball

[Artwork by Daniel Kent] TRANSLATION: Badmaster Records celebrates its 4th year on Feb, 26th 2009 @ Kung Fu Necktie. RELATED: Founded in March 2005, Badmaster is an eclectic homegrown music label that fosters local musicians and artists. Now on its 17th release, Badmaster continues to lend a hand to the local with an MP3 Collection of local area musicians entitled DIS-ADELPHIA planned to be released digitally on Feb, 26th in conjunction with the label showcase @ Kung Fu Necktie. The compilation will feature unreleased tracks by U.S. Girls, Birds of Maya, Satanized, My Mind, Hot Guts, Mincemeat or Tenspeed,Talk Me […]

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HEAR YE: The Vivian Girls

Now playing on PHAWKER RADIO! Vivian Girls open for M.Ward at the Troc Friday! VICTIM OF TIME: Behold the Vivian Girls. Just as their alluring name only became passed around mere months ago, this group of three upstart New York females have taken the noisy pop mantra and dipped it in pure gold, right out of the gate. With their debut 7″ on their very own Plays With Dolls Records label already sending out waves of panic and adoration to the outer limits of the underground pop contingent, they have become the newest breakout sirens of the New York loft-pop […]

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Whatever You Put On Facebook Stays On Facebook

SILICON VALLEY BUSINESS JOURNAL: A number of bloggers voiced concern Monday after discovering that Facebook Inc. changed rules earlier this month regarding how it treats user content. The Palo Alto-based social networking company now says in its terms of service that it will have unending and irrevocable license to use any content uploaded to its service, according to a posting on The Consumerist blog. The story is one of the ten most talked about Monday on Twitter Inc.‘s micro-blogging service. Before now, Facebook said it would only have rights to use any content posted on its service while the user […]

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CONCERT REVIEW: Five Things You Should Know About Rufus Wainright At The Kimmel Last Night

[Photo by TIFFANY YOON] 1. He’s Got Miles And Miles of Style Dressed in clingy cranberry trousers, brown sparkly shoes tied up in bows and a cream blazer with a ruby flower broach on the lapel, his flopsy bangs shorn to Hugh-Grant-in- Four-Weddings-And-A-Funeral-length, Rufus looked hale and healthy and so happy together. Noting the balcony crowd bearing down upon him from all sides, he declared: “I feel like I’m on trial…and I’m winning the case.” The jury of his peers would acquit him handsomely, awarding him two standing ovations by the night’s end. More importantly, his swooning woman of a […]

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