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The Devil and Doctor Octagon: Kool Keith returns

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: March 12, 2008

From his 1988 landmark album Critical Beatdown with Ultramagnetic MCs to the groundbreaking collaboration with S.F. producer Dan the Automator as Dr. Octagon, the rapper Kool Keith has covered...

Music

Devendra Banhart loves Karen Dalton -- Now You Can Too

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: November 21, 2007

Since Karen Dalton's death in 1993, her fan base has grown faster than a Colorado mountain town. And folks can thank a retired builder from Indiana named Joe Loop for Cotton Eyed Joe , a batch of...

Reviewed

Magik Markers

BOSS (Ecstatic Peace!)

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: October 10, 2007

On the surface, drawing comparisons between the Motor City Five and Magik Markers seems absurd: The former are proto-punk icons from the Vietnam era; the latter are modern indie upstarts. On the...

Reviewed

Oakley Hall

I'll Follow You (Merge)

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: September 19, 2007

Defining rock music as a common language for the American masses is the stuff of fiction, not the people's actual history, which tells us that rock has always been a fragmented tribe of competing...

Reviewed

D. Charles Speer

Some Forgotten Country (Sound@One)

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: August 22, 2007

Some Forgotten Country opens with picket-fence guitar, Harry Smith banjo, and a bluesman spitting marbles: "Going to Atlanta just to look around ... " I've heard this stoned baritone before,...

Reviewed

Flying Canyon

Flying Canyon (Soft Abuse)

Justin F. Farrar

Published: February 7, 2007

Singer-songwriter Cayce Lindner sports a thick gray beard, calls Northern California home, and plucks an acoustic guitar. This means most music writers are gonna describe his new project, Flying...

Reviewed

Various Artists

The Hightone Records Story (Hightone Records)

Justin F. Farrar

Published: October 11, 2006

The Hightone Records Story is extremely likeable in concept. The imprint is a hardworking indie out of Oakland that has spent the last 20 years documenting modern roots music. In fact, Hightone...

Music

Bluegrass Philanthropy

Warren Hellman takes S.F.'s free roots music festival into its sixth year

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: October 4, 2006

Most of us think we're livin' large when we head to Amoeba and blow 50 bucks on a short stack of sweet jams. But when Warren Hellman, arguably the world's richest bluegrass fanatic and amateur...

Music

Misc. Reviews

Johnny Z and the Camaros at the Gold Dust Lounge

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: September 20, 2006

Drop a couple bucks in Johnny Z and the Camaros' tip jar, and the trio will gladly ditch "Margaritaville" and "Friends in Low Places" for smooth renditions of Haight-Ashbury acid rock and West...

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Centro-matic|The Leather Uppers|Husky Rescue|Wayne Hancock

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: September 6, 2006

God damn the humorless alt. country zealots for casting Centro-Matic as a blue-collar indie hero; it takes a hot second in the audience of the Denton, Texas, band to realize that it doesn't fit...

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Willie on my mind; Dropping acid

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: August 30, 2006

With late-career homeruns and a relentless "On the Road" ethos, Willie Nelson 's renown has rightfully grown in recent years, saving the ripe and wrinkly 73-year-old outlaw from a quiet ride into...

Music

Den Fathers

Lo-fi rules the Li Po

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: August 23, 2006

Chinatown's Li Po Lounge — a former opium den sitting on Grant between Washington and Jackson — is one of the coolest fuckin' bars in San Francisco. Its exotic, faux-temple design makes...

Reviewed

Tuxedomoon

Bardo Hotel Soundtrack

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: August 9, 2006

Bardo Hotel Soundtrack is Tuxedomoon's first locally recorded disc since the band relocated to Europe more than 25 years ago. This fact is noteworthy because the group, which began life opening...

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16 Brash Bitches

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: August 9, 2006

The Curtains were Chris Cohen's band back when he was just a fan of Deerhoof. Now that he's done his civic duty as guitarist for the Chamber of Commerce's "San Francisco is so weird and cute!"...

Music

California Sunshine

The golden state of Skygreen Leopards' cosmic roots-pop

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: August 2, 2006

A sun-soaked San Francisco afternoon is a dreamy, almost spiritual affair, even without psychedelics and a chilled bottle of white wine. But here we are, Glenn Donaldson and I, passing a clear...

Reviewed

Brightblack Morning Light

S/T

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: July 26, 2006

Brightblack Morning Light actually sees itself as some kind of rural commune. Its core members sport robes 'n' beads, call a teepee in the NorCal woods home, and claim to steer clear of "city...

Music

Noise Sorcery

Magik Markers' potent potions

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: July 5, 2006

"You were right to give the record a shitty review," Magik Markers' Elisa Ambrogio says via cell. She's referring to my scathing write-up (appearing last summer in this very paper) of the Markers'...

Reviewed

Vodka Soap

Un Chand Pyramdelier

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: July 5, 2006

No Bay Area outfit is more mind-fuck cozmic than the duo of Spencer Clark and James Ferraro, the Skaters. But regardless of just how out there among the stars and nebulae — or in here (as...

Music

Bluegrass Buddies

Burning Embers bring honky-tonk to our local land's end

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: June 28, 2006

Seated at the Riptide, way the fuck out by Ocean Beach — just one block from the end of America — banjo picker and vocalist Eric Embry and I shoot the shit going pint for pint around a...

Reviewed

Whirlwind Heat

Types of Wood

By Justin F. Farrar

Published: June 28, 2006

None of you should be reading about Whirlwind Heat. That's because this trio of emaciated shaggy hairs from Grand Rapids, Mich., was never anything but utterly banal. Back in 2000 — as young...