Before he was ever a basketball star, Bill Walton was a Grateful Dead fanatic.

In Under The Influence, The A.V. Club asks a musician to pair three of their songs with a non-musical influence.

It’s not just that Eric D. Johnson has a common surname. He shares his first and last names with multiple figures in pop culture, sports, politics, and academia, including another singing and songwriting Eric Johnson whose work also draws on influences from the realms of folk and country. So when The A.V. Club challeng…

In 11 Questions, The A.V. Club asks interesting people 11 interesting questions—and then asks them to suggest one for our next interviewee.

Andrew Bird’s career has been characterized by its prolific nature. Though it’s been four years since the songwriter released a full-length of original material, it’s not like he’s been dormant since. He released and toured behind a covers album of songs by The Handsome Family, began an instrumental series by…

The transformation undertaken between Bleached’s 2013 debut Ride Your Heart and 2016’s Welcome The Worms is a familiar one. Where Bleached’s debut is a gritty, raw piece of garage rock, the group’s latest effort is more polished, with tightly finessed melodies and a glistening bit of production from big-time producer…

This year is poised to be a banner one for Cheap Trick—or at least, that’s how it’s been planned. The arena-ready power-pop pioneers from Rockford, Illinois are very deservedly being inducted into The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame on April 8, ideally alongside estranged drummer Bun E. Carlos, who has been feuding with—and…

There’s no denying the influence of chemical enhancement—or at least the hazy trappings of it—on Yeasayer’s music, but to dismiss or define what the Brooklyn band does as simply “druggy” misses so many other fitting descriptors. Its fourth album, Amen & Goodbye, is florid, psychedelic, poppy, complicated, aggressive,…

Because its sophomore record, NVM, packed together upbeat tracks about menstruation and catcalling, Tacocat is a feminist band. Really, because three of its members are women and they happen to occasionally express an acerbic viewpoint, the four-piece is essentially a riot-grrrl revival act. Sound like silly,…

In 2014, a surprising thing happened: Weezer released a good album. Let’s be honest—ever since The Red Album, every new Weezer record has been briefly hailed as a return to form, often by frontman Rivers Cuomo himself. And then, after a few days, fans would realize it didn’t have nearly the staying power of past…

As a band, Mogwai has evolved at the same pace as its songs. No single Mogwai record can be classified as a massive sonic shift for the band. Rather, new instruments, themes, and styles emerge on select tracks, only to appear down the line in a more fleshed-out manner. Analog sounds, for example, have bubbled up in…

Over the course of six albums, Austin post-rock pioneers Explosions In The Sky has developed and mastered a style that puts the band in a perilous position in 2016. The members know what works, with their Friday Night Lights film soundtrack shining a light on the cinematic capabilities of their instrumentals. Huge…

Every Friday, dozens of new records are released into the wild. Some make big splashes, and others sink almost immediately. For most music consumers, it’s almost too much information, and save for those precious few who spend their hours glued to reviews sites and release calendars, it’s hard to know what’s coming out…

In We’re No. 1, The A.V. Club examines a song that went to No. 1 on the Billboard charts to get to the heart of what it means to be popular in pop music, and how that concept has changed over the years. In this installment, we cover Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy,” which hit No. 1 on the U.K. chart (and No. 2 on the U.S.…

The disturbing use of atomic power to end World War II had folks in the following decades pretty shaken up, leading to the “duck and cover” bomb-shelter era of the 1950s and beyond. Ira and Charlie Louvin—an Alabama gospel duo that helped popularize “close harmony” vocals—captured that feeling on their 1962 album Weapo…

Permanent Records is an ongoing closer look at the records that matter most.

The Atlanta rappers that make up Migos—Quavo, Takeoff, and Offset—are no strangers to the finer things in life. The trio first hit it big with “Versace” in 2013, and they’ve been reveling in excess ever since. When the three stopped by Chicago on their recent tour, The A.V. Club decided to see how often Migos could…

In HateSong, we ask our favorite musicians, writers, comedians, actors, and so forth to expound on the one song they hate most in the world.

Girls is a show I’ve had complicated feelings about over the years (last season almost lost me with Hannah’s Iowa sojourn). But I’ve always been impressed with its ability to wrap each episode up with a fantastic pop song, bleeding from the final scene into the credits. The dramedy set a precedent for this in its…

Spring has sprung, so plenty of great bands are hitting the road over the next couple of months, taking their new music from city to city. Speaking of new music, three fantastic groups are putting out new albums this month on Triple Crown Records: Into It. Over It. released Standards on March 11, and both O’Brother…