“Hi.” This simple utterance kicks off “The Mountain Will Fall,” the leadoff track from DJ Shadow’s new album of the same name, right before a swell of operatic sound (reminiscent of the theme accompanying the THX logo prior to a movie screening) rises from the silence. This coupling, of the slight and unobtrusive with…

God bless Deerhoof for never growing tired of being Deerhoof. In the time it takes most two-decade-old bands to make a record, Deerhoof makes three. Shattered kick drums litter the San Francisco band’s trajectory. Deerhoof makes music recklessly and wildly, but with great skill and a premium on sweetness.

When Puro Instinct bubbled up with its curiously addictive debut Headbangers In Ecstasy in 2011, it salvaged a throwback sound that the mass movement of ’80s worship had yet to rediscover: thick, tropic-steamy dream pop, coasting along trance-like guitar lines and a shimmering drum machine, with cool, breezy…

When Radiohead released Amnesiac on June 5, 2001, the album arrived with a mysterious online companion: GooglyMinotaur. The Where The Wild Things Are-like character was a goofier take on Stanley Donwood’s figure on Amnesiac’s cover, and he was friendly. AOL Instant Messenger users could add the GooglyMinotaur to their…

The Cars: As you may have noticed, I’m something of a completist, to a fault. If I love a band, I generally have everything they’ve ever done. But The Cars to me is the very definition of a greatest-hits band. I’ve never heard an entire Cars album straight through, I don’t think, and I’m fine with that. Because why…

The mustache, the beard, the dreaded soul patch: Each one carries the power to define the face of the wearer. The Darkness is no stranger to notably wild facial hair, so we wondered if the group would be able to pick out the celebrity after only seeing some choice follicles. Watch as the band plucks out right answers…

For all the losses we’ve suffered in 2016, we can take comfort in this: Joni Mitchell is still with us. A year ago, that seemed unlikely. When news broke that the singer-songwriter had suffered a brain aneurysm back in March of 2015, her fans braced themselves, mentally preparing their tributes, wondering which lyric…

In Hear This, The A.V. Club writers sing the praises of songs they know well. This week, since we’re getting into the summer groove, we’re picking what we’d like to be this year’s song of the summer.

The controversies spawned by Paul Simon’s Graceland have never quite gone away; for some, white Western dudes co-opting traditional African music is just too suggestive of colonialism for comfort. But part of that skepticism has to come from Simon’s using the record to establish his pop-icon prominence—particularly in…

The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ sound has always added different touches and flavors as their lineup changed—Hillel Slovak provided more pure funk; John Frusciante gave the band a melodic edge; Dave Navarro a heavier, almost psychedelic side—but this group, the one with former Gnarls Barkley, Beck, and Christina Aguilera…

On her last album, 2014’s excellent Bury Me At Makeout Creek, Mitski Miyawaki (she drops the last name on stage) perfectly captured the messiness of late adolescence, that chaotic period when suddenly you can do whatever you want, and make some bad choices as a result. The title of her follow-up, Puberty 2, suggests…

On stage the normally stoic, meditative Michael Gira performs as a sort of mad conductor, gyrating and flailing with what’s to be perceived as the primal, cathartic release of Swans’ music. Omniscient crescendos pile one atop the other as Gira’s possessed body movements often work independently of a track’s overall…

Angry music ain’t easy. Maintaining peak levels of disgust with sociopolitical hierarchies, religious bastardization, or the human race in general takes a lot of elbow grease—particularly over the course of a full-length record. Nails have it figured out, though: Don’t trifle. Since 2009 the SoCal grind merchants have…

In Hear This, The A.V. Club writers sing the praises of songs they know well. This week, since we’re getting into the summer groove, we’re picking what we’d like to be this year’s song of the summer.

In Hear This, The A.V. Club writers sing the praises of songs they know well. This week, since we’re getting into the summer groove, we’re picking what we’d like to be this year’s song of the summer.

In Hear This, The A.V. Club writers sing the praises of songs they know well. This week, since we’re getting into the summer groove, we’re picking what we’d like to be this year’s song of the summer.

Black Francis/Frank Black: At the height of Pixies reunion mania in 2004, Frank Black—by then back to Black Francis—released an oddity called Frank Black Francis, a two-disc set with very distinct recordings on each. The first is a cleaned-up version of the earliest Pixies demos—Black solo, recorded straight to…

For 20 years Mike Park has run Asian Man Records out of his parents’ garage. Before Asian Man sprung to life Park started Dill Records in order to release records by his band, Skankin’ Pickle, and other up-and-coming ska acts. As Dill became Asian Man the label’s roster also began to shift. After the dissolution of…

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