Arts, Entertainment, and Media

Joffrey Ballet

Rachael Kilgour: I can make an impact through my music

Rachael Kilgour doesn't immediately seem like the kind of girl who would take on the social injustices of the world in a song. She's sweet-faced, fast with a bright smile and sunshine energy. A few minutes into knowing her, though, and it's suddenly impossible to see her in a role besides activist. ... More >>

Jack McNally totally didn't know today is Jack McNally Day

When your name is also part of the moniker for one of the country's premier music schools, you have to be sure you're releasing an album on the right terms. For Jack McNally, co-founder of the McNally Smith College of Music in St. Paul, the process took 28 years to make sure everything was done exac ... More >>

The best concerts in the Twin Cities this week: February 13-19

Valentines Day week has arrived! Whether you plan on celebrating Valentines Day with a special someone, alone, or with your multiple cats, be sure to check out Lucy Michelle & The Velvet Lapelles' Greatest Valentines Mixtape show at the Cedar Cultural Center. On Friday synth-pop band Usonia rele ... More >>

Black and White

Ta-coumba Aiken and Joseph Norman

Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" is the greatest simile in rock 'n' roll

Tyler Flory is a teacher at Main Street School of Performing Arts in Hopkins. His Music Class column ties together his job and his music fandom in a neat little package. "I believe [Bob Dylan's] 'Like a Rolling Stone' is the greatest rock and roll simile of all time," I state to my 4th block 9th G ... More >>

Die Hard, Die Alone

When John McClane lost his family, the movies lost much of John McClane

George Strait

The 2013 Grammy Awards played it safe and got it wrong

If the Grammy Awards are indeed 'Music's Biggest Night,' then it's no wonder that the industry itself is in so much trouble. Despite the Academy's best efforts in recent years to draw the "alternative" music fan into the mainstream self-congratulatory love fest that is the Grammys -- even going so f ... More >>

Get Cryphy turns five

The DJ crew that taught local hip-hop heads to love club bangers celebrates half a decade

Yo La Tengo biographer Jesse Jarnow shares the band's not-so-lurid secrets

Just a few weeks since its release, critics have already hailed Yo La Tengo's 13th full-length album Fade as one of the band's best in years, harkening back to epic cult favorites such as I Can Feel the Heart Beating as One and And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out. In anticipation of the band ... More >>

The best concerts in the Twin Cities this week: 1/30-2/5

The Twin Cities is starting to thaw out as January comes to an end. Friday night is especially busy. Retribution Gospel Choir plays the Turf Club while Minneapolis pays tribute to Joe Strummer in the First Avenue Mainroom. Semisonic songwriter Dan Wilson and brother Matt Wilson play a set at Pantage ... More >>

Cam'ron

Paul Mecurio

Mother Banjo's Ellen Stanley: I hit the hell out of that banjo

The name Mother Banjo conjures up an image of a woman passing along wisdom and stories via her music, mainly her banjo, and Minneapolis artist Ellen Stanley does just that. Along with her band, Stanley has created a new album prime for listening. The Devil Hasn't Won owns its string-led riffs that e ... More >>

Emeli Sandé at the Varsity, 1/23/13

Emeli Sandé with Emily King Varsity Theater, Minneapolis Wednesday, January 23, 2013 What is it, like, a rule that every female singer to come out of the U.K. has to take over the pop music world? As if Adele wasn't enough, there is now a new force in the game: Emeli Sandé, a powerhouse vocalist ... More >>

Jose James channels his idols

Switching from jazz to soul, James evokes Al Green and Marvin Gaye on No Beginning No End

Grace Potter: I imagine a crowd of 60,000 -- even if there's only fifteen

Blues-rock singer Grace Potter is not just a pretty face. Grace and her band the Nocturnals tour constantly, as much as 200 shows a year. She's hard-working, but when given the opportunity to tour with different artists, she also shows her business finesse. The singer was invited to open for Kenny C ... More >>

Greycoats: If our last album was molasses, this one's San Pellegrino

In early summer of 2012, Minneapolis band Greycoats released a five song EP Helicline that was a teaser to their full-length album, World of Tomorrow. The new album is four years in the making, four years when the band took to grow into a new, more-complete sound. What grew was a heart-stoppingly ca ... More >>

Jennifer Lawrence and SNL remind us Minnesota radio still lacks hip hop

Saturday Night Live still thinks the state of hip hop radio in the Twin Cities is laughable. Over the weekend, we returned to the fictional studios of B-108 in Shakopee, "Minnesota's home for blazing hip hop," for another early morning joke at our scene's expense. This time, guest The Hunger Games s ... More >>

John Mark Nelson seeks support for new album on Kickstarter

John Mark Nelson, the latest darling of the local music scene, has been churning out new music with a furor ever since the 2011 release of his debut album Still Here. Since then, the 19-year-old singer-songwriter has released a second album, Waiting and Waiting, and is currently in the process of re ... More >>

Jawaahir Dance Company's 20th Annual Henna Party

Transmission announces '90s-themed 12th birthday party at First Avenue

The long-standing dance tradition in the Twin Cities known as Transmission is about to reach a dozen years in existence. Jake Rudh's new wave and goth party known for its delicious combing of '80s delights in that vein is celebrating its 12th birthday with a First Avenue Mainroom party in March!Rudh ... More >>

Patti Page, pop-country crossover sensation, passes away at 85

Country crossovers didn't begin with Taylor Swift; the genre's embraced its pop side for almost as long as folks have been laying bow to fiddle. And for that reason, today we eulogize Patti Page, the pop/country/R&B singer and onetime Benny Goodman band singer who passed away Tuesday.

Out There celebrates 25 years

Walker Art Center's annual avant-garde festival defies definition

Les Misérables doesn't dream daringly

The latest screen adaptation mostly plays it safe while trying to be gritty and realistic

Our 15 best live music GIFs of 2012

Yeah! It's time to run down the year in live music GIFs. This Black Sabbath fan from Lollapalooza this summer embodies how psyched we are to share these with you.With help from photographers Erik Hess, Anna Gulbrandsen, and Stacy Schwartz, this was a year for the already excellent visual representat ... More >>

The Ten Best Country Albums of 2012

By Alan Scherstuhl This list of the year's best country albums is assembled with two important premises in mind: First: If the people who record and listen to these records consider them country, than they're damn well country. Purists who argue that country should still sound like '68, '76, '84 or ... More >>

Quentin Tarantino unchained

The iconic director emerges with one of his most ambitious films yet, Django Unchained

2012 Film Critics' Poll

The critics' picks from best film to best performers

Kenny Kane

Best Twin Cities albums 2012: Staff lists

The waterfall of opinion flows s'more today with a collection of the best albums released locally in the Twin Cities in 2012. As opposed to the list that appeared in this week's issue, these are 14 distinct opinions on what was impressive in the past year, and a bunch of links to the related stories ... More >>

How to Dress Well on making folk music for a modern world

Tom Krell, the man behind the How to Dress Well moniker, makes the kind of music you should probably listen to at home, alone, with maybe a bottle of something strong. His second full-length album, Total Loss, touches on dark themes from the perspective of a sensitive intellectual. Krell explores gr ... More >>

Greg Grease's Cornbread, Pearl, and G album release

Public Enemy at First Avenue, 12/6/12

Public Enemy's Hip Hop Gods Tour with X-Clan, Monie Love, Schoolly D, Leaders of the New School, Wise Intelligent, Son of Bazerk and No Self Control, Awesome Dre, Davy DMX and DJ Johnny Juice Thursday. First Avenue, MinneapolisThursday, December 6, 2012 The Hip Hop Gods Tour, the brainchild of Pub ... More >>

Mousey McGlynn on North Dakota, MTV, and Jesus

Don't let the name fool you, North Dakota-based artist Mousey McGlynn is not a timid artist. The electro-pop musician expresses her talents not only musically, but also visually. Her single "Faith 1 (Sunday)" plays into the sound perfectly, swirling, warm, yellow/gold (if sound can be described in ... More >>

Notable 2012 deaths in country music

Get out your hanky so you don't spill a tear in your beer; from Susanna Clark to Kitty Wells, several legendary country singers and songwriters passed on in 2012, and their loss is felt keenly as our connection to a better time in traditional country goes slippin' away.

Public Enemy's Chuck D: Yeah, I voted in the 2012 election

Rap music is an omnipresent sound in the country's earbuds today because acts like Public Enemy refused to fold. With two albums released this year, Most of My Heroes Still Don't Appear on No Stamp and The Evil Empire of Everything, this has been a vital time for the 25-year-old group and its mercil ... More >>

Dance Revolutions

Impressions

Portage on Scott Seekins, recording in an attic, and impromptu lyrics

Witness the evolution of a young band. Duluth transplants, Portage, bring to Minneapolis a string of harmonies that bring to mind the guts of rock music which are culled from the disheveled corners of generations past. The group is set to release their sophomore album Landings, with songs that segue ... More >>

Gary Burger

A Behanding in Spokane

Life of Pi star forges cross-cultural career

Irrfan Khan is committed to both Indian and American films

Christmas: Impossible

The Cloud Atlas team dares you to leave your pod

The filmmakers discuss the obstacles of bringing their art to the screen

Dethklok's Brendon Small predicts future of Metalocalypse

It's hard to believe that it's already been six years since the institution of rock was turned on its face, the fame of the Beatles reduced to mere peanuts in the presence of something so much more important and the inhabitants of the planet rendered lemmings to the Doomsday ticking of Dethklok. Ok ... More >>

Sonny Landreth

The Discord Syndicate on Mergers and Acquisitions EP and science fiction

Nikki Schultz never thought she would see herself fronting a loud, gnarly rock band. The singer-songwriter has never been comfortable with the idea of the spotlight, anyway, and her previous work as a backing vocalist for local folk artist Chastity Brown doesn't immediately conjure up images of Schu ... More >>