Email Author Daniel Levin Becker

2010 Stories by Daniel Levin Becker

• Did Usher Borrow From Homer Simpson on 'OMG'r

  published Dec 29, 2010

  So the rabbit hole deepens with the revelation (or conspiracy theory, if you prefer) that the bridge in Usher's "OMG" bears slightly more than a passing resemblance to a song Homer sings in a late-se... More >>

• Listen To This While Pining: Busdriver's "I Don't Dream"

  published Dec 29, 2010

  Los Angeles MC Busdriver is usually a one-man dictionary-wrecking crew, all piss and vinegar and nerdish vengeance aimed at just about everything: haters, wack MCs, racial tension in America, you, hi... More >>

• The Sounds of 2010

  published December 29, 2010

  What? Another year is over already? We could have sworn it was mid-September only last week. But all right: The close of oh-ten means it's time... More >>

• 

  FEATURED STORY

  On the Fascinating and Often Listenable Feedback Loop That Was 2010

  published Dec 27, 2010

  Ah, twenty-ten. Two thousand and ten. Two years before our state warps and crackles and slides into a boiling sinkhole that used to be the Pacific Ocean. It was the best of times, it was the worst of ... More >>

• A Holiday Greeting From A Cat We Wish Were Our Mascot

  published Dec 24, 2010

  Happy holidays to one and all. May you be as thrilled to open your presents, in whatever form they may be bestowed, as this fellow.... More >>

• Download a Free 8-Song Mashup of Big Boi and The Black Keys

  published Dec 23, 2010

  If you like a little juxtaposition with your year-in-review jawns, we've got just the thing for you: The Brothers of Chico Dusty, an unbidden and inspired pileup of two very well-liked 2010 albums by ... More >>

• Balls Cost Money: Donate To Local Comedians Killing My Lobster

  published Dec 22, 2010

  This just in: a (kind of) impassioned plea from a burrito, a snowwoman, a BLT, and more to reach out this holiday season by donating money to support local sketch comedy troupe Killing My Lobster, wh... More >>

• 

  FEATURED STORY

  Bay Area Beatsmith Jel Opens For Tricky Tonight, Defends Name From Interlopers

  published Dec 21, 2010

  We haven't heard enough from Jel, born Jeffrey Logan, of late. An early mainstay of Oakland's Anticon collective, he released an excellent solo record, Soft Money, in 2006, then returned to the shadow... More >>

• 

  FEATURED STORY

  'Kings of Leon Tour Bus Catches Fire' And Other Headlines SF Artist Johnny Selman Should Interpret

  published Dec 21, 2010

  What's that you sayr A San Francisco-based artist agitating for sociopolitical changer My stars, now we've seen everything! But seriously, folks. Transplanted Virginian and extremely assiduous master'... More >>

• Badly Drawn Boy Mouths Off At Our Nemeses Down South

  published Dec 20, 2010

  Esteemed and perpetually behatted English troubadour Damon Gough, doing business as Badly Drawn Boy, just got a little more esteemed. After a show last Tuesday at the Swedish American Hall in San Fran... More >>

• 

  FEATURED STORY

  Om, Lichens, Barn Owl Share Trancey Stories in the Dark of the Independent

  published Dec 17, 2010

  OmLichensBarn OwlDecember 16, 2010@ The IndependentBetter than: Any other situation involving lichens, barn owls, and sacred syllables.It was dark at the Independent last night. The performers sent f... More >>

• Write A Colorful Song with This Inexplicably Soothing Elephant Paint Instrument Thing

  published Dec 16, 2010

  You're probably not going to do any work today as it is, what with all the visions of sugarplums and such and such. Know what would be a more advantageous use of your time than drafting that missed c... More >>

• Tonight: Free Lichens In-Store at Aquarius Records

  published Dec 15, 2010

  If you're taking a pre-happy hour totter through the Mission this evening after work, you should probably stop in to visit darling indie-esoterica purveyors Aquarius Records and catch a free in-store ... More >>

• OK Go Tag Los Angeles with Enormous GPS Parade

  published Dec 14, 2010

  I think we all stopped caring a while back whether the Chicago-via-L.A. quartet OK Go were putting nearly as much effort into their music as they were into the videos that accompanied it. (I recall re... More >>

• 'Tis The Season For Denatured Versions of Holiday Standards

  published Dec 13, 2010

  It's turning out to be a good week for surrealistic Christmas cheer. First we've got Low playing at the Great American Music Hall tomorrow night in celebration of the reissue of their slowcore Christ... More >>

• 

  FEATURED STORY

  Paris Surf Minstrels La Femme Talk Censored Cover Art and American Adventures

  published Dec 10, 2010

  Contrary to what you might quite reasonably expect, Parisian post-surf-rock outfit La Femme is, well, not very feminine at all. Besides a variable cast of sultry chanteuses, the group comprises three ... More >>

• Helpful Advice from Wiz Khalifa on How To Roll a Clutch Joint -- While in a Hot Tub

  published Dec 09, 2010

  Perhaps we've been remiss in regularly endorsing songs to listen to while high without giving you the technical wherewithal to get high. (As for the material wherewithal, well, if you don't know how t... More >>

• Watch the Bathrooms: Bay Area Rapper Durt Reynolds Puts the Durt in Durty

  published Dec 08, 2010

  r Ask and you shall receive. Or, rather, leave your four-track promo CD by the sink in the men's room at Mezzanine during a Wu-Tang show and I shall bring it home and listen to it. This one's for you... More >>

• Today In Girl Talk: A Date Which Will Live in the Opposite of Infamy

  published Dec 07, 2010

  Happy Gregg Gillis Day! Oh, you thought it was Pearl Harbor Remembrance Dayr Get with the times, fossil. December 7 is now a holiday devoted to the one-man dynamo of exhaustive intertextuality that is... More >>

• The Week In Event Names: Google Images Edition

  published Dec 06, 2010

  A lot of bands playing this week whose names stoke the fires of imagination (except Flesh the Racist Crayon, which is a crappy name no matter how you look at it -- I once had a set of markers called ... More >>

• Low: Show Preview

  published December 8, 2010

  Once the saccharine cacophony of the holiday season gets to be too much, as it inevitably will, consider celebrating in a different mode. To... More >>

• 

  FEATURED STORY

  Wu-Tang Clan Rocks A Cutely Dressed Mezzanine Crowd, Eventually

  published Dec 03, 2010

  Wu-Tang Clan La the Darkman Mean Doe Green DJ M-Rock Thursday, December 2, 2010 @ Mezzanine Better than: Being packed into a hot, wobbly sweatbox for any other conceivable reason RZA dropped out of t... More >>

• Au Revoir Sexpigeon, Excellent S.F. Photoblog

  published Dec 02, 2010

  As a handful of baggage claim snaps and one stirringly impressionistic kiss-off post indicate, our fair city has lost the roving rapier wit behind Sexpigeon to the siren call of some other big ci... More >>

• published Dec 01, 2010

  ... More >>

• Target Christmas Album: Best Coast/Wavves, Blackalicious, Jason Schwartzman et al. Hock Holiday Cheer

  published Dec 01, 2010

  Now that it's December, the merchants of the world have declared open season on premature holiday festivities, turning life into the cultural equivalent of that house on your block that puts up Hallow... More >>