Email Author Justin F. Farrar

2006 Stories by Justin F. Farrar

• The Herms

  published May 3, 2006

  The Herms' full-length debut, Record Machine, has a fitting title. Most indie rock bands these days are like computers, extracting hooks... More >>

• Feeling the Fuck-a-Thon

  published April 19, 2006

  As your average noise-rock freak-a-zoid, I'm a club music rookie. But over the past six months, ass kickin' electronic dance music commonly... More >>

• Unusual Operators

  published April 19, 2006

  A few years back, when No Doctors called Chicago home, the quartet was active in the Midwest's now-flourishing underground noise and freak-rock... More >>

• Diamonds in the rock; Ice Cube reigns supreme

  published April 19, 2006

  Flash pots? Diamond Nights don't need no stinkin' flash pots. Why waste time on cheap pyrotechnics when your band can dazzle with the... More >>

• The Birth of BOCA

  published April 5, 2006

  San Francisco is overrun with meat-market clubs and parties peddling your garden-variety dance jams: commercial hip hop, nth-generation ragga and... More >>

• Floating on Vetiver's fumes; Free jazz befriends Four Tet

  published March 29, 2006

  There's music that heaves, and then there's music that sighs. Portland's Talkdemonic performs the latter variety. Its quiet releases,... More >>

• Psyched! Helios has some love for sale!

  published March 22, 2006

  No discussion of the New Zealand jangle-pop scene from the '80s and early '90s — a talk likely dominated by such Flying Nun Records... More >>

• Howling with Hagerty; Scottish indie-pop gets brawny

  published March 15, 2006

  Oh shit, the Howling Hex is playing San Francisco -- which means you and I, we get to stay up superlate and see Drag City recording artist... More >>

• Band of Brothers

  published March 15, 2006

  "The reaction was, 'Y'all niggas are crazy.' That was the true reaction," says Anthony Starks, bassist for Stone Vengeance, explaining the... More >>

• Some of My Best Friends Are Records

  published March 15, 2006

  Hello, My Name Is: Justin F. Farrar A quick scan of my 10 picks reveals that, yes, I did indeed apply affirmative action when... More >>

• Oh, Pioneers

  published March 1, 2006

  Open up just about any popular book on '60s rock music, and the story of how the "San Francisco sound" developed will unfold something like this:... More >>

• Record Dork

  published February 22, 2006

  Future Friends is a well-designed but not overly refined 60-page, softcover compendium of photography by Ports Bishop, a New Yorker who in... More >>

• Psychic Ills

  published February 1, 2006

  Psychic Ills is a relatively new quartet from New York developing an indie rock hybrid of Confusion Is Sex-era Sonic Youth (the shattered... More >>

• Prince Douglas

  published January 25, 2006

  For the past several years, Basic Channel, a European label specializing in minimal electronics, has been reissuing a slew of roots records... More >>

• Into the Mystic

  published January 11, 2006

  "How do you think your individual sounds blend?" I ask Spencer Clark and James Ferraro as we sit facing one another in the cluttered living room... More >>

• Pearls and Brass

  published January 11, 2006

  Pearls and Brass is a grungy stoner-rock trio from Allentown, Pa., and as is the case with most modern groups working from an early-'70s... More >>

• Robert Wyatt & Friends

  published January 11, 2006

  The lineup Robert Wyatt utilized for this rare live performance in '74 is a who's who of the mid-'70s English progressive-rock scene. There is... More >>