The Flaming Lips

Insane Clown Posse on Haters, Faygo, and Doing This Shit 'Til They're 90

And now, a valid and reasonable idea that isn't communicated enough: the Flaming Lips and Insane Clown Posse are spiritual brothers from different mothers. Granted, they sound nothing alike and one is largely reviled, but both are headline-worthy outfits who rose to fame in the 1990s and have amasse ... More >>

Bottle Rock: Napa Festival's Attempt To Combine Food, Wine, and Music Falls Short

It seems like a good idea on paper: Throw a music festival in wine country where guests can go wine-tasting and sample some of the region's best restaurants in between musical acts. That was the focus of Bottle Rock, a new festival thrown in a park in downtown Napa that combines stadium-filling rock ... More >>

Rock the Wine Country: Bottle Rock Festival Is an Odd New Addition to the Bay Area

Top 9 Trends in Local Music From 2012

Ke$ha's Warrior: A First Listen

A quick scan of the titles on Ke$ha's second album means it better be her pop masterpiece -- nothing looks as hilarious or striking as "D.I.N.O.S.A.U.R." or "Party at a Rich Dude's House." But even those of us who wanted to love her found that debut fucking annoying. I was finally converted by the f ... More >>

Bridge School Videos: Guns N' Roses Play Some Classics, Jack White's Full Set, and More

So Neil Young's annual Bridge School Benefit concert went down at Shoreline Amphitheatre this weekend, bringing artists like the Flaming Lips, Jack White, Guns N' Roses, Eddie Vedder, and many more onstage for an all-acoustic show. Somewhat surprisingly, Guns N' Roses actually showed up, apparently ... More >>

Animal Collective's Centipede Hz: A First Listen

I'm not an Animal Collective fan. I like Strawberry Jam a lot, and I cherish a few individual songs elsewhere, particularly "Summertime Clothes" (not least because it sounds just like the theme from Snoopy Come Home, which I loved as a kid). But their rhythms are so clumpy, melodies so soupy, and "i ... More >>

Nevermind Badu vs. Coyne: Here Are the Top Five Greatest Band Feuds

Uh-oh. Wayne Coyne from The Flaming Lips unleashed the wrath of Erykah Badu this week by releasing a video for their collaboration, "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," without getting her approval first. Which was kind of important, since the video features crazy close-ups of all (and we do mean ... More >>

Etbonz on Futuristic Sci-Fi Sounds and Why Total Recall Is the Best

Listening to Portland-based producer and DJ Etbonz's live analog sets and cosmic techno jams makes one suspect that he can channel music from the future. As if embarking on a musical space odyssey, Etbonz employs physical synths and sequencers to play a mix of Italo-disco and sci-fi-sounding tracks, ... More >>

Making "Myth": How Geographer Keeps Failing Forward

Jordan Kurland's Top Five Noise Pop Memories

Live Review, 2/21/12: The Hold Steady's Craig Finn Leads a Good, Depressing Time at Bottom of the Hill

Craig Finn Sad Baby Wolf Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2012 Bottom of the Hill / Noise Pop 20th Anniversary Opening Night Better than: Seeing The Hold Steady. Ask a local, or a bring a notebook with you to a show, and they'll tell you: Noise Pop is as much about discovering new music as it is about venue-hopp ... More >>

The Noise Pop Festival's 20th Anniversary Year Is Go

Yep, it's here: Noise Pop, the little San Francisco indie music fest that turned into a big one, opens its 20th year with two shows tonight and continues all week in venues around town. We will have oodles of festival coverage here on All Shook Down, including reviews of many of the festival's most ... More >>

Better, Later, and on the Air: A Wish list for S.F. Music in 2012

Girls' Father, Son, Holy Ghost -- A First Listen

​ I've been everywhere with the San Francisco band Girls: Love 'em, hate 'em, find them overhyped, find the detractors overly cynical. I think they like it that way. Girls' hugely-acclaimed 2009 Album blew me away for a week. Then I found myself having trouble rekindling that need to hear it a ... More >>

A Guide to NorCal Music Festivals

Starfucker Channels Disco-Pop Forerunners at Rickshaw Stop

Starfucker at Rickshaw Stop last night.​Starfucker Unkown Mortal Orchestra March 9, 2011 @ Rickshaw Stop Better than: Naming a child with an obscenity. Ladies, I'd like to introduce your Passion Pit/MGMT stand-ins. Scream softly, please. But listen up: don't tell Mom and Dad what you're snea ... More >>

This Is Noise Pop: What Not to Miss at S.F.'s Signature Indie Music Fest

Noise Pop 2011 -- The Films: Arcade Fire, Feist, José González, the Making of Noise Pop, and More

The Flaming Lips in This Is Noise Pop​S.F.'s annual Noise Pop Festival is mostly known for bringing a week of awesome indie music shows to the city. But the fest usually pulls in a pretty good selection of new films for music nerds -- and this year is no exception.With film subjects including the ... More >>

Treasure Island Stage Partially Fails, Injuring Workers

Christopher VictorioThe Flaming Lips at Treasure Island 2009​Workers setting up for the Treasure Island Music Festival suffered minor injuries this afternoon after the roof of a stage partially collapsed.The workers jumped off about five feet the stage, injuring their ankles, according to Allen Sc ... More >>

Saturday Afternoon: Kid-rockers The Sippy Cups Dazzle Dolores Park

​The Sippy Cups @Dolores ParkJune 19, 2010 Better Than: Eating strawberry Pop Tarts while watching a Flaming Lips video It was like many Saturday afternoons in Dolores Park, aka "Hipster Hill": City types lounged in groups next to open containers and fixed-gear bikes. Laughing childr ... More >>

Free Tastes of New Bonnaroo Ice Cream at Ben & Jerry's

Mmmm... Kings of Leon​Bonnaroo, the giant Manchester, Tennessee music festival in mid-June, just got a little tastier. You can now count down the days until Stevie Wonder, Jay-Z, Conan O'Brien, The Flaming Lips, and a billion other marquee names take multiple stages down south by licking your way ... More >>

What To Do? Monday's Pick: MGMT

 MGMT @ the Fillmore MGMT's Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden willed themselves to fame with "Time to Pretend," the biggest movie-trailer indie crossover hit since "Paper Planes." Now they want us to know that they can play with that popularity. The chewy new Congratulations isn't at all ... More >>

Treasure Island: Indie-rock elders move forward

Math Jazz

The Lowbrow Art Sale: Greg "Craola" Simkins, Ron English & Ken Garduno

Camper Van Beethoven at 25: from warm beer to funny ideas

Harmonic Convergence

The Bird and the Bee's cinematic pop

Pop operas

Opening your eyes and ears

Burning Down the House

The Spinto Band sparks a buzz brush-fire

Grind It Out With Pam

Freestyle Fellowship

Award Show Performers

SF Weekly Music Awards

Independent Thinking

Two new high-class local venues. Bruce Springsteen concerts. Sounds like the work of Clear Channel. But it's not.

Geek Chic

Stanford Junior MC Lars Horris may not unseat Eminem, but, with luck, he might be the next "Weird Al"

Hear This

Ay, dios: Get to Grandaddy's show early, and you just might hear God. Er, god.

Holiday Jeer

Twas the night before Xmas, and all through this column, a bunch of bands you never heard of, got their names in print

House of Tudor

The all-girl punk band Las Ultrsónicas is so unhinged it's banned in Mexico City

House of Tudor

The Hackensaw Boys deliver the anachronic; the Graves Brothers Deluxe fire up the Fourth

Hear This

Cornelius makes his Point, reconfiguring pop in unpredictable ways

Radar Bros.

And the Surrounding Mountains (Merge)

Creeping Toward Bethlehem

A major label recording contract. Big-name producers. Lazy nights in the Jacuzzi. San Francisco's Creeper Lagoon has got it made, right? Not exactly.

Night & Day

Local Yokels

Riff Raff

Bubble Burst

Recordings

Recordings

Recordings