After playing mutant swamp-blues-rockabilly guitar with the Gun Club in the early ’80s, Ward Dotson embarked on a less contrived musical course as guitarist, main writer and de facto leader of the Pontiac Brothers, a quartet of unlikely heroes whose Stonesy tunes — even their record company described the Orange County, California band as Stones-influenced,…
Stephin Merritt is a contradictory character: an avowed ABBA aficionado with a monumental misanthropic streak, a recondite home recorder with Spector-scope ambitions, an incurable romantic afflicted with jadedness that borders on the terminal. In short, the reclusive mastermind of the continually transmuting Magnetic Fields is the quintessential pop eccentric, dispatching universally touching songs to a…
At home in Australia, You Am I had three consecutive albums debut at number-one. In the US, the band struggles to land its CDs in record stores the same year they’re released at home (if they make it Stateside at all). This is a tremendous injustice. You Am I has all the best influences: the…
If awards were handed out for foresight, Birmingham’s Stephen Duffy would not likely be considered for one. At the turn of the decade, he parted company with a trendy young new romantic band, saying they were just too reliant on synthesizers for his taste. Never mind that his own subsequent work for a time included…
Five winsome young Swedish beatniks sharing a house in Malmo and a penchant for wistful melodies with light, sophisticated lounge arrangements: meet the Cardigans. The cherubic Nina Persson’s cool vocals (in English) are matched by the deft instrumental touch of her male colleagues; what they offer is a distance from rock’n’roll, something they cheerfully profess…
