Booty calls

Five years can be a long time to wait for anything. If the body’s cells regenerate every seven years, after five years you’re more the new self than the old one. After 11 years of recording and performing, Yo Mama’s Big Fat Booty Band has regenerated more than once, which is partly why five years […]

MantraFest

Asheville is no stranger to sacred chanting. From renowned kirtan leaders like Jai Uttal, Bhagavan Das and Wah! to sacred music artists like Shimshai and Snatam Kaur, to local musician/kirtan leader Kristin Luna Ray, the WNC scene is rich in musical events steeped in Eastern spirituality and conscious intent. In fact, local groups like Sangita […]

Righteous mother

Folk singer and feminist icon Ani DiFranco begins her fall tour just five months after the birth of her second child, Dante DiFranco Napolitano. Admitting that mothering a newborn who “likes to party all night long” is exhausting, DiFranco says she’s eager to get back into the world and make music again. Her latest album, […]

Smart Bets: Alex Krug Combo

Local singer-songwriter Alex Krug has been having a big year. With her band (Kevin Lampson on upright bass, Rachel Gramig on harmonizing vocals, Kyle Samples on electric guitar), she's opened for Donna the Buffalo and Erin McKeown, and released new album, Divers. Krug, a Maryland transplant, grew up in a family of blacksmiths. "This unique […]

Smart Bets: Just Die!

Local hardcore and thrash outfit Just Die! was voted best punk band three years in a row by Xpress readers. The quartet (vocalist Steve Shell, drummer Dave Reinhardt, Jay McBones on bass and guitarist Matt Evans) posted this simple Facebook bio: "Encouraging High Fives Since '06." Those happy high fives will be missed: The band […]

Smart Bets: The Broadcast

Self-described "ground-shaking, soul-driven powerhouse" collective The Broadcast has not only been busily playing shows around the area and across the country (140 dates last year!), they've also been at work on sophomore album Dodge the Arrow. "The blood, the sweat, the tears, the touring, the van breaking down," writes the band in a recent blog […]

Sound Track

More Songs About Animals and TV by Alligator Indian "You guys have an amazingly beautiful and bizarre sound," wrote one commenter about the Alligator Indian song "Corpsing." It's an apt summation for the twitchy-ethereal, other-worldly sonic-scapes crafted by the local surreal-pop band. Electronics and vocals leap and swoop interchangeably, sometimes with aching beauty, sometimes as […]

Clubland features: Snarky Puppy, City and Colour, Yawpers

More is more: Texas- and New York-based fusion outfit Snarky Puppy isn't a band in the traditional sense: it's a collective of nearly 30 musicians swapping styles, instruments and influences to produce what bandleader Michael League has described as ""jafunkadansion." The highly respected ensemble visits Asheville on Thursday, Sept. 26 for a performance at Asheville […]