Rochester punks — and adherents abroad — face new challenges, from inside as well as out. Are they ready for what’s coming? Can punk save itself like it saved rock ‘n’ roll? Or is punk dead?
Music Feature
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Queer Rock Camp amplifies voices of LGBTQ and gender expansive youth
Girls Rock! Rochester has been running music camps every summer since 2012, and in August, the group will start a new session: Queer Rock Camp.
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Calicoco can’t find one bad thing about making music
On her new album, “Float,” Giana Caliolo, who performs as Calicoco, wields her big guitar like a paint brush to further color the nighttime sky. Her voice is unassumingly pretty and innocent, and her at-times gentle songs serve to pull the listener out of their shell and into her world. “Float” comes out July 6 […]
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Forty years in, Rochester Women’s Community Chorus can’t help but sing
The choral rehearsal begins like any other: singers gather, and their excited, friendly chatter gradually settles down as the director guides the singers through breathing, stretching, and vocal warm-ups. The focus and the concentration grow as the women pay attention to balance and blend, tuning and tempos. The rehearsal space contains nearly 50 women, swaying […]
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Moving Mountains breathes a little fresh air
It’s sheer music biz savvy: A band celebrates 10 years together, releases a new CD, hires a new bass player, sets up a celebratory gig, and then breaks up. Pure genius. That’s precisely what Moving Mountains — then known as The Goods — did a year and a half ago. And the band — drummer […]
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‘Authentic’ is a fine word for The Wood Brothers
Oliver Wood’s voice has a Levon Helm quality to it, a plaintive howl, and the songs fit that rural landscape. As does the groove laid down by Chris Wood on his upright bass and percussionist Jano Rix.
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Andrew W.K. goes over the top to see the other side
Andrew W.K. wasn’t always what he considers “a servant to the party gods.” Despite having had music lessons since he was 4 years old, W.K. originally never considered music as a career. Before he became an indisputable force of party-rock positivity, he had moved to New York City in his early 20’s with different aspirations: […]
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Hamid Drake masters the heartbeat of the universe
The names at the top of DownBeat Magazine’s Critics Poll are constantly changing in most categories from year to year. But, in recent years, one name has been stuck at the top in the percussion category: Hamid Drake. Whether he’s playing a hand drum or a full set, Drake’s dexterity, subtlety, and precision are aurally […]
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Breaking rules to help the homeless
James Jackson, aka Kaiser Solzie, wants to use his story to inspire others going through some of the same struggles he has.
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Jake La Botz writes a living obituary
There is a pervading darkness to Jake La Botz’s music, a noirish narrative, haunting and hungry like a hellhound on his trail. His music is captivating; his words, prose. It’s the blues on a cloudy night. On his latest Hi-Style Records album, “Sunnyside,” there is romance that leads to murder, inflatable ducks, and a positively […]
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The Hi-Risers make their own kind of fun
Rochester’s rock ‘n’ roll roustabouts The Hi-Risers’ new album kicks off with that snap, crackle, and pop the band has become known for. Album number nine, “My Kind of Fun,” is pure Hi-Risers, full of clever licks and hooks. You can dance to it, too. The tenacious trio has become its own thing over the […]
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Multibird is the word
Seth Faergolzia is a whimsical wrangler of beautiful chaos. He is essentially genre-less and hard to categorize. Even he is beguiled by his open-minded, multi-pronged attack. The leader of 23 Psaegz, a loop painter (recording vocal loops while painting at the same time), a solo artist, and a disciple of the profoundly odd, Faergolzia added […]
