Adam Bregman

Back when skeezers were freaky, hip-hoppers abstained from cussing and effeminate rappers like Slick Rick and Dana Dane flourished, hip-hop was one weird-ass, funky-fresh universe of its own conjuring. Tommy Boy records recently completed the release of its 12-CD series, Hip-Hop Essentials 1979–1991,which celebrates the highlights of that era. Sold......

1. Will Smith, Lost and Found (Interscope). Rapping about subjects other than murder and ass, Will Smith has a sort of candy-corn, Everly Brothers, ranch-dressing, Frosty the Snowman style of rhyming. Like a sock puppet with attitude, his lines flow like ketchup. 2. Lou Barlow,Emoh (Merge). Lou Barlow (Dinosaur Jr.,......

A STUFFED ALLIGATOR SMACKS AGAINST THE FACE OF THE singer of Kung Fu Chicken and explodes. It is retaliation for the torrent of toy animals that he and his band have been chucking mercilessly at the audience. In the slam pit, there's a kid in a hooded sweatshirt and baggy......

type o, joseph cultice; bell, karen mason; custer, anne hamersky TYPE O NEGATIVEWorld Coming Down (Roadrunner) A new facet of goth culture on display at the Bauhaus reunion show at the Palladium was office goths: folks who had long ago traded in their black lipstick and powdery faces for an......

AFTER MAKING A TRIUMPHANT COMEBACK, DISCO has finally bitten the dust again. New wave still won't go away, but a lot of people have begun to realize that the majority of those songs were, well, preposterous. Punk rock, however, marches on into the horizon, a bit trite and excessively cynical......

Photo by Larry HirschowitzUNLIKE THEIR NEO-SATANIC BRETHREN, METAL ICONS JUDAS Priest were most concerned with the individual and the right to drink, fuck and trash respectable establishments without Big Brother breathing down one's neck. Taking metal further than anyone thought possible, Priest's epic vision encompassed spectacular motorcycle accidents, depraved macho......

Art by Dave ShulmanCHRIS CHECKMAN IS THE FUNNIEST guy on the radio. For 12 years he's mercilessly ragged on his KXLU-FM co-hosts and skewered a small but devoted audience while spinning old and rare blues on the station's Thursday-morning Blues Hotel. Checkman's pal Morris Beef -- co-host of Blues Hotel......