Nikki Darling

We Write About More Than Bad Hipster Bands. No Seriously

The internet's stomach continues to churn over our Top 20 Worst Hipster Bands post, which -- as I noted in our "correction" -- inspired widespread anger and funny death threats involving oral sex from sharks. Someone even whined that it made him want to quit writing about music. Boo hoo! Folks too ... More >>

Top 20 Greatest L.A. Punk Albums of All Time: The Complete List

*Top 20 Worst Bands Ever: The Complete List *Top 20 Musicians of All Time, in Any Genre: The Complete List *Top 20 Sexiest Female Musicians of All Time: The Complete List *Top 20 Sexiest Male Musicians of All Time: The Complete List The history of Los Angeles punk is largely composed of a series ... More >>

Top 20 Greatest L.A. Punk Albums of All Time: 10-1

*Top 20 Greatest L.A. Punk Albums of All Time: 20-11 *Top 20 Worst Bands Ever: The Complete List *Top 20 Musicians of All Time, in Any Genre: The Complete List *Top 20 Sexiest Female Musicians of All Time: The Complete List *Top 20 Sexiest Male Musicians of All Time: The Complete List 10. The Di ... More >>

Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: The Complete List

​See also: *Chuck Klosterman's Favorite Hair Metal Albums One day I was sitting around thinking I want to write a song about ménage a trois...and the line 'love in stereo' came into my head. Inspiration can happen anywhere at any time. -Jani Lane, Hit Parader magazine History has not been ... More >>

The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: #5-1

​See also: *The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: #20-16 *The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums of All Time: #15-11 *The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: #10-6 *Chuck Klosterman's Favorite Hair Metal Albums ​5. Motley Crue Shout At the Devil (1983) Motley Crue's second record stands a ... More >>

The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: #20-16

See also: *The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: #15-11 *The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: #10-6 *The Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: #5-1 *Chuck Klosterman's Favorite Hair Metal Albums One day I was sitting around thinking I want to write a song about ménage a trois...and the l ... More >>

Night Gallery, Museum of Public Fiction and Other Eastside Experiments

THEY WRITE ABOUT THE SONGS

The 10 Best L.A. Albums of the ’00s

From Beck and Dilla to Fiona, Jenny and Quasimoto, a mishmash decade of Southern California sounds

Last Night: Emily Lacy's LACMA Performance

Emily Lacy's experimental sound performance, Temples of the Minds, Saturday night at LACMA was a great example of how music can transform a space. That the piece was set in the museum's Japanese sculpture garden made it easy to arrive at an open and meditative state: It's an indoor spiraled room wit ... More >>

Misfits at the Key Club: Danzig Who?

The Misfits show Saturday night, the first in a two-night sold out gig at the soon to be closed Key Club, left no room for wallowing in original lead singer Glenn Danzig's absence. Current singer and bassist Jerry Only grabbed the crowd by their sweaty nuts and tossed them about the pit like so many ... More >>

Best of L.A.: Recreation and Self-Improvement

Best of L.A.: Shopping

Best of L.A.: Nightlife

FYF Fest 2009: Parks and Inspiration

Event's new mission: Save Our State Parks (and deliver a mind-bending roster of punk, electronics and noise)

This Week in LA Weekly: Jerkin', Sunn 0))), Amanda Blank, LA Ladies Choir, More

This week's hard copy of the LA Weekly is packed with useful music information, news, profiles, and music picks (if we do say so ourselves). Haven't gotten around to grabbing one yet? Here's what you'll see: Star ForemanLA Ladies Choir​ Jeff Weiss has written an in-the-trenches feature on th ... More >>

Last Night: The All Ladies Choir and AsDSSka at Family Bookstore

Sunday night at Family Bookstore on Fairfax found an assorted bunch of artsy types milling around waiting for the The All Ladies Choir and David Scott Stone and Aska to perform. The event was for a screening of Aska's new music video, which was shot by Spike Jonze and Crystal Moselle (which West Coa ... More >>

Revisiting LA Music History: Guns N Roses' 'Appetite for Destruction' Studio

Nikki DarlingThe studio formerly known as Rumbo, where "Rocket Queen" was recorded It was a time when the Valley lingered somewhere between Frank Zappa's ramblings and a real life version of Paul Thomas Anderson's Boogie Nights. A mix of agriculture, dust, white wagon wheels, diners, car dealershi ... More >>

Over the Weekend: Oprah/KFC Backlash, Lebowski Fest, Video Game Girls Burlesque, Anthony Kiedis Gets Iggy Pop's Sweat in His Eye

Mother's Day may already be a Hallmark holiday but that didn't stop Oprah, KFC and El Pollo Loco from turning it into a full-blown, corporate flame (grilled chicken) war over the weekend. Is nothing sacred? As Gendy Alimurung reported on Saturday, "The latest installment in our continuing coverage o ... More >>

National Record Store Day in LA and at Coachella: Celebrating Brick, Mortar, Mom, Pop

Patrick O'DellFatbeats' DJ Rhettmatic Celebrating record stores as part of the second annual National Record Store Day, which is tomorrow, should be a no-brainer for Southern Californians. After all, the region is the undisputed center of the vinyl industry, with RTI, Rainbo and Erika all pressing ... More >>

Ten Coachella Picks: Ariel Pink, Genghis Tron, Vivian Girls, Mastodon

Plus, A Place to Bury Strangers, Mexican Institute of Sound, Gui Boratto, MSTRKFT and more

Hecuba at Wildness: Perfect Sequined Body Suit, Music from Forthcoming Release

Nikki DarlingHecuba at Wildness! At Tuesday night's one a.m. performance by Hecuba at Wildness, the tranny bar/art kid/cum performance night hosted at Koreatown's Silverplatter, the place was bursting. Cumbia, techno, 80s new wave blasted from the sound system, sweaty art kids pressed and bounced a ... More >>

LA Weekly's Interview with Will Oldham: On Acting, Hollywood, the Nature of the Press, and Facebook

Yesterday Will Oldham, aka Bonnie Prince Billy, did an instore performance at Amoeba Records on Sunset, and West Coast Sound's Nikki Darling was there to report on the scene: Will Oldham gets French pedicures and shows them off while wearing flip-flops and Hawaiian board shorts. That's the first ... More >>

Last Night: White Magic at Ooga Booga

Nikki DarlingWhite Magic is performing down below ... really Last night White Magic set up shop at Chinatown "hipster boutique" Ooga Booga, which is an unfair way to describe a store that encourages freedom of thought, artistic community and integrity and DIY spirit -- but for lack of a better phra ... More >>

The Homosexuals and Silver Apples at the Echoplex: Old White Men Sometimes Do It Right

Nikki DarlingSimeon, of the Silver Apples By Nikki Darling I like to date within my age bracket and retain a certain level of intellectual integrity, although older men never seem overly concerned about impressing younger women with their world weary intelligence. Rather, the schmary few who have ... More >>

Will the Stink of Success Ruin the Smell?

Downtown L.A.'s DIY haven tries to keep it real as the club's best-known ambassadors - No Age, Mika Miko and Abe Vigoda - hit the mainstream