The Beach Boys

Gibson Amphitheatre To Shut Down

Gibson Amphitheatre, the mainstay mid-size concert venue at Universal City, will close its doors in September, according to its operator Live Nation Entertainment. As announced in December 2011, the 6,200-capacity amphitheatre is expected to be demolished to make way for The Wizarding World of Har ... More >>

The Best Concerts in L.A. This Week

Monday, February 25 The Residents EL REY THEATRE Somewhere between rock & roll's spiritual mystique and a distinctly unhinged surrealist pathology, you'll find the lair of bizarro-art-imitates-music tribe The Residents. Unprecedented, with no discernible frame of reference save for a magnificently ... More >>

Is The Dove Shack's "Summertime in the LBC" the Perfect Summer Song?

[Editor's note: Jeff Weiss's column, "Bizarre Ride," appears on West Coast Sound every Wednesday. Be sure to also check out the archives.] See also: KDAY, the Gangsta Rap Oldies Station, Breaks New Ground by Playing Music From the Bad Old Days This is the city and the season for the summer jam. Yo ... More >>

Five Must-See L.A. Bands at SXSW

Initially a place where music executives could check out a bunch of emerging bands in the span of a few days, SXSW has become the spring break of the music biz. Bands from all over the globe descend on Austin hoping to convince the masses they're the next big thing. While megastars like Bruce Spring ... More >>

Why the Grammys Stink

See also: *2012 Grammys: The Best, the Worst and the Weirdest *Deadmau5, Rihanna - House of Blues - 2/13/12 *Dan Wilson: From "Closing Time" to Adele's "Someone Like You" So, our Grammy credentials were fairly limited last night. In fact, we were trapped in a room for eight hours, with journalists ... More >>

Fanatics! Henry Rollins' KCRW Show Tomorrow Night: Live From Amoeba

​KCRW Broadcast #140 for Saturday, November 12, 2011 Fanatics! Tonight, we are live at the rekkid sto! We will be broadcasting live from Amoeba Records at 6400 Sunset Blvd. Like I would need to tell you that address. Anyway, I will be there doing my shift from 8-10 live at the store. Any excu ... More >>

Funky Homosapiens: The Best Rapper Names Of All Time

Busta Rhymes​See Also: The Worst Rapper Names Of All Time, Besides Shorty Shitstain Last week we ran down the world's corniest MC names, and on Haterade Monday this week we complained about the worst albums by the best L.A. rappers, as well as the most ridiculous Beach Boys songs (including o ... More >>

Bad Dads: Five Of The Worst Fathers In Musical History

he's a genius too, you know Dads--they have sure done a lot for music, either by being musicians and dads at the same time, making some rockin' dad rock, or just fathering incredibly talented children. In honor of Father's Day, we thought we'd bring you a short series on dads. Today we bring you s ... More >>

Best Coast Is Best California Band of 2010 (According to Bostonians)

Drew Tewksbury​A few years ago, The Phoenix, Boston's leading alt-weekly, came up with a neat annual music future: they surveyed the US state-by-state and had their music critics pick the best "new" band from each state. The first year they did this, 2008, they also picked the best group and s ... More >>

Admiral Radley: the Other California

Quartet pays tender tribute to the Central Valley

Live in L.A.: Make Music Pasadena (with Matt & Kim, Natalia Lafourcade, Warpaint), Opening Night at the Bowl, Freestyle Fellowship, Jamie Lidell, Erykah Badu, Billy Joe Shaver

Warpaint​Pasadena is used to its parades, but on Saturday its denizens will be traipsing around Old Town to get an earful of music rather than an eyeful of rose pedals. What's impressive about the annual Make Music Pasadena is how many constituencies the festival is serving over one day. With ... More >>

"We're Not Sexual Blobs!"

Pocahaunted's Amanda Brown on their "body music," loving leather, and getting funky with the French

Absolutely Killer Goth-Industrial MP3 Mix: Trouble & Bass DJ Star Eyes Does Her Thing All Over Coil, Ministry, Thrill Kill Kult, Psychic TV, etc, etc

​One of our favorite DJs, Star Eyes from the hard-working Trouble and Bass crew quietly dropped a free download of a sick mix she put together with designer Dust La Rock. She'll have a presentation party for the project tonight on the East Coast, but you can get it right now through Chronic Y ... More >>

N.W.A's Straight Outta Compton: The Word Cloud

​ In an ongoing effort to better understand the many classic albums of Los Angeles, we've come upon an equation that gets to the heart of the matter without much thinking, analysis, verbiage or any of those other "old-model" music criticism techniques that have become obsolete. Specifically, ... More >>

The Venture Bros.' Doc Hammer and Jackson Publick Talk Favorite Music

Shannon Cottrell​Sunday night at midnight, The Venture Bros. returns to Adult Swim for another season of mad scientist and supervillain misadventures. While we have heard bits and pieces about what to expect for the upcoming episodes at Comic Con, when LA Weekly caught up show architects Jacks ... More >>

First Listen to Essential Rhino Box: 'Where The Action Is! Los Angeles Nuggets, 1965-1968'

​Times are tight, for sure. A box set is a luxury that few can afford these days. Given the choice between a 4 cd collection and paying the phone bill or buying a bottle of Scotch, well, let's just say you can't download a bottle of Scotch. But if you're at all curious about the history of th ... More >>

Weekend Report: Mia Doi Todd, Carlos Nino, Gaby Hernandez, Grace Woodroofe and More Cram an Office Space with Music

Randall Robertsif you look closely, you can see a reflection of the party in the curve of the balloon. (not really.) We've just got one decent snapshot of Saturday night's party in Hancock Park at the offices of the Masses (or at least one that's not dark and blurry), and it was taken as we were si ... More >>

Honoring Alan W. Livingston: Capitol Records' Kingmaker Signed the Beatles, Beach Boys, the Band (and Bozo the Clown)

Alan Livingston is said to have come up with the initial idea for the design of the iconic Capitol Building The legendary longtime Capitol Records president Alan Livingston died yesterday, and with the loss comes the end to a remarkable Los Angeles story. Among his other accomplishments, Livingston ... More >>

L.A. Weekly's "Top Seven Music Things of the Year That Weren't Compact Discs" List

Vivian Girls Cover the Beach Boys on New Single

The Vivian Girls' self-titled debut was one of the indie breakout records of the year, an angular and totally catchy garage-pop collection that was issued by Mauled by Tigers in the spring and promptly re-released by Highland Park's finest, In the Red Records. On their new single, the band covers ... More >>

Beck, Arabian Prince, Dennis Wilson, Love: Four More Great L.A. Reissues of 2008

Diggin' in the crates

Let the Listing Begin: Ten Great Folk Records of the Past Decade

You're going to be seeing a lot of lists in the next few weeks. Lists of bests and worsts of year, lists of disappointments, lists of dance mixes and YouTube clips. We figured we'd begin our weeks of lists with one that captures not the year in music, but one aspect of the decade in music: new wei ... More >>

Record Reviews: Inara George and Van Dyke Parks, Darker My Love

Also, Hawthorne Heights, the Starlite Desperation

Grizzly Bear and the Los Angeles Philharmonic at Walt Disney Concert Hall, March 1

Grizzly Bear and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Walt Disney Concert Hall Saturday, March 1 photos by Timothy Norris You knew Saturday night was turning magical when a roustabout in the audience at Walt Disney Concert Hall let out a yelp of glee during the LA Philharmonic's octane-fueled performanc ... More >>

Music Picks: Black Heart Procession, Vandelles, Minnie Driver, Ronnie Mack

For the week of Jan. 11 - 17

Weiss' Top Albums of 2007 (#40-36)

40. The Twilight Sad-Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters [Fat Cat] Take note Bloc Party. This is how you do histrionic, nostalgic and bombastic arena rock for indie kids without coming off like total fucking pussies. A Weekend in the City wasn't terrible, but it wasn't good either, and by the end ... More >>

Mending the Gap

An interview with Joanna Newsom, who performs Ys with a 28-piece orchestra at the Walt Disney Concert Hall on Friday, November 9

Rock Picks

For the week of April 5–12

Anti-Gravity Rainbow

The Klaxons' Myths of the Near Future

Crullers That Bloom in Spring

Time to see the Donut Man

Super-Duper Sondre

Norwegian songbird embraces inner Thomas Dolby!

In the Pink

Shins take a trip to the dark side of the moon

Oops! Year-Ended Again!

Drake Bell, Mick Jagger & Me

Kitty Litter

Giant Drag is the real poop

Amalgamated Cure

Fire and Water

Karen Carson and Jennifer Pastor

Musclin’ and Guzzlin’

In praise of V-8s

No Ashes Left

Time of the Session

When the music was fast, and the players anonymous

Devil Children

An Anthem Reclaimed

Three-Ring Chaos

You can’t wreck a disaster

Sons of the City

The Red Hot Chili Peppers have made an unlikely pop masterpiece by singing bittersweet songs of salvation that could have only been born in L.A.

Dune Prophecy

The Tao of Pop

Saint Etienne unbounces back

Give the Drummer Some

Earl Palmer, rock & roll's heavy hitter

Nerve Action

Flaming Lips and the spark that bleeds

Sunshine Superman

Louis Philippe's music for libertines

Lost Soul

A lament for black Los Angeles