Falling James

When Backbiter singer-guitarist Jonathan Hall says, “We’re the weeds of the L.A. rock scene,” he means it in the same way that Johnny Rotten once railed, “We‘re the flowers in the dustbin,” and Neil Young described his “cowgirl in the sand” as a “ruby in the dust.” It’s Hall‘s polite......

Silver Lake hepcats tend to throw around the word genius when describing W.A.C.O. front man Steve Gregoropoulos, if only because he resembles a mad professor, in his black coat and unruly hair, while conducting his equally unruly mini-orchestra with one hand and hammering out judgments on the piano with the......

MANU CHAOAt the Auditorio Municipal, Tijuana, December 13; and at the Palace, December 14 Layered with maddeningly insidious melodies, serpentine acoustic guitars and an ongoing Greek chorus of dialogue sampled from obscure movies and revolutionary speeches, Manu Chao’s debut CD, Clandestino -- the rock en español equivalent to Sgt. Pepper‘s......

JOHNNY THUNDERSIn the Flesh (Amsterdamned) The late Johnny Thunders wasn’t the world‘s fastest or slickest guitarist, yet his thick power chords, reckless hara-kiri thrusts up the ax’s neck and distinctive twist on Chuck Berry‘s style -- bending the strings with an extra fat and deliberately lazy juiciness -- influenced just......

Even the Devics aren‘t sure what their name signifies. Singer Sara Lov and pianist-guitarist Dustin O’Halloran just liked the way the word (pronounced ”DEE-vicks“) sounded when they overheard a friend use it in 1991. ”It‘s something that we thought meant something and ended up being something else,“ O’Halloran says. ”She......

COBRA VERDE SINGER-GUITARIST JOHN PETKOVIC HATES INDIE ROCK even more than you do, which is a bit surprising, considering that his first band, Death of Samantha, spent much of the '80s releasing albums on Gerard Cosloy's influential alterna-label Homestead. In fact, Death of Sam's sardonic rock revisionism on records like......

The BellRays have a tough-love plan to save rock & roll's lazy ass. "You know why there are so many crappy bands?" asks singer Lisa Kekaula during a recent interview at a Japanese restaurant in a mini-mall near the Beverly Center. "It's because so many people go out there and......