Review: Kings of Leon, 'Come Around Sundown'

Review: Kings of Leon, 'Come Around Sundown'

Review: Kings of Leon, 'Come Around Sundown': Aidin Vaziri | If Kings of Leon are feeling any fatigue from running so hard during the past few years - basically since 2008's "Only by the Night" blew up and made them shaggy-haired festival stars - it certainly doesn't show on the group's fifth studio album. On "Come Around Sundown," the Followill siblings don't shrink from the spotlight with a bunch of off-key krautrock tunes produced by Steve Albini, but rather grow heroically into their roles as rock 'n' roll torchbearers. There's not much fluff here. The first single, "Radioactive," speeds forward on a mammoth glam riff and jackhammer chorus; "The Face" finds the group fine-tuning its U2-goes-south strut; and "Mary" sees the boys delivering an unexpected slab of throat-scraping bubble-gum pop. The nonstop touring, the backstage fistfights, the hearing "Sex on Fire" in every topless bar from Bakersfield to Bangladesh - it all went in here. If the previous record put Kings of Leon over the top, this should be the one that makes sure they stay there.

Riding With Pablove Across America

Riding With Pablove Across America

Jeff Castelaz fights cancer with Pablove Foundation: Aidin Vaziri | Jeff Castelaz was ready to celebrate. Convinced his 5-year-old son Pablo had beaten a rare form of childhood cancer called bilateral Wilms' tumor, the co-founder of Los Angeles independent label Dangerbird Records planned a cross-country bike trek to raise money and awareness for other victims of the pediatric disease. "We wanted to do it as a show of strength - that we went through this and we made it," says Castelaz, 38. "That's not how our story ended." Just a few days after his sixth birthday, Pablo lost his yearlong battle with cancer. Given the option of sitting in a room and pulling the shades, Castelaz decided he would complete the ride. "I needed to do something to wring my soul out," he says. "Cycling has the grace and aggression I needed." So Castelaz and his wife, Jo Ann Thrailkill, established the Pablove Foundation and set a fundraising goal of $500,000 for pediatric cancer research. Then he started pedaling. Read more.

Clint Eastwood Makes Overtone's Day

Clint Eastwood Makes Overtone's Day

Overtone to play Yoshi's San Francisco: Aidin Vaziri | Johnny Cash? Brahms? Slayer? When you think of the music that might be spinning in the Clint Eastwood household at suppertime, the last thing you would probably expect to hear are a capella covers of George Michael songs by a gleaming South African boy band called Overtone. But that's exactly what tops the playlist at the Carmel home of the 80-year-old professional badass. "Their harmonies are terrific," says Eastwood, on a break from promoting his latest project, "Hereafter." "Pop music isn't my first choice, but I can listen to theirs." Read more.

Pop Quiz: Mary J. Blige

Pop Quiz: Mary J. Blige

Aidin Vaziri | It hasn't been easy for Mary J. Blige. From being born into a Yonkers housing project and enduring a string of toxic relationships to years of drug and alcohol abuse, the nine-time Grammy winner has fought some pretty remarkable odds to keep her head up. We spoke to the singer, who is on tour in support of her most recent album, 2009's "Stronger With Each Tear," shortly after her knockout performance with Drake at the Video Music Awards.


Mary J. Blige
Q: Why is this tour called Music Saved My Life?
A: I believe there are certain things that God uses to get us out of a bad situation, and I believe music was one of the things he used for me. The first time I heard "Keep on Moving" by Soul II Soul, I felt like somebody pumped a new spirit in me that made me want to go on.
Q: Do you hear the same thing from other people about your own songs?
A: I remember this mother telling me a few years ago about her little girl whose face was destroyed by a dog bite. The girl didn't want to live. Then "No More Drama" came on the radio while they were in the car, and she opened her mouth for the first time and said, "I don't want to die."
Q: Is it hard singing the most painful songs from your past?
A: As hard as it is for me to listen to "My Life," I know I made it. Every time I put it on I'm in tears thinking of all the experiences I had. You can push it under the rug, but when you're faced with it, you remember you made it through.
Read more.

Pop Quiz: LCD Soundsystem

Pop Quiz: LCD Soundsystem

Aidin Vaziri | This is it: James Murphy has pledged to kill off LCD Soundsystem at the end of the year. Not only would that would make "This Is Happening," the Brooklyn disco-punk outfit's third and most recent release, its last - it would also mean its headlining set at the Treasure Island Music Festival on Saturday will be the last time you can catch them live. As if you needed one more reason to get out there. We tried to talk Murphy, 40, off the ledge last week when we caught up with him at a tour stop in Boston.


James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem
Q: You're touring so much this year. Aren't you worried about going through withdrawal if you stop?
A: No. I don't think I would ever feel withdrawal from touring. I like it, but I also like not touring.
Q: Is it hard for you to be a front man, considering you don't really move like David Bowie or Mick Jagger?
A: I never really felt like a natural front man. But I have to do the job. I found a place where it makes sense to me. My job is slightly different from those guys. I tailored it how my personality operates.
Q: You seem so aware of your band's place in the scheme of music history. Does that put you at a disadvantage compared to, like, the guy from Train?
A: Is Train a band?
Q: You've never heard of Train?
A: I've literally never heard of them. Are they a big band?
Q: They're kind of big. They sing a lot of songs about lattes.
A: I don't have a radio. I have no idea. Maybe the process is complicated for me by not being OK with generic s-.
Read more.

Review: Fran Healy, 'Wreckorder'

Review: Fran Healy, 'Wreckorder'

Review: Fran Healy, 'Wreckorder': Aidin Vaziri | Fran Healy had a good run with his band Travis, turning out sweet-natured pop tunes that served as an antidote to tour mates Oasis' caveman rock in the late '90s. But the Scottish group's last few albums were directionless and dull, so much so that the members decided to wander off and start families rather than make any more. But the singer presses on with his first solo effort, "Wreckorder." Healy looks a bit like a vagabond now, with his gray scruff and thrift-store fedora, but the songs here are probably his most inspired since those on Travis' 1999 classic, "The Man Who." He recruited Paul McCartney via e-mail to play bass on the down-tempo "As It Comes" (Healy went vegetarian to thank him for his troubles), and trades verses with Neko Case on the lovely "Sing Me to Sleep." But it's the solo songs, sounding a little more synthetic than you might expect, that see him launching into orbit, particularly when he breaks out the old falsetto for the heart-wrenching "Anything." Now if only he could give up the bad rhymes (on "Buttercups," Healy sings, "I see you sitting in silence outside my house/ Quiet as a mouse"), things might get fully back on track.

Live Review: Arcade Fire at the Greek Theatre

Live Review: Arcade Fire at the Greek Theatre

Review: Arcade Fire lays siege to Greek Theatre: Aidin Vaziri | If the members of Arcade Fire weren't in a rock 'n' roll band, they would probably be institutionalized. Not even halfway into "Ready to Start," the opening song of their first sold-out concert at Berkeley's Greek Theatre on Saturday, and several of the musicians in the Montreal collective were twitching wildly, shouting for no particular reason and violently banging on anything within arm's reach - including each other. Even with eight members sagging the stage, none of the musicians felt comfortable sitting out a single song. When things got slow, they merely switched instruments. The accordion player, for example, moved behind the drums, the keyboard player jumped up front with a megaphone and Win Butler, the group's freakishly tall singer with a half-shaved head, grabbed a mandolin and strummed the bejesus out of it. Read more.

Pop Quiz: Davy Jones

Pop Quiz: Davy Jones

Aidin Vaziri | Davy Jones, not the tentacle-faced monster from "Pirates of the Caribbean" but Marcia Brady's favorite Monkee, will return to the San Francisco stage at the Rrazz Room Friday through next Sunday. Even though the 64-year-old Englishman has spent the past few years tending to his large stable of horses in rural Pennsylvania and getting married for a third time, to a Telemundo star half his age, he still likes to trot out classic hits like "Daydream Believer" and "Pleasant Valley Sunday." We caught up with Jones to find out how married life is treating him, how he feels about Justin Bieber and whether he anticipates ever getting back together with the old primates, Micky Dolenz, Peter Tork and Michael Nesmith.


Davy Jones
Q: Any hopes for getting the Monkees back together?
A: We're talking about doing a tour next year with the Monkees.
Q: I thought you hated those guys.
A: I know, but all of the sudden they're talking about going out. Micky, Peter and I talk. They've gone through a couple of changes over the last few years. Mike is hard to pin down on dates. My thing is I just don't want to get onstage with a bunch of old guys. But they're talking about something else. They're talking about a show with dialogue and all this stuff.
Q: You mean like the Abba thing?
A: The problem with that was, once I saw the Abba thing I was like, "Get me out of here!" But it might be different with the Monkees because they're funny guys.
Read more.

Review: KT Tunstall, 'Tiger Suit'

Review: KT Tunstall, 'Tiger Suit'

Review: KT Tunstall, 'Tiger Suit': Aidin Vaziri | The runaway success of KT Tunstall's first album, 2004's "Eye to the Telescope," transformed her from a spunky Scottish folkie to jingle writer extraordinaire thanks to inescapable hits like "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" and "Suddenly I See." But self-doubt set in after its follow-up, 2007's "Drastic Fantastic," failed to repeat the trick, so the Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter took a few years off to redraft the blueprint. The changes are immediately apparent on the raucous "Uummannaq Song," the opening track from her third album, "Tiger Suit." Recorded in Berlin's Hansa Studios, the album is dominated by electronic effects, clanging percussion and brittle verses - all of which conspire to make Tunstall's soft-focus rasp strain to be heard. The whole thing sounds like a bit of an overreaction, really, with the 35-year-old singer so desperate to move on that she neglects to hang onto the things that made her worth embracing in the first place. From the processed strings and hollow putdowns of "Glamour Puss" to the dreary industrial blues of "Madame Trudeau," she doesn't sound inspired but bitter. It's hard to imagine any of these songs playing over the opening credits of next year's big chick flick.