Molly Bergen

It wasn't supposed to get this big. Justin Gage started a blog named after a Wilco lyric called Aquarium Drunkard in the summer of 2005 so that he could let his buddies know what he was listening to. "It was just an easier way than email to share with friends, who had spread out across the country, whatever books I was reading or movies I was watching, or obviously, music I was listening to." Gage told us over some beers in Silver Lake. "It started out as just my immediate circle of friends and then people I didn't know started reading it, and quickly became just focused on music." The blog flourished, and within a year was being read not just by Gage's buddies, but by people all over the US and around the world.

"If it's a million degrees and the world is on fire, where do we have a show? The desert," Kevin Richard, lead guitarist for the Mannequin Men, laughs from his van heading up Highway 5, "That's how we roll. If there was an epic snowstorm right now we'd be playing Quebec." Humor is what makes these Chicago garage rockers so much fun to watch. Their sound is meat and potatoes garage rock influenced heavily by the Stooges and the Replacements, but underneath the snotty vocals you can hear genuine discontent spiked with a dash of raunchy humor. Like the Black Lips, these guys write about a generation of kids who finished school to enter world to a world which has no employment for them. They write for those who are worn out and frustrated by working dead end jobs with no sign of things turning around. The Mannequin Men harness this rage and turn it into fuel for their songs with some sprinklings of sexual frustration just for kicks.

"Brothers and Sisters I have a story for you," announced a skinny man in a white collared shirt. He then relayed to us a tale of a magic man on Hollywood Blvd. who gave him magic coins that got him so high he saw Jesus. He then denounced Jesus and said that the next band would be even better than the son of God, which is a pretty tough introduction to live up to. I'm...

The deaths of James Brown or the Wicked Wilson Pickett left a huge gaping hole in the soul universe, but all is not lost Black Joe Lewis is picking up where they left off. Bursting out of Austin with a eight piece set up, Black Joe Lewis and his Honeybears have been drawing fans like flies to a honey jar with their saucy dirty, blues. The songs of their debut album,Tell 'Em What Your Name Is! get to the meat of what life is all about when you're young: being broke ("I'm Broke"), one night stands ("Sugarfoot"), amour ("Bitch, I Love You") and getting down ("Boogie"). Black Joe Lewis was kind enough to talk with us before his show at the Troubadour. Here is some of what was said.

Some bands are like those brilliant, glowing sparklers that you light on Independence Day. They burn really brightly for a couple minutes and then fizzle out. Promising Nashville rockers Be Your Own Pet did just that. They put out an album, toured for a couple years, and then imploded in on themselves. A year later, rising from the ashes of that band, former guitarist and bassist, Jake and Jamin Orrall have decided to get serious about their side band, Jeff the Brotherhood. Releasing their fifth reverb heavy, garage rock album (and first really serious foray as an independent group) the brothers will be opening for Ted Leo and the Pharmacists at the Echo on Friday.

A few weeks ago, I walked into the Bootleg Theater and was hit with a wall of sound. I had to take a step back and ran over my teeth with my tongue to make sure my fillings were still in place. With all of my molecules a-quiverin' in perfect unison, I ventured deeper into the theater and was surprised to find only two men on stage one armed with only a keyboard and a laptop and a the other with a drum kit making some of the most beautiful, swirling, electro-ambient music I've heard in quite sometime. Due to the set up of the venue, I perched on a bar stool and soaked up the vibe, but given my druthers I would have been lying on the floor, feeling the vibrations seep through my clothes and into my body. In fact, if you're listening to this tune at work you should do just that.

Travis Pastrana has been the only person to land a double back flip on a motorcycle, enjoys jumping out of planes without a parachute, has done a back flip in a monster truck, won nine X Games gold medals and three Rally America championships, has a show on MTV where he and his crazy friends do incredibly dangerous (and exciting) things called Nitro Circus, and has pretty much beaten everyone around him in every sport he's ever tried - and he’s only 25 years old. Due to the fact that Pastrana might not live to see his 26th birthday, and the fact that it's been ten years since he first emerged as a motocross star (Yes, he won his first X games gold at the tender age of fifteen) Red Bull and MTV and God knows who else, decided to throw a lifetime achievement award party/ roast for Mr. Pastrana at the Avalon in Hollywood in order to honor the living legend, while he's still...you know living.

Three weeks ago, someone handed me a copy of Frankel's latest album, Anonymity Is The New Fame. I was floored. Here was a songwriter who wove intricate lyrics in between lovely melodies that captured your imagination. It was the sort of album that required you to lie on the floor, stare at the ceiling, and absorb its stories. Naturally, my next move was an internet search for the date of his next live show. As it turns out, it's "never". That's right - never. I figured I must have heard wrong. I mean, what kind of artist puts out a record and then doesn't tour?

If Guy Garvey was half as pretty as Chris Martin, Elbow would have been at the top of the charts a long time ago, neck in neck with Coldplay. As it is Elbow's richly melodic rock, powered by Garvey's transcendent voice has long made them the darlings of critics and music geeks everywhere, but not as celebrated as they should be be the mainstream. Such is life. Over the past ten years, Elbow has gathered an extremely diverse and loyal base, which poured into the Wiltern on a Wednesday night, selling out the house. There really is something magical about standing in between a behomoth of a man, covered in tattoos, in a jean jacket with the sleeves cut off, and a tiny scrap of a girl, who couldn't be more than sixteen, wearing tons of glittery eyeshadow, and hearing them both unabashedly belting out the same song at the top of their lungs.

Some people go green by driving Priuses. Others brag about their bio-diesel conversions. Don't get me wrong. These are both admirable attempts at meaningful earth friendliness, but when you really want hardcore bragging rights, nothing beats abandoning the auto altogether. For their first West coast tour, The folk-pop duo known as Blind Pilot decided to head from Vancouver to San Diego by...bicycle.