The Curmudgeon Rock Report

In which The Curmudgeons hop into the phone booth and travel back to the time when Britpop ruled the world during the heart of the 1990s. What was Britpop? Most specifically, it was a call to rock 'n' roll arms by a swath of young, hungry bands peeved at America's cultural imperialism of the era. The music swayed and blasted with confidence, and its pop structures were tight, tuneful--and, as a result, titanic. We start this series...

In which The Curmudgeons continue their exploration of all the cool and revolutionary sounds blasting out of the City of Angels in the 1990s. By 1995, the music world had been grungified, making things safer, brighter and lovelier for not only hard-rock artists, but folks of the more soul-breaking, confessional variety. And that L.A. satisfied both ends of that spectrum between 1995 and 1999. Rage Against the Machine, Tool, System ...

In which the Curmudgeons once again venture to the City of Angels to recapture all the great vibes generated during the 1990s. After a 1980s in which glam metal and punk scenes dominated, what came next for Los Angeles? Well, the trade winds blew in from the Pacific Northwest, and the influence of grunge made the music crunchier and louder, giving us bands like Tool and Weezer. Meanwhile, the longstanding stylings of the L.A. under...

In which The Curmudgeons pay loving tribute to one of our favorite bands. Built to Spill is the brainchild of Boise, Idaho, native and guitar maestro Doug Martsch, who's been banging and crunching his way through indie-rock anthems for more than three decades now. As Arturo Andrade likes to say, BTS, as we call them for short, taught indie-rockers everywhere that classic rock and guitar solos were cool. And BTS has served up some r...

In which The Curmudgeons take a big ol' dukey on that most prominent of rap-metal bands Limp Bizkit. The band is surely one of the worst hard-rock outfits to make it big since cranking up guitars real loud became a thing. Its plodding, uninspired riffage was eclipsed only by its misogynistic, corroded worldview and ultra-dumb lyrics. We dive into the rock's dregs here, analyzing the band's origins as we...

In which The Curmudgeons trip out through outer space and rock out to Hawkwind, one of the most singular psychedelic rock bands of all time. And in which we do it completely sober! This band practically invented what is known as space rock, a jammy, propulsive brand of heavy metal that focuses its gaze firmly on the cosmos and all the alien beings and strange phenomena the Great Beyond can generate. We focus on this longtime, proli...

In which The Curmudgeons give loud, deserved props to one of modern rock's most influential bands. Hûsker Dû started out as a revered hardcore punk band in Minneapolis in 1979, but by the mid-1980s, the band had veered toward a style that became known as punk-pop--loud and abrasive but also unquestionably melodic and heartfelt. During this episode, we extol the virtues of Hûsker Dû and what made them truly great. We discuss their s...

In which The Curmudgeons continue their exploration of the City of Angels during arguably its most fertile period, namely the decade of the 1980s. Last episode, we established that the glam metal and punk scenes gestated based on a similar us-against-the-world ethos, albeit expressed much differently from one another. By the late '80s, glam metal had become a bona fide global commodity and its punk...hadn't, morphing instead into s...

In which The Curmudgeons travel back to sleazy, sweaty streets of Los Angeles to celebrate the music emanating from the City of Angeles. On one end, you had the burgeoning glam metal scene, a parade of excess and depravity in leather, chains and spandex--and some glorious, decadent riffage. On the other end, you had the DIY punk underground, led by hardcore punk stalwarts Black Flag and their SST label. You also had quirkier bands ...

In which The Curmudgeons end their dynamic 3rd Golden Age of Rock series with a loving reexamination of the year 1980. The year stands as crucial pivot point for the development of rock 'n' roll culture. Punk and post-punk were becoming Gothic rock and New Wave. The Clash was serving as a virtual world jukebox. Talking Heads was virtually doing the same. And everyone was serving up their tunes and imagery in the year before MTV cha...

In which The Curmudgeons honor one of hip-hop's most tragic figures. Big L was a hip-hop savant from Harlem whose flows were endlessly inventive, whose lyrics walked a fine line between pathos and shock value and whose professionalism allowed him to dominate any beat and any style. His star was on the rise in early 1999 before disaster struck and Big L was murdered. We'll closely examine his brief career and its astounding output i...

In which The Curmudgeons passionately laud, lavish and defend one of the true gentle giants of popular music--and certainly its most underappreciated. Curtis Mayfield was an absolute pioneer of soul, R&B and funk. Mayfield produced an astonishing body of work, first as the bandleader for soul trio The Impressions in the 1960s, and then as a prolific solo artist in the 1970s. He tempered the anger and rage of Black America with ...

In which The Curmudgeons honor one of the most important years in all of rock 'n' roll history. Through the greatest albums and songs of 1979, we hear the sound of one decade fading and another decade splashing into full color and light. Post-punk, for instance, reached its most glorious heights, with bands like Public Image Ltd. and Gang of Four offering up a danceable yet jagged concoction. There was also the grandest statement p...

In which The Curmudgeons examine the last great era for hip-hop, namely the years between 1999 and 2008. After the catastrophe that was the murders of Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls, hip-hop could have imploded and or lost its footing--or even its respect as a genre. Instead, the movement throughout the 1990s, in which the hardcore went mainstream, carried over in the new century. In fact, hip-hop as a popular music genre exploded,...

In which the Curmudgeons know it's going to be a long, long time before the heavens produce a young man as preternaturally gifted as a songwriter and performer as Elton John proved to be back in the early 1970s. John's output during the early part of that fabled decade was routinely incredible, possessed with both a swagger and a tenderness that shone through in gorgeous melodies and the often profound lyrics of collaborator Bernie...

In which the Curmudgeons revisit the underrated yet crucially important year of 1978. Punk rock had gone mainstream in the two years prior to '78, and true to the restlessness that defined the genre, the music was ready to morph into post-punk and New Wave. We marvel at the movement this pivotal year brought in this episode. We cover albums by Elvis Costello, Public Image Ltd., Patti Smith, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Talking Heads,...

In which each of Yours Truly Curmudgeons offers our list of the ten best albums we consumed over the past 12 months. This was a surprisingly strong, deep year for new music releases...something exemplified by the fact that our lists share five entries in common. Here's a sneak peek: The top album on both of our lists is one of the greatest and most beloved superstars of all time. Shocking, but true: A pop goddess delivered a master...

In which The Curmudgeons shout before all the human race like we'll never lose. Yup, we're discussing the mighty, mighty Queen on this episode, focusing on the band's undeniable greatness from their beginnings all the way through 1980, when they peaked commercially with "Another One Bites the Dust" and "Crazy Little Thing Called Love." The band managed to be unapologetically campy and occasionally naughty while more than occasional...

In which the Curmudgeons continue to revisit the fertile fields of the late 1970s and land on 1977, one of the most explosive years in rock history. It's when the Sex Pistols dropped their album Never Mind the Bollocks, here's the Sex Pistols and set off a punk revolution. It's also when Fleetwood Mac, Kraftwerk and Bob Marley dropped genre-defining masterpieces. And that still only runs to the surface of what 1977 produced. From D...