Counting Crows brought their signature blend of alt-rock nostalgia and emotional resonance to Richmond’s new Allianz Amphitheater this past weekend, playing to a packed crowd under clear summer skies. The night kicked off with The Gaslight Anthem, opened the evening...
After an almost three year dry-spell, Mastodon returns with a deeply personal new record in Empire of the Sand. Formed in the late 90s, Mastodon made waves with a pair of concept records in the early 00s - 2002's Remission and 2004's Leviathan, the later of which garnered massive praise from metal mags nationwide. 2006's Blood Mountain continued...
Take some good ol’ fashioned rock and roll and mix it with a little country/Americana and you have RVA’s The Trongone Band. The group, which began as a family affair years ago, has been entertaining crowds ever since with their feel-good, no frills, energetic shows and next month, the band will drop their debut album. On a recent afternoon, I sat...
Tis’ the season! Festivals are on everyone’s mind, and after Dominion Riverrock this past weekend, I’m sure Richmond cannot wait until the next three-day festival. Up next is the continuation of the Friday Cheers series, Richmond’s Greek Festival, Broad Appetite, Jazz Fest, Bacon Fest, and we even have the Beer, Bourbon, and BBQ fest to look...
While not a household name (yet), Ki:Theory’s music has been going worldwide via placements in shows like "Suits," "CSI" & "How to Get Away With Murder" for some years. Even popular brands, ranging from Nike, GoPro and Audi, feature his music in advertisements. And this succesful producer and song writer does it all from a studio located in...
Back in February, RVA Mag first gave you the scoop on Friends for Equality, a local music and zine collective that raises money for social justice and civil rights organizations, just a few months after the group released its first music compilation. The collective was started by lifelong activist Nancy Kells as an outlet for her outrage and...
According to Ben Rellick, Monopolyopolis is an experiment in how many o’s you can fit in a band name. But in reality, the instrumental solo project is an experiment in much more than that. The project, headed solely by Rellick, had been toying around with multiple combinations of sounds and textures for about a year and half before releasing his...
“This is my daughter!” shouted a hip-looking guy to a group of equally hip-looking parents, introducing his pre-teenager, as concertgoers rapidly filled the space around him. A crowd of fans young and old descended on the National Wednesday night for The Shins’ sold out show, fresh from the previous night’s show at Norfolk venue the NorVa and...
I spent the weekend in Durham, NC, at a festival devoted to the synthesizer and some of the best acts from the show are stopping in RVA tonight. It's also gonna help if you like terrifying noise music. I'm gonna run down Moogfest in the next week or so (as I am still recovering) but one of the stand out acts, NYC's Pharamakon (top image), should...
“This band is like the soundtrack of my childhood, like what my dad used to listen to,” said Corey Fonville, who plays drums in the Richmond-based groovy instrumental quartet, Butcher Brown. Fonville, along with Devonne Harris (DJ Harrison, keys), Marcus Tenney (saxophone, trumpet), Andrew Randazzo (bass) and Morgan Burrs (guitar) make up the...
