KMDFM celebrates 40 years of kickin’ ass in Atlanta with start of LET GO tour

With hands thrown in the air and fists slapping the sky, fans of all ages bobbed along, banging heads to the “ultra heavy beat” at the Masquerade in Atlanta on March 6, 2024.

KMFDM opened its 40th anniversary tour with the first track off the 2022 release, Hyëna.

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Show Review: Jamila Woods with Madison McFerrin at August Hall, 2/4/24

(Photos by Dakin Hardwick)

I am a new fan of Jamila Woods, having just discovered her through Spinning Platters’ intense and wonderful Album of the Year process, and I’m so glad I did. Jamila Woods is an amazing writer, and her music fills the soul. On the stormiest Sunday California has seen in a long time, I trekked through the almost deserted streets of San Francisco in the hopes that music would take away the wet and soggy feelings I’d had all weekend.  Continue reading “Show Review: Jamila Woods with Madison McFerrin at August Hall, 2/4/24”

SF Sketchfest Review: Bracing The Elements: Avatar The Last Airbender Podcast Live at The Great Star Theater, 1/28/24

There is something about the cartoon series Avatar: The Last Airbender, almost twenty years old now, that was always unusual. Aside from being coined the first American Anime, it was nothing like any other cartoon on Nickelodeon or any other station for that matter. Taking place in a completely fictional world made up of societies and lands corresponding to the four main elements: Earth, Fire, Air, and Water, the story was a continuous adventure full of growth that built to a huge climax at the end of three seasons. But the most startling aspect of this story, for something supposedly targeted at kids, was that it was rampant with extremely adult themes, such as war, genocide, loss, and conflict. But at no point was the plot relegated to hopelessness. There was an idea of balance woven into the fabric of the story’s DNA. Countering all the negative hardships the characters have to live through, there was a cornucopia of warm moments popping up and bursting in the episodes, full of love, hope, friendship, laughter, caring for your fellow person, and fighting for what is right. Continue reading “SF Sketchfest Review: Bracing The Elements: Avatar The Last Airbender Podcast Live at The Great Star Theater, 1/28/24”

SF Sketchfest Review: The Bechdel Cast at Club Fugazi, 2/1/24

I’m not a movie person. I have seen maybe five movies in the last five years. Yes, that included the two years or so of complete pandemic lockdown and not leaving the house. I like The Bechdel Cast because I’m a fan of Jamie Loftus and Caitlin Durante more than movies. But I haven’t spent much time listening to the podcast for that reason. However, with the two of them doing a tour to discuss Barbie, the 2023 monster hit film AND the only movie I’ve seen in theaters this decade, I was glad to have some connection to the movie the two were discussing.  Continue reading “SF Sketchfest Review: The Bechdel Cast at Club Fugazi, 2/1/24”

SF Sketchfest Review: Red Room Orchestra plays The Lost Boys at Great American Music Hall, 1/19/24

It is apparent as we arrive that The Lost Boys is a seminal coming-of-age film to more goths and their familiars than those —ahem — of a certain age. Though not sold out, The Great American is full of stylish vampires of all ages, my partner and myself included. The 1987 Schumacher Peter Pan/Anne Rice mashup maintains a certain cultural currency as evinced by a thirty year reunion back in 2019 featuring the full living cast.
Tonight features a more modest guest list — a fit Alex Winter and a near manic Timmy Capello, second-string vampire and scene-stealing shirtless saxman — the Red Room Orchestra lineup is fire. This is a blessing because when we dust off the Lost Boys Soundtrack CD, we find an abbreviated list of ten tracks representing not a post-punk goth masterpiece but a schizophrenic mash-up of late eighties pop distractions, from INXS regrettably twice-dipping into Aussie pub-rock, to late-career solo forays by Foreigner’s Lou Grahm and the Who’s Roger Daltrey, to the residual 50’s rock n’ roll hangover that plagued that decade. The unauthorized list containing all the film’s tracks is just as bewildering, including the Run DMC/Aerosmith hip-hop crossover, “Walk This Way.” We rightly remember the high points: Echo and the Bunnymen covering “People Are Strange,” Gerard McMann’s standout “Cry Little Sister,” and, of course, Tim Capello’s sweaty and inexplicable cover of Christian rock band The Fall’s “I Still Believe.” Continue reading “SF Sketchfest Review: Red Room Orchestra plays The Lost Boys at Great American Music Hall, 1/19/24”

SF Sketchfest Review: Kids In The Hall “Unplugged” at Palace Of Fine Arts, 1/23/24

Photos by Jakub Mosur

I’m not sure what the “unplugged” in Kids In The Hall Unplugged is referring to. Non-electric comedians? Acoustic comedians? The first thing that happened was a sound issue with one of the mics running foul and each member of the cast hopping up and down and tapping and teasing each other to figure out whose it was. They were wireless mics, so there’s that. As will likely become apparent, I am not a comedy reviewer. I’m not even much of a live comedy consumer. Perhaps “unplugged” is vernacularly smuggled in from live music that has assumed its own valence. At any rate, the mic problem, rather than hindering the performance, seemed to loosen everybody up and give them a chance to stretch their ad-lib muscles in these predefined but still vigorous skits.

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SF Sketchfest Review: Doug Loves Movies Podcast at The Gateway Theater, 1/21/24

It’s SF Sketchfest time! I may have a schedule full of shows, but I am still here to give you this review/guide to Doug Loves Movies (DLM), comedian Doug Benson’s podcast that has been making us laugh since 2006. On the show he has celebrity guests (usually comedians or actors) and along with fun banter, tests their knowledge of movies with a variety of trivia games. For this episode (available here or on your favorite podcast streaming platform) his guests were Amy Schneider a writer of Jeopardy! fame; Geoff Tate: comedian and DLM regular: Chad Opitz: another comedian and regular; Anna Roisman: comedian, host, writer, actress; and Ardin Myrin: actress, comedian, and podcaster.  Continue reading “SF Sketchfest Review: Doug Loves Movies Podcast at The Gateway Theater, 1/21/24”

SF Sketchfest Review: Derek and Simon (and Bob): An SF Sketchfest Tribute Celebration at Cobb’s Comedy Club, 1/27/24

My favorite thing about SF Sketchfest is catching all kinds of funny people at once in the same room. Not only that, but these are the kind of people I don’t often have the chance to see live, so it’s always fun to peruse the schedule every year and see who’s slated to appear with whom, what’s being celebrated, yadda yadda yadda. As is the case with most years, there were quite a few events I was interested in, but in the end, I only made it to one. This past Saturday night, I found myself queuing up around the block at Cobb’s Comedy Club to watch old clips of Derek & Simon: The Show with the stars and creators of the show (Derek Waters, Simon Helberg, and Bob Odenkirk in particular). Continue reading “SF Sketchfest Review: Derek and Simon (and Bob): An SF Sketchfest Tribute Celebration at Cobb’s Comedy Club, 1/27/24”

SF Sketchfest Review: Jena Friedman: Not Funny with Brittany Carney at The Gateway Theater, 1.26.24

I’ve spent a LOT of the pandemic digging around YouTube, looking for ANYTHING to push the serotonin levels up. That’s when I uncovered Jena Friedman’s YouTube channel. Insomnia + depression + anxiety are all great for political satire, and I really fell head over heels for what she was doing. Little did I know that she was a writer on The Daily Show, but it all kind of made sense after that. In another depressed fit, I ended up preordering her book Not Funny, and despite not feeling depressed when I read it, I still enjoyed it. So, of course, when SF Sketchfest presented me with the opportunity to see her live, I figured it was something I needed to do. Continue reading “SF Sketchfest Review: Jena Friedman: Not Funny with Brittany Carney at The Gateway Theater, 1.26.24”

Show Review: Cattle Decapitation, Immolation, Sanguisugabogg, and Castrator at The Belasco Theatre, 12/15/2023

The Terrasitic Infestation of Los Angeles

Heavy music has been making a pretty big comeback into the public eye lately. My theory is that when the world around us seems intent on reminding us that we are a species that is hardly worth the time and effort it takes to survive, we gravitate toward music that shares that outlook. No band embodies this thesis wholeheartedly as much as San Diego’s Cattle Decapitation, so it should be no surprise that I’m a pretty big fan. That aside, it was one hell of a night for death metal at The Belasco.

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