Category: Features

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NoCo Music NoGo: COVID-19’s Massive Impact On Colorado’s Music Industry

March 25, 2020

“It’s pretty easy to see how unprepared everyone was,” said Brian Claxton – a touring drummer and music educator based in Greeley, Colorado. Music venues, restaurants and bars across the globe and in Colorado have been ordered to close due to coronavirus precautions, essentially cutting off the lifeblood of the music industry. But the ramifications go deeper, from the 50th anniversary of the huge UNC Jazz Festival delaying one year to smaller bands such as Float Like A Buffalo cancelling their shoestring budget tours.
“I think it will take a year to recover, not just in the economy but in the entertainment industry here,” Moxi Theater Ely Corliss said, “and that’s if we resume in April. If this goes until May 11 or so, it’ll be catastrophic for the Moxi and (his restaurant) Luna’s both.”

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Out Of The Perils: Old Man Saxon

March 24, 2020

“This is like some horror movie shit.” Old Man Saxon is looking back on one of the scariest moments during the 13 months he was living in his 2001 Ford Explorer Sport while trying to “make it” in Los Angeles. It was the middle of the night and he was sound asleep when a loud noise jolted him awake …

… but with homelessness now in his rearview, Old Man Saxon was able to focus on his next adventures, which included landing a song on HBO’s Silicon Valley soundtrack (“That was a miracle,” he says), a teaching role at the Musician’s Institute in Hollywood where he taught rap and a spot on the Netflix competition show Rhythm + Flow. 

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Max Barcelow: The Fragile Big Time and Saying Yes

March 17, 2020

Max Barcelow’s life as a professional musician in Fort Collins has had plenty of twists and turns. Drumming for prolific folk artist Gregory Alan Isakov, he’s played Red Rocks, in Europe, with the Colorado Symphony and attended this year’s Grammy ceremony on January 26 at The Staples Center, long dubbed “Kobe’s House,” on the day of Kobe Bryant’s death.
An evening torn between celebrating music and hastily trying to address and honor Bryant, Barcelow witnessed the pomp and grandeur of the Grammy’s while being reminded of how no one can escape life’s fragility – even with success and money. “It’s funny how death just brings it all back home,” Barcelow said.

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Into The Original: Tyler Walker & John DeWitt at the RMCMAs

March 6, 2020

As the talent booker for the Greeley Stampede’s music acts, John DeWitt always liked the Tyler Walker Band. But now that he’s in the band, he’s an even bigger fan. “I believed in him for a lot of different reasons,” DeWitt says. DeWitt and Walker will be part of this year’s Rocky Mountain Country Music Awards at the UCCC in Greeley on March 13.

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Jim Curry Is Not John Denver

March 3, 2020

Jim Curry is not John Denver. Well, no #@%*!, you say, but when you see him sing on stage, you may have doubts. Curry brings his Denver act to Greeley, performing with the Greeley Philharmonic Orchestra March 6. Curry has worked with Denver’s old bandmates themselves, though admitting: “I never did embrace the idea that I could have a music career.”

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Cover Story: Kyle Emerson – Coming Down and Into His Own

February 7, 2020

At the end of every show on his first tour as a solo artist, Kyle Emerson found himself exhausted. Emerson supported his first solo record, 2017’s Dorothy Alice, which he named for his late grandmother, with a lengthy tour.

Now, with his release Only Coming Down, Emerson focuses on the energy and connection with the crowd, bringing his more upbeat band shows to The Moxi Theater in Greeley on Thursday, February 20, presented by The Colorado Sound.

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Sultans of Shred: Greeley Teen’s World-Class Guitar Chops Run In La Familia

February 5, 2020

Greeley’s Liam Garcia is 17, a junior at Greeley West High School, and by all accounts plays guitar better than just about anyone else in the world his age (and honestly, most people twice his age).

He traveled to London in September for the Young Guitarist of the Year competition as the only American selected for the finals.

He plans to study at the Berklee College of Music, but the biggest exhilaration is playing with his dad Socrates on stage.

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Ani DiFranco: Still Righteous After All These Years

February 4, 2020

Since the 90’s, Ani DiFranco has been steadily creating a legacy for herself. She released 20 albums under her own record label Righteous Babe, and inspired an entire movement of women artists. Now the year is 2020, and the industry has changed once again. But Ani’s message hasn’t.

“I think there’s many people who think feminism doesn’t seem urgent,’ but you can’t prevent imbalance without addressing it,” DiFranco said.

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