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Kevin Johnston writer

29 stories

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FeaturesPlay it For Your Mates: Tones And I Rises Up Solo; Puts the “I” in Team-MacklemoreYou’ve heard it. It was written by a busker, in a closet, for a few friends at a youth hostel but somewhere on Planet Earth in the last three years, you’ve heard it.Kevin Johnston · Aug 11, 2022

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Bevin Luna: 105.5 The Colorado Sound’s Featured Artist“Madison & Angelus is a garage rock EP because it’s rock and roll. And it was literally recorded in a garage in LaPorte, Colorado,” Bevin Luna says. True to the garage band ethos, the 6 tracks mesh originals, covers and co-writes with big, fuzzy guitars, overdriven vocals and bashing drums. But the garage has a heart and some depth behind its door. Much of the writing discusses the turmoil of being a musician in the digital age, and as Luna puts it: “In the middle of a pandemic sandwich: never knowing where to begin or if it’s ever going to end – constantly trying to reassure ourselves that everything was gonna be OK.”Kevin Johnston · Jul 21, 2022

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MusicAlbum Review: People in General – friendsPeople in General are making the leap. Since their first release Piglet in 2019, the trio has grown into a full 8 piece band with horns, extra vocalists and more.Kevin Johnston · Jul 20, 2022

Son Lux band portrait: three people in dark clothing and glasses posed against a plain cream wall.

FeaturesSon Lux Scores Everything and Frees Up Their TomorrowsIf André 3000 playing a Mayan double flute for your band’s movie score isn’t proof that the multiverse exists, we don’t know what is.Kevin Johnston · May 11, 2022

Four women stand against a sage green wall holding a cello, violin, upright bass, and mandolin outdoors.

105.5 The Colorado Sound's Featured ArtistsBig Richard: 105.5 The Colorado Sound’s Featured Artist“It is SO FUN,” cellist Joy Adams says of Big Richard. “We’re always laughing until we cry, and there’s no competition. It’s just genuine, supportive fun.” Big Richard formed specifically to be the token all-female band at McAwesomefest in Colorado in May of 2021. Lucky for fans of bluegrass, authentic vocals and a little something different, what started as a token quickly alchemized into gold.Kevin Johnston · Mar 4, 2022

Seven men pose in a wood-paneled lounge with record shelves, holding trumpets, a trombone, and a sousaphone.

FeaturesCommon Ancestor: LowDown Brass Band’s New Hotness Has Roots“LowDown Brass Band has roots in the Jazz education world,” MC Billa Camp tells BandWagon, “but the Jazz education world has the habit of treating Jazz like an island. As if – Jazz isn’t birthed from the same struggle as Hip Hop. As if they are not Black father and son, born fighting the same fight.” Lowdown Nights, the latest and most future-leaning record from LowDown Brass Band, was appropriately released during Black History Month. It takes things further out of the pigeonhole and into the pan-genre stage, using the history of the African American experience as its guide. Especially with the hit single “Be The One Tonight,” they go mainstream – and that’s a good thing. The collective has enough talent within its ranks to deliver a show with as much variety as Beyoncés 2018 Homecoming at Coachella. It’s the multi-lingual, multicultural, multi-genre kind of mainstream pop and dance music that encapsulates the musical stew of 2022.Kevin Johnston · Feb 10, 2022

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FeaturesSpoke In A Wheel: Zachary Williams of The Lone Bellow Hits the Road with Dirty CamaroZachary Williams, whose powerful voice drove him out from the Brooklyn Bar4 open-mic world and onto the international stage, is best known as the belting leader of The Lone Bellow. His new solo record Dirty Camaro is indeed an escape from that band’s gravity; one that’s weird, head-turning, soulful and fresh. Williams says “I’ve wanted to do it for a long time – really, right after Jim James from My Morning Jacket released his solo record.” He says James had “graciously come out to a couple of my shows,” and the two connected. What began as a two day trial session resulted in the full length record. The album is rich with expert pedal steel guitar, orchestral strings, saxophone and a Texas-band backbone that really cooks.Kevin Johnston · Feb 9, 2022

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MusicSingle Review: Branson Hoog – “No Vacancy”Intimate and sexy, Branson Hoog’s nimble, close-up vocals evoke an alluring darkness. The NOT A TOY (fka Shatterproof) frontman employs deep and minimalistic beats on “No Vacancy,” the second release under his own name.Kevin Johnston · Jan 11, 2022

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MusicSingle Review: Co-Stanza – “20 Minutes”Dropping realness like a reference to FaceTime helped folks relate to FoCo’s Co-Stanza (to the tune of nearly 2 million streams on “I Don’t Mind”) and by the sound of this hooky new toe tapper, Co-Stanza will continue racking up fans with each tick of the clock.Kevin Johnston · Jan 10, 2022

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MusicAlbum Review: This Broken Beat – Far From HomeJulio Perez, lead singer of This Broken Beat has the kind of pop-rock cross-over voice that would make Adam Levine turn his chair around.Kevin Johnston · Dec 8, 2021

FeaturesBreak It To Make It: Okey Dokey Hits The CoastIt’s 1 am in San Antonio, Texas and Aaron Martin wants to give you a hug.Kevin Johnston · Dec 7, 2021

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CommunityThe Motet: Colorado Sound Featured Artist, October 2021A motet, in Western classical music, is a composition, diverse in form and style, dating all the way back to medieval times; a polyphonic form described by scholars as “a piece of music in several parts.” Today, we might call such a conglomeration simply … a jam. Maybe that’s where the head of drummer Dave Watts was in 1998 when he founded what would become one of Colorado’s (and the world’s) most well-loved live bands: The Motet. Always laying on a fresh coat of funk, rock, soul and jazz, the band is known for surprising their die-hard audiences with top-tier special guests, but have other tricks, and indeed treats, up their sleeves too, especially for Halloween.Kevin Johnston · Oct 12, 2021

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MusicAlbum Review: Covenhoven – IVFor Coloradans, the name Covenhoven has become synonymous with intimate and heartfelt yet cinematic and powerful folk music.Kevin Johnston · Oct 8, 2021

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CommunityLady Denim: Colorado Sound Spotlight Artist, September 2021“We were desperately trying to stay optimistic,” Lady Denim’s lead vocalist Nick Lundeen tells BandWagon, “which – to be honest, was a lot easier said than done.” On September 10, Fort Collins indie-pop quartet Lady Denim release “Loosely Held Hands” with plans to rock the block at Downtown Greeley’s Block Party festival that night in celebration of the EP’s release. “Loosely Held Hands is about holding on to something during tough circumstances,” Lundeen says. “We became a lot more dependent on one another and the songwriting became more fluid.”Kevin Johnston · Sep 8, 2021

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MusicAlbum Review: The Cuddies – Fix It MyselfGreeley’s jazz-leaning (Hannah &) The Cuddies put on a rock show, but shine in moments of intimacy on their full-length debut Fix It Myself, a gloss-rock review via theatrical means.Kevin Johnston · Sep 4, 2021

Three musicians play guitar and bass on a blue-lit stage while a large screen behind them shows a drummer up close.

CommunityBuckle Up: FoCoMX Drive and Jive Continues Despite BoHo NoGoTaking place on Sundays this month at the historic Holiday Twin Drive-In, FoCoMX: Drive and Jive continued its live offerings last month with further programming into August and beyond. Reimagining the series to feature a mix of established veteran Colorado acts as well as “discovery” artists from the region, Drive and Jive aims to build engaged audiences and more. In light of yesterday’s news that the Bohemian Foundation’s recently announced Bohemian Light Music Festival is now in fact cancelled due to COVID precautions, the Drive and Jive series offers a live music format which has proved to function well under pandemic restrictions.Kevin Johnston · Aug 7, 2021

The Burroughs pose on stage in matching blue tracksuits, a man in a navy hat crouching center under bright lights.

105.5 The Colorado Sound's Featured ArtistsColorado Sound Spotlight Artist: The BurroughsStarting now, 105.5 The Colorado Sound and BandWagon will bring you a Colorado Spotlight Artist of the Month!Kevin Johnston · Aug 4, 2021

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MusicSingle Premiere: Cody – “I’m Not Really Listening”After years of solely identifying as the co-front man of Colorado’s adored brother-band Slow Caves, Jakob Mueller steps away from those familiar indie guitar shoegaze shores.Kevin Johnston · Jul 15, 2021

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MusicAlbum Review: Lighthouse Sessions – D.C. Myers‘Lighthouse Sessions’ is the debut EP from Denver’s D.C. Myers, and while it’s a dark catalogue of a sad man alone in a room with his electronics, it’s also one of the most engaging, smart and fun records to come out of Colorado in months. Myers knows this well: stimulate the more sophisticated neurons of those goths and their black-leather-clad hips will follow.Kevin Johnston · Jun 8, 2021

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MusicSingle Premiere: Goth Club – Sweep Me Up“Sweep Me Up” premieres via BandWagon today, and it’s a black lipstick affair. Goth Club’s third release, it sinks to the half-spoken, sultry depths of Monster Magnet’s “Paradise” or even Ramstein with an added layer of synths and old-school drum machines akin to an early Depeche Mode. McFadden looks directly into the black mirror on “Sweep Me Up,” finding shadows, distortion and sludge within it.Kevin Johnston · Feb 18, 2021