7.12.2011

How much is a good song worth? Jessi Darlin found out early one morning when she was awakened in her hotel by an itch to get some lyrics down. “I got up at 6 a.m.,” she recalls, noting that her...

The Dodos’ sound is tough to categorize. Folk? Sorta. Rock? Kinda. Psychedelic? In parts. But Meric Long, lead singer and acoustic-guitar virtuoso noticed a different word constantly reemerge when he...

Ezra Furman is a talker.It’s 3 p.m., and he’s sleepy after a video shoot that ran long, yet he’s still rattling off phrases like “untouchable figures...

The head and the heart. We’re all too familiar with the connection between these two things—the one stuck up there on top of the neck and the one stuck like a bird in a cage amongst all the nerves and...

When an ethnic civil war caused Azita Ghanizada’s parents to flee Afghanistan and seek asylum in the U.S., they had no idea the little girl they brought with them would grow up to be a superhero. But...

The first time I heard hip hop, I was a lonely 14-year-old white kid in Macon, Ga., riding home on the school bus. That day, the daily argument over the radio was won by the black kids, and the driver...

With this issue, My Morning Jacket becomes the first band to appear by itself on the cover of two different issues of Paste magazine. (Death Cab for Cutie’s Ben Gibbard—also featured in this issue—has...

Send your letters to feedback@pastemagazine.com and service concerns to mplayer@pastemagazine.com. INTERPLANETARY LOYALTY I’m stingy with money. Despite that, I purchased your first issue way back...

Modern folk acts have created a more accessible version of roots music, blending alt-rock and acoustic, throwing in fiddle or banjo and a raw, raspy voiced frontman. And that’s all well and good. But...

For his first full-length and Sub Pop debut, Georgia good-old boy Ernest Greene hasn’t moved too far from the sound that found him first making (chill)waves in the music blogosphere in 2009. But...

On occasion, a musical act comes along that I want to like before I’ve ever heard a bar. Usually it’s because of buzz or backstory, but once in a while I preemptively root for a group based on their...

A welcome relief from The Fiery Furnaces’ spontaneous ad-libbing and warped song structures, Eleanor Friedberger’s seductively husky vocals are easily the most accessible aspect of the duo’s live...

Project Nim is the fascinating and exquisitely executed new documentary by the makers of Man on Wire, Paste’s documentary of the decade.In Man on Wire, director James Marsh recounted French tightrope...

Most every journalist, at one point in is his or her life, has envisioned a gig at the New York Times. And why not? Playing the righteous defender of...

Ever want to kill your boss? Nick, Dale, and Kurt plan to do just that three times over.Never aiming to be anything more than a barrel of laughs, Horrible Bosses takes advantage of three comic actors...

The vampires in True Blood have always had an interesting dynamic on the show, because they aren’t particularly good. The audience then has to constantly question their motivations and intentions. As...

As a whole, there are two primary types of Futurama episodes, and both of them have had their moments. First there’s the ones that are traditional sci-fi, “What if?” episodes. I’m not talking about...

Story is God. Most every human thing we apprehend—our values, our cultures, our very belief systems—settles into us through storytelling. We human animals are made of our stories as much as of flesh...

“Sorry, I don’t normally do this,” I apologize as I pull my vibrating iPhone from my pocket. My friend continues to tell me about her thesis while I restock the sushi bar or floor three of my tiny...

This powerful and rare recording of The Ramones was culled from the private archives of the late Bill Graham. Recorded three days after Christmas in 1978 at Winterland in San Francisco, it features...

Ezra Furman & The Harpoons played the 2011 Paste Party in Austin during SXSW. Watch “Hard Time In A Terrible Land,” a song from the band’s afternoon...