If there was one trait that most Prince shows shared — aside from musical brilliance — it was unpredictability. After the initial shock of the Xcel Energy Center tribute show line-up wore off, then, it felt almost natural to see a few puzzling names. Some recoiled at John Mayer, and Christina Aguilera’s pick mystified most (update: Mayer, Aguilera, and Anita…

Star-studded festival lineups are routine these days, but the lineup for next month’s Desert Trip festival in Indio, Calif., is in a league of its own. The festival is only hosting six acts, and they’re doozies: Paul McCartney, the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, the Who, Roger Waters (the golden-era leader of Pink Floyd), and Neil…

Fresh off performing with the Revolution at their three sold-out First Avenue reunion shows and stopping by to record a session for the Local Show at the Minnesota State Fair, André Cymone will release a new four-song EP titled Black Man in America this Friday, September 30. Careful listeners of the Local Show may already…

Summer’s last sigh found its perfect soundtrack on a blustery late September night in Northeast Minneapolis this past weekend. Sociable Cider Werks threw the last in their series of Sociable Summer concerts, a show that also doubled as Haley Bonar’s local album release show. Bonar released her latest, Impossible Dream, back in August, and while…

Legendary drummer and Prince collaborator Sheila E visited the Sabanthi Community Center in South Minneapolis this morning (the very same building where Prince attended Central High School in the 1970s) to announce the “Purple Philanthropy Sheila E. Benefit Concert,” happening October 23 at Orchestra Hall. When plans were being solidified for the October 13 Prince…

Astronautalis, “Kurt Cobain” Jacksonville, Florida native Astronautalis delves into his past on “Kurt Cobain,” the opening track from new album Cut The Body Loose. The video is visually arresting, even as the rapper recounts having guns pulled on him (“Gun pulled on me by a cop one time/ Four guns pulled on me in Atlanta last night”), and the shoutouts…

Minnesota music has not forgotten Micheal “Eyedea” Larsen, the talented rapper who died six years ago at 28 years old. Following its premiere at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival last spring, Brandon Crowson’s documentary The World Has No Eyedea is being shown at the Parkway Theater on October 9, and the members of the local scene…

While grabbing a sandwich during a work break, Peter Jesperson stumbled upon a cover band that transformed how he thought about the Twin Cities music scene. “I suppose I was a little bit of a snob working at the record store thinking there wasn’t anything local that was as good as what we were selling,”…

Stranger Things makes a splash in the music world Just two days after Wiz Khalifa sampled the Stranger Things theme song in a song called, appropriately, “Stranger Things,” YouTuber/internet darling Nathan Zed hopped on the train. “You can really do anything with this BRUH,” he snaps as he shows off his Kanye West, Kendrick, Drake, Beyoncé, and Desiigner mash-ups (all while being infinitely more…

As he teased in an interview last month, Tommy Stinson is officially reforming his early 1990s, post-Replacements rock band Bash & Pop and will release a new album under that name in early 2017. In a press release today, Stinson revealed that he’s planning to play his first official show with the reunited Bash and…