February 1, 2008 – In a nutshell: Eight dreamy, world-weary Indianapolis musicians brought together by a shared love of woodsy Americana and chamber pop. Their cello-laden debut, 2006's The Dust of Retreat, caught the attention of Epic Records; the band signed on without reservation. "I grew up playing music in basements, thinking it wasn't cool to [sign with a major]," says frontman Richard Edwards, 24, who cofounded the group with Andy Fry, 32, whom he met in a pet store in 2004. "But you figure out that it isn't about being cool or uncool. Plus, I just got a new amplifier for the first time since I was 15. It rules." What's the big deal: An alterna-troubadour in the vein of Conor Oberst, Edwards has the kind of wounded-fella vibe that makes you want to take him home and pour him a mug of chamomile tea.

February 1, 2008 – "It's the fucking weather," says 15-year-old Black Tide lead singer/guitarist Gabe Garcia, explaining why Florida produces so many extreme-metal bands, such as Deicide and Obituary. "The heat makes everybody go crazy, and the humidity makes you angry." Plenty of teenagers are pissed off, but few get the chance to vent their rage by reinterpreting Reagan-era thrash in front of thousands. Despite the fact that not a single member of the quartet -- which includes guitarist Lex Nunez, bassist Zakk Sandler, and drummer Steven Spence -- has celebrated his 20th birthday yet, Black Tide have played at Ozzfest, opened for Avenged Sevenfold, and scored a major-label deal. Yes, they're shred prodigies, and they know it.

January 11, 2008 – In addition to their awesome 'fros, our esteemed jurors had something else in common this year: Both took cautious steps away from the outfits that made them famous. Andy Samberg -- fresh off his unlikely Emmy win for "Dick in a Box" -- tried to ride Hot Rod toward leading-man status, even as his ubiquitous Saturday Night Live digital shorts remained Monday-morning in-box staples. Guitarist Albert Hammond Jr. strayed from the currently dormant Strokes with his tuneful solo debut, Yours to Keep (and has another he hopes to release in '08). The verdicts are in -- what say you, dudes? The White Stripes"Icky Thump"Jack White grinds out four minutes of filthy garage blues whose title became a dirty euphemism after a fake Meg White sex tape surfaced. HAMMOND: I haven't heard this. It's hard to judge.SAMBERG: It's playing right now. Just say you like it.

January 29, 2007 – What follows is an unabridged version of the Bloc Party interview that appears in our February issue. You'd think Kele Okereke would be worried. His band, Bloc Party, are about to drop their much-anticipated second album, and they recently had to pull out of a potentially rewarding support slot on the Panic! At the Disco tour. Music bloggers obsessed over the Essex, England-based band's 2005 debut album, Silent Alarm, which ended up on many critics' year-end lists, and Okereke knows expectations are huge. But he and his bandmates -- guitarist Russell Lissack, bassist Gordon Moakes, and drummer Matt Tong -- also realize that for many bands the lightning of hype rarely strikes twice. "We know we're not going to be the cool new blog thing this time around," Okereke says.

December 19, 2006 – A confession: I don't particularly enjoy the year-end list season, where every publication, TV station, podcast, and blog submits their best- and worst-ofs for the year that was. I find it sort of arbitrary and not particularly useful -- after all, the only way to decide if anything will be long-lasting is to look at it a few years down the line. I think it would be wise for everybody to work on a five or six year delay. Wouldn't it be amazing to take a look back and see how right or wrong Spin was in 2000? I'm glad you think so, because that's exactly what we're doing. I'll post my top records of the year next week, but this week, I give you the Spin Top 10 from 2000. Let's see if we had any foresight, or if we were just distracted by millennium fever. 10. Le Tigre, Le Tigre: A not-exactly watershed debut from a band whose importance probably hasn't been determined yet.

November 29, 2006 – Thanksgiving brought me home to Connecticut, where I attended a football game, pitting the University of Connecticut against the University of Cincinnati. The Huskies lost by a field goal in the closing seconds of the game in a heartbreaker, a loss I pin entirely on UConn's terrible kicker, who shanked an extra point that probably was the difference in the game. But my complaints about the game have more to do with the half time show. The UConn marching band provided entertainment, and I was doing what I always do whenever a marching band is playing: I did my best to pretend I was some place where a marching band wasn't playing. I consider marching bands to be only about as entertaining as women's basketball or movies with hobbits in them, which is to say not at all.

October 25, 2006 – I've been gone for two weeks, but that's only because I've been planning a very special two-part Halloween edition of A-D. I happen to be a big metal fan, and I got the opportunity to speak to Dani Filth, frontman of longtime black metal stalwarts Cradle of Filth, who just released their new album, Thornography. I've always been a fan of their tongue-in-cheek approach to black metal (with album titles like Bitter Suites to Succubi and a commitment to theatricality), and Filth's soft-spoken demeanor backs it up: It might be dark, but at least it's fun. A-D: You guys have been around for a while now. Do you find that your audience keeps "resetting" every time you come out with an album, or are your fans aging with you?Dani Filth: Obviously there's an influx every record of new people discovering the band.

September 27, 2006 – The fourth single from Stone Temple Pilots' debut was an acousticdirge called "Creep." That statement is an anomaly for two reasons.First, when was the last time any album, especially a mainstream rockrecord, broke four singles? U2 pulled it off with All That You Can't Leave Behind,but I leave U2 out of this argument because A) Bono has managed to turnU2 into a lifestyle, so the songs don't really matter anymore -- sayingyou like U2 now only means that you think poverty is a bad thing; andB) I hate U2, so they're disqualified anyway. Getting back toStone Temple Pilots: The other reason that statement about "Creep"seems foreign now is because of the title of that song.

September 1, 2006 – The MTV Video Music Awards are almost always the most overhyped event of the year, but their knack for courting controversy (or even courting entertainment) has slipped in the new millennium. But with host Jack Black and a bevy of next-gen performers and nominees, this year's version of the VMAs seemed like they could break the mold, and the only way to come to a conclusion is to break it down. Join me on the journey through the outer reaches of music television. 7:35 I missed the first part of the pre-show, which seems like it's been pretty grating, but right now My Chemical Romance are killing. Seriously, this record is spectacular, and it's a bummer that this song's premiere is in a live setting where the sound isn't perfect. Why the hell can't MTV produce live music?

November 18, 2005 – David Bowie, Hunky Dory (Virgin, 1971) "I still remember when I heard 'Changes' for the first time. I thought it was Bob Dylan because of the way he sings the verses. I found out it was Bowie and it was from this album called Hunky Dory. It's the most important record to me, ever. I appreciate that he's still able to write songs, because even when there's a rough album, there will be that one song on there. But Hunky Dory is the pinnacle -- there's not one song I skip past." Jim Croce, You Don't Mess Around With Jim (ABC, 1972) "Everyone's heard three or four of his songs, but they probably don't know they're by Jim Croce. I loved 'Operator' and "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown,' and I just kept hearing songs and going 'He sings this? He sings "Lover's Cross"?' I just love his mustache, and he's always got a cigar in every picture you see. That's cool.PrintEmail