The Current’s Nate Ryan was on hand as Jeremy Messersmith and his band made their network television debut on CBS’s The Late Show with David Letterman. Here’s Nate’s fly-on-the-wall story and photos. Last Thursday was when we first found out that Jeremy was confirmed to be on The Late Show with David Letterman. At that…

Who are the world’s richest bassists? Maybe that’s not a question that you realized you wanted to know the answer to, but now that it’s been asked, aren’t you curious? The Richest lists the top ten (in descending order of richness): the Beatles‘ Paul McCartney ($1.2 billion), the Police‘s Sting ($300 million), KISS‘s Gene Simmons ($300 million),…

In addition to the high-profile Grandstand shows—including our own MN Music-on-a-Stick showcase on Aug. 30—the Minnesota State Fair is alive with free music. The Fair has posted complete schedules of performers at their free stages and other venues (booths, restaurants, etc.), and MPR will be hosting several performances at our own booth—but who are all these artists?…

“We like to regionalize our locations,” said Jeff Nolan as he walked through the new Hard Rock Cafe at the Mall of America. “It’s a heck of a lot easier here than in a lot of places,” he continued, noting Minnesota’s “singular” music history. That history of course includes Prince—whose outfits, including one emblazoned MINNEAPOLIS…

Protests and tensions continue in Ferguson, Missouri after the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown on Aug. 9, and numerous musicians are sharing their views on the situation—many expressing anger and sadness. Chuck D, Questlove, John Legend, Frank Ocean, Talib Kweli, Moby, and Rage Against the Machine‘s Tom Morello have criticized the actions of local law enforcement,…

Phantom Tails: Rides Battalion Phantom Tails describe their genre as deep-space doom-funk. As strange as that sounds, they’ve gained a big local audience for their far-out but indisputably rocking records. Their newest release, Rides Battalion, is available today followed by the release show this Friday at the Triple Rock. “All Your Cities,” the first single…

Local legend has it that when the Cedar Cultural Center was converted from a ​movie theater to a music room, a guitar belonging to West Bank folk star Spider John Koerner was buried in the venue’s foundation. Is the legend true? In the first episode of a new series from the Current, David Campbell takes on the role of the Minnesota…

The Legend of Drizzt, an anthology of short stories based on the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game, has been produced as an audiobook featuring celebrity readers including “Weird Al” Yankovic and Ice-T. In a promotional video, the rapper—who’s said in his podcast that he took the gig reading an audiobook without realizing what the subject…

Tom Hallett, a singular critic with a distinctive, rambling, and passionate voice and a sharp ear for music, passed away yesterday afternoon in St. Paul after a long struggle with diabetes. He was 50 years old. Born in Deer River, Minn., on July 27, 1964, Hallett spent time living with family in Alaska and traveling the country before…

KISS frontman Gene Simmons has apologized after receiving a barrage of criticism—from Mötley Crüe‘s Nikki Sixx, among many others—for comments about depression that he made last month in an interview with Songfacts.com. “I don’t get along with anybody who’s a drug addict and has a dark cloud over their head and sees themselves as a victim,” Simmons…