When Amy Abts returns to Duluth this weekend to play Homegrown, it won’t just be a return to a city where she spent her formative music-making years and a festival she helped launch. It will be something of a victory lap for Abts—who has spent the past few years undergoing treatment for a rare brain…

Apollonia Kotero is no stranger to the Twin Cities. As Prince’s on-screen romantic interest in Purple Rain, she spent many months here filming the 1984 movie—and June 28 will mark her first time back in Minneapolis since the shooting of the film over 30 years ago. Kotero will participate in the third annual Benefit 2…

The weeks leading up to graduation are a momentous time for any high school senior, but for Austin, Minnesota teen Molly Kate Kestner, this excitement has grown exponentially. On April 20, Kestner posted a YouTube video of herself emotively performing “His Daughter,” an original song, accompanying herself on piano. The video now has over 1.4…

Although singer-songwriter Brent Colbert has been performing as the Awful Truth since 2008, he is a relatively new act on the Twin Cities scene. This month marks the one-year anniversary of Colbert moving to Minneapolis from his previous homebase of Salt Lake City, Utah, and he’s celebrating tonight by playing his biggest show to date…

St. Olaf College has long been a front-runner in the world of choral music. However, the liberal arts college in Northfield is now also lending a hand to student rock bands on campus by providing them with various resources. With everything from folk and rock groups to individual singer-songwriters, campus bands have begun to take…

Update: At yesterday’s sale, the New York Times reports, Dylan’s handwritten lyrics sold for $2,045,000—a sum above even the upper limit estimated for the lyrics’ value. This isn’t your ordinary music memorabilia auction, and it isn’t your ordinary collectible. 1965’s “Like a Rolling Stone” is the definitive song by Bob Dylan, the Hibbing native who’s widely…

With the 20th anniversary of the show Friends coming up later this year (Rachel left her groom at the altar and first stormed into Central Perk on September 22, 1994), Minneapolis-based group the Rembrandts have announced that they will perform the hit theme song “I’ll Be There for You” on The Today Show this Friday,…

Though it’s not uncommon for local musicians to head out of state, it’s also quite common for musicians to come here, to Minnesota, to pursue their musical ambitions. Singer-songwriter Chastity Brown moved to Minneapolis from Knoxville, Tennessee. A friend who was attending grad school here convinced her to come after telling her about the local…

Yesterday, Bob Mould released his latest single, “I Don’t Know You Anymore,” off his upcoming album Beauty & Ruin. This was the second track to be released from the record, after the surprise drop of album track “Hey Mr. Grey.” The single is a raw and honest description of emotions after a messy breakup. Catchy…

Update 6/2: The entire Jesus Christ Superstar American tour has been canceled due—say the show’s producers—to disappointing ticket sales. A New York Times article on the cancellation reports surprise and anger among cast members—though, perhaps tellingly, not so much among prospective audience members. * * * John Lydon, former lead singer of the Sex Pistols and Public Image…