What bird songs do you want to hear for the 9:30 Coffee Break?

Foster the People have made an admirable effort to inject an even more adventurous spirit into their second album, resulting in a mixed bag of new sounds that range from catchy to unfortunate.

Music journalist Holly George-Warren's new book traces the troubled life and backwards career arc of Big Star's Alex Chilton. Reviewer Jason Heller says the book is a poignant and forthright portrait.

After decades in dormancy, Johnny Rey is eager to reenter the Minnesota music scene with a bang. Rey’s previous bands Flamingo and Johnny Rey and the Reaction were standbys at Jay’s Longhorn Bar (1978-1980) in downtown Minneapolis. I recently sat down with Rey, his wife Sharon, and their spunky Maltese Murphy to discuss his reasons…

When the Sam Roberts Band stopped in to The Current's studio to chat with Jill Riley and to play a few songs off their new album, Lo-Fantasy, we had some time at the end to ask Sam Roberts about his guitar. He was happy to tell us about two guitars that he likes so much, he calls them "a couple of good friends."

On Monday night at Intermedia Arts, 140 passionate representatives from the Twin Cities hip-hop community came out to discuss the upcoming event that MN Original and the Current are planning for May 10 at the Fitzgerald Theater. As is the nature of many open meetings, the conversation bounced around quite a bit and touched on everything…

In 2011, just after the release of their album Days, Real Estate played the (now defunct) 400 Bar with Big Troubles and a (now defunct) Macalester student band called the Muskies. Tickets were $5 and there were no more than 150 people in attendance. Last night, Real Estate played a sold-out show at the Fine Line…

From basement jam sessions to big theatre performances, Pert Near Sandstone live for the inspiration gained from other musicians. The band grew out of jam sessions at a house in St. Paul. “We didn’t get together as a band necessarily,” said mandolin and fiddle player Nate Sipe. Trying different instruments, and collaborating among themselves, led…

For Johnny Cash fans like Bill DeVille, today's release of Johnny's lost album, 'Out Among the Stars', is huge news. Bill DeVille shares some of the album's backstory and gives his review.

Howler: World of Joy From the sound of their second full-length album, you’d think that Howler spent the last two years—since their debut America Give Up—locked in a one-room apartment in England, subsisting on nothing but records by the Replacements and the Smiths. Appropriate, considering Howler’s Twin Cities roots (despite their ambiguous feelings about those roots) and the…