Casiotone for the Painfully Alone may be an unusual name for a band, but it makes sense: basically a solo project by Owen Ashworth, the band uses mostly battery powered keyboards and electronics recorded on a four track. The results on his first three albums were intimate, ethereal electronic pop songs. On the most recent disc, “Etiquette,” Ashworth decided to expand his sound to include guitars, strings, pianos and so on, especially on songs like…

Seeing as we’ve already effusively reviewed them twice, we figured that it was about time to step back and solicit your thoughts on The Hold Steady and their magical concert abilities. Were you at their Black Cat show Saturday night? Did you swig Budweiser and Jim Beam along with the band members? Were the songs lighter-worthy, or yawn-inducing? Did you find their presence powerfully earnest or overrated? A quick spin around the blogosphere shows that…

We’ve talked about the lineup, interviewd the organizer, and even talked to a couple bands. Now we want to give you the chance to hear what’s coming our way with some MP3 previews of a few DAM Fest bands. The music staff got together, divied up the lineup, gathered some files together and is now serving up brief breakdowns of a few bands D.C. will play host to this weekend. If you’ve got some insight…