There’s something inherently likable about about Spencer Krug. Just ask Wolf Parade bandmate Dan Boeckner who snidely referred to him as the guy that everybody likes. Although that was a clear barb, Boeckner has a point. Dante DeCaro, another fellow Wolf Parade member likes him enough to continue touring with Krug (under the moniker of opener Johnny & The Moon). Fellow Canadians Carey Mercer (Frog Eyes) and Dan Bejar (Destroyer) like him enough to work…

Ragged Glory plays tonight at the Velvet Lounge. Can’t afford to pay $100 for a cheap seat at Neil Young’s upcoming DAR stop in November? You’re in luck. During our last chat with Ryan Walker from The Beanstalk Library, we found out he also put together a Neil Young cover band a few years back. They call themselves Ragged Glory, and the lineup plays something like a who’s who of up-and-coming local bands: Brian Kent…

You waited until the last minute to try to buy tickets for Saturday’s “Hip-Hop Honors” concert, only to discover it sold out. Fear not, because D.C. will be having a number of other noteworthy shows over the next week. First up is Eric Roberson’s Friday night set at the Black Cat. Who’s Eric Roberson? New Jersey native Roberson began his professional singing and songwriting career while a student in Howard University’s Musical Theatre program in…

Rockville based chain California Tortilla has reached a milestone. According to Washington Business Journal, the chain has sold 5 million burritos. 5 million! I prefer to say they’ve sold 5 megaburritos, but whatever floats your boat. The big winner of a year’s worth of indigestion, er, delicious goodness, was college student John Baroody of Herndon, Virginia, who purchased number V at the Ashburn Village store. Congratulations, John! I’m sure your feelings at the moment of…

There aren’t many reasons to wake up at a quarter of 5 a.m., but tomorrow’s celestial phenomenon—a total lunar eclipse—may be one of them. The second of 2007, tomorrow’s eclipse will be but a fleeting treat for Washington and the rest of the eastern U.S. According to the U.S. Naval Observatory’s friendly and helpful public affairs Officer, Geoff Chester, Washington will be lucky enough to see the Moon slip into the Earth’s umbral shadow a…

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…

Though it’s an open question as to whether D.C.’s rock scene has sacrificed quality for quantity, there is no denying a time when there were not that many places for a rock band to play in this city. “During college, the music scene was a bit struggling, especially in the Georgetown area,” says The Bravery’s guitarist and Georgetown University alum Michael Zakarin, “but I was at the Black Cat or the 9:30 every weekend. It’s…

If you’re a fan of sushi, it may come as a bit of a surprise to know that your eating habits may directly be propping up the Washington Times and the rest of Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s quirky religious empire. A reader recently tipped us off to an article in the Chicago Tribune outlining how Moon — a self-proclaimed messiah and leader of the Unification Church — has all but cornered the sushi market, using…

As a live act, with two drum kits and, at one point, six people participating in percussion, Modest Mouse is definitely driven by its rhythm section. At Thursday night’s show, it was impressive to watch the complementing drummers pound away, working to coordinate seemingly disparate sonic elements into the cohesive sound that is Modest Mouse. But then Isaac Brock chimed in with some vocals and the whole thing, unfortunately, sort of broke apart. Usually, it…