Related:
Minneapolis music scene named second-best in the U.S.
Top 20 best Minnesota musicians: The complete list
50 cool facts about the Minnesota music scene

Kudos are in order for the Cedar Cultural Center, as the readers of About.com have crowned the venue the Best World Music Venue for 2012. Depending on how you look at it, this is a slightly more prestigious honor than finishing second in Livability.com's poll for the best music scene in the country.  More >>

Obviously disgruntled.

​Stephen Colbert's sardonic commentary on Tuesday night's episode of The Colbert Report provides an excuse to promote an upcoming weekend music event that will be lower on dry rub barbecue and performances by Mr. Muthafuckin' eXquire, and higher on idiosyncratic music criticism. Yes, the 2012 EMP Pop Conference hits New York March 22-25.

Although Colbert's paper, "Self-Love in an Elevator: Apollonian Images of Hedonism, Eroticism and the Mechanized Urban Lanscape of Post-Comeback Aerosmith," will not be part of the weekend's discussions, both myself and the Current's Andrea Swensson will appear on a panel "Roundtable: All Internet Is Local? The Meaning Of 'Local Music Coverage' In The Pageview Era" to perhaps discuss Howler's Gatesmithgate.
More >>

"Willard Mitt Romney Song": for Florida's many glowstick-waving voters.

​Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has a new song dedicated to him with a message he probably won't approve. "Willard Mitt Romney Song" by Minneapolis electro-hop act the Sicko Pervs arrived over the weekend -- just as the former Massachusetts governor heads into a heated Republican primary election this week in Florida. This is a markedly better soundbite-chop than Dubnasty's "Newt Gingrich Sucks the Iowa Caucus Remix," but it seems that this political-sparring dubstep subgenre inspires some of the most uninspiring song-titling around.
More >>

Photo by David Shankbone

​Despite what Wikipedia would have you believe, the Thurston Moore solo catalog is fucking immense, and most of it is full-on noise apocalyptic, limited-edition cassette-only recordings of an iconoclast manchild, his mis-tuned guitars, and his atrophied amplifiers wilding the fuck out. I've been in attendance at a handful of Sonic Youth concerts over the years, but never one of Moore's by-his-lonesome love-ins, so I have no clue what those of you planning to queue up for tonight's show at the Varsity Theater are in for.

An educated guess: he'll lean heavy on the sensitive, avuncular abominable-scree tunes from his two Matador LPs, maybe throw in a selection from Psychic Hearts, tease with some ear-splitting improve or the introduction to "Sugar Kane" or something, because even though he's starting to sound his age, Moore's still an asshole at heart.

Regardless of what Mr. Kim Gordon has up his sleeve, Gimme Noise encourages you to beg, bribe, and otherwise con him into performing the following five songs.
More >>