Once the frontman for hardcore and black metal bands Teen Cthulhu and Book of Black Earth, TJ Cowgill started writing raw, stripped-down folk songs under the name King Dude (borrowed from metal hero King Diamond) in 2005. The project started just for kicks one drunken night. Even his stage name came on a whim. "My roommate and I were bored, so I picked up an acoustic guitar and started writing these songs as a joke,… more »
Of all rock's family tendrils, rockabilly is the one that keeps re-boppin', sporting a revival every decade or so, its coming-of-age kicks allowing each new offspring to roll its own. Guitar-heavy, emphasizing Wild Ones rebellion ("whaddya got?") and sonic dazzle (heavy on the reverb and chest vibrato), it raves and paves garage-punk (The Seeds to Damned), shockabilly (The Cramps and Chadbourne), new-wave (Stray Cats and Dire Straits), waggle-wobble (Jon Spencer and Boss Hog), Nirvana and… more »
Ronald Thomas Clontle is the author of Rock, Rot & Rule, a controversial music reference book that purports to be "the ultimate argument settler" when it comes to rating an artist's worth. In the book, the uncompromising Clontle ranks thousands of artists under the three headings listed in the book's title (rock = good, rot = bad, rule = great), based on various stringent criteria and extensive surveys. With the newly updated 2007 edition of… more »