Rancid

When they recorded their ninth album, "Trouble Maker", the venerable punks of Rancid had been working together as a band for 25 years. It would follow that maybe the record would be nostalgic, and it is. Both lyrically and musically, the 19 songs have the blurry feel of old Polaroids, as the bandmembers stick to their guns and dish out tales of past glories.

Rancid - the legendary Bay Area punk rockers are back with their 10th studio album, Tomorrow Never Comes on Epitaph Records. Emerging from the blue-collar swamps of Berkeley, California, Rancid has now been a living, breathing punk rock band for over a quarter century. Back in 1991, after the demise of their much beloved and still influential first band, Operation Ivy, founding members Tim Armstrong (vocals, guitar) and Matt Freeman (bass, vocals) decided to do the impossible – start an even better band. Thus, Rancid.

Rancid as a band have always been imbued with a sense of place: the blue collar neighborhoods where they grew up in Berkley, California, their place as individuals within their band, their band as part of a movement and their evolving sense of place in relation to the world at large.

Rancid - the legendary Bay Area punk rockers are back with their 10th studio album, Tomorrow Never Comes on Epitaph Records. Emerging from the blue-collar swamps of Berkeley, California, Rancid has now been a living, breathing punk rock band for over a quarter century.

The Interrupters are an L.A. based four-piece bound by their rebel spirit and deep love of punk, rock, ska and 2 Tone. They make super high-energy rock -n-roll that’s equal parts catchy and confrontational.

The Interrupters are an L.A. based four-piece bound by their rebel spirit and deep love of punk, rock, ska and 2 Tone. They make super high-energy rock -n-roll that’s equal parts catchy and confrontational. Their third album, Fight The Good Fight, was produced by Rancid’s Tim Armstrong and released on his Hellcat imprint for Epitaph Records.

Rock Stars Kill is one of three compilations released by the Olympia, Washington-based Kill Rock Stars label. Released in 1994, this is the third and last compilation released. Highlights on this includes exclusive material by Rancid, Boredoms, Starpimp, God Is My Co-Pilot, and Spinanes.

On his eighth album, the singer-songwriter connects his gentle, acerbic soul to his most politically charged, well-stated, and funniest songs. On the very first song on his very first record, Cass McCombs went to the hospital. There he received some troubling test results and found himself faced with an unanswerable question. “Is it dying that terrifies you,” he sang, in a gentle, boyish sigh that would earn him plenty of comparisons to Elliott Smith, “Or just being dead?” It was a heavy introduction, but, in its plainspoken intensity, it foretold the work to come. As McCombs’ music progressed from murky lo-fi to austere folk-rock, his on-record persona has evolved with it, becoming at once more fleshed-out and more mysterious. He’s in a strange position now of being a veteran songwriter who we’re just getting to know.

The Interrupters are the newest signing to Tim Armstrong's Hellcat Records, releasing their debut self-titled album. Fronted by singer-songwriter Aimee Allen, the Los-Angeles based ska band began working with Armstrong on his popular Tim Timebomb series of singles. (Before that, Allen sang background vocals on the Armstrong-produced Grammy-winning Jimmy Cliff album Rebirth). Steeped in ska, reggae, and punk, Allen and the Interrupters bring a sly sense of humor to their music and lyrics on songs like "White Noise" and "Liberty". With extensive national touring planned behind the new album, the Interrupters will be bringing their brand of noise to a waiting world.