03 Jul 2025

Heirs to a Violent World: Pit Lord's “Massive Grilling Capacity”

By Loren Thacher

Death metal has roots in numerous bands and places, most significantly in the humid, blood-soaked, stimulant-crazed state of Florida, a peninsula cursed since the days of the Spaniards, if not before. Its tentacles have spread across the globe, including to the poisoned wastes of Iowa, which brings us to the subject of this article.

03 Jul 2025

Music and Memories: Concert Organizer John Taylor Brings the World to Small Towns

By Jonathan Turner

John Taylor doesn’t have to go far to hear first-class live music. Since 2014, the friendly Iraq war veteran and computer programmer has hosted concerts at his home in tiny Cambridge, Illinois, 31 miles southeast of Moline.

02 Jul 2025

G. Wygonik's New Single “Reel Life” Debuts on Sunday Night's “Off the Beaten Track”

By Todd McGreevy
G. Wygonik's New Single “Reel Life” Official video screenshot

[Must read lyrics are in this article!] The new single “Reel Life” marks the powerful rebirth of CUT.RATE.BOX. Released for free (pay as you wish) via Bandcamp, it offers a dark and unflinching reflection of our modern age: overstimulated, algorithmically manipulated, and emotionally anesthetized. Musically, the track is a tense fusion of dense electronic punk, EB rhythms, and synthpop unease – drawing on influences such as Cabaret Voltaire, Wire, and Brian Eno, while embracing modern production and generative tools as instruments of expression, not novelty. 

10 Jun 2025

Risk and Reward for a Bettendorf Native: The Mike Conrad Trio, June 29 at the Redstone Room

By Jonathan Turner

Like many of us, Mike Conrad is just making it up as he goes along. Unlike most of us, however, the 37-year-old – a Bettendorf High School alum whose trio headlines a June 29 concert at Davenport's Redstone Room – has won international acclaim and several awards for his improvisational wizardry as a composer, arranger, pianist, and trombonist.

03 Jun 2025

Nice Ways of Saying Something Ugly: Live Music June 13 through 15

By Loren Thacher

The Tubs (confuse with the Tubes at your own risk) are a Welsh band, relocated to London and now touring America for the first time. On first listen, their newest album Cotton Crown is a glorious wash of '90s college-rock guitar, a warm shower at midnight in a gently-lit bathroom, radio-ready four-chord nostalgia for hipsters and Blues Traveler fans alike. Taken at the most superficial, background level, it's an energizing shot of musical positivity.

06 May 2025

Wild, at Heart: Wolfskill & the Wild Play in Support of Their EP Debut "Feral Heart," May 30 at Ragged Records

By Mike Schulz

Plenty of albums feature songs that are also love stories. Far fewer albums are themselves love stories.

01 May 2025

Local, Regional, International: A Varied May at Rozz-Tox

By Loren Thacher

The three live-music events scheduled at Rozz-Tox (2108 Third Avenue, Rock Island, IL) in May pair talented local artists with respectable regional bands, and, on May 18th, a topnotch, brand-new, international heat-seeker.

29 Apr 2025

Young QC Conductor Makes His Mark: Hisham Bravo Groover Leads the Quad City Symphony Orchestra in “Video Games in Concert,” May 10 at the Adler Theatre

By Jonathan Turner

Hisham Bravo Groover is nearing the close of his first season leading several QC orchestras. And the articulate, passionate conductor is earning key bravos along the way.

11 Mar 2025

Touring the Globe with Music: Pianist and St. Ambrose University Professor Marian Lee Performs at the Figge Art Museum, March 29

By Jonathan Turner

Like the romantic sweep of a Rachmaninoff concerto, Marian Lee's passion for music is visionary, powerful, and awe-inspiring.

06 Mar 2025

From Local to National Artists, QCA Music Scene Is Better Than Ever: If You Are Not Paying Attention, It's a Damn Shame

By Sean Moeller

We correct when it gets egregious and we scold when they nettle and pinch too hard, but for some reason, this moronic thought that the Quad Cities music scene is crippled or lesser prevails through the times.

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