Over the last handful of years discerning fans of synth pop in Denver that have been fortunate enough to witness a babybaby4ever show have an artist worthy of her influences. Lily Conrad grew up in Golden, Colorado and started playing music at a young age getting into playing guitar and then cello by her middle school and teen years. In 2016 in college Conrad started making music and performed her first show as babybaby but in the past couple of years she changed the project name so that it was more findable via internet search engines. Early on playing out in and around Denver Conrad was part of the local DIY scene playing house shows and underground venues like the now defunct Posh House. Around that time she started playing keyboards in the live version of psychedelic garage rock band Rose Variety with her friend Becc Perez. The pandemic era stretched time in weird directions but since the world opened up again Conrad started playing around more often in her solo project at venues that could better represent her developing sound and its highly developed, rich synth tone and production. The show now includes props and aspects of performance art from Conrad making a babybaby4ever show memorable both visually as well as for the finely crafted songs that have the spontaneity and vulnerability of classic indiepop and the robust and enveloping melodic tonality of 80s New Wave. In 2026 babybaby4ever releases the new album 4ever is a long time via Denver-based imprint Witchcat Records. The nine songs are loosely a kind of breakup album as breakthrough. The lyrics and moods honor the heartache and the will to move forward by embracing vital experiences and the roots of who were are and what makes our lives feel vibrant.
Friday | 01.02 What:Angel Band w/Ryan Wong, Fishlegs, Elaine and Nimona When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Angel Band is an indie pop band that seems to have taken inspiration from jangle pop groups of the late 80s and early 90s. Like C86-affiliated groups and acts on the Sarah Records and early Slumberland imprints. There is an enthusiasm with which the music is performed but without losing a sense of delicacy and gentleness. Fishlegs is like-minded in its embrace of the kind of charming twee pop that made 90s underground music worth seeking out. Ryan Wong is of course the songwriter and producer behind his band Supreme Joy but his solo performances can wax into his equally worthy country songwriting.
Victim of Fire, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 01.08 What: Victim of Fire, Cronos Compulsion, Aleister Cowboy, Pedestal for Leviathan When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Victim of Fire is a Denver-based hardcore/black metal band that has been at the forefront of that music out of the Mile High City. Its 2025 album The Old Lie is a sharp and ferocious dissection of economic elitist lies told to working class people to get them to give up their best interests in pursuit of enriching the wealthy at the expense of everyone. Cronos Compulsion is a death-sludge metal band also from Denver whose 2025 album Lawgiver is a bracing listen and a solid example of the caustic and brutal sonic power of the art form. Fort Collins’ Aleister Cowboy released an EP of what might be described as cosmic death metal called Neolithic Blood Rites in 2025. Pedestal for Leviathan’s flavor of black metal is the more symphonic variety but don’t worry, it’s plenty brutal as well once the songs get into gear.
Black Flag in 2019, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.09 What:An Evening With Black Flag When: 7 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Ever since replacing the most recent lineups of Black Flag with young musicians, Greg Ginn seems to want to bring some new blood into his venerable and influential punk band Black Flag. Did it work? You’ll have to go to find out but Ginn’s guitar work remains impressive and unique in the canon of punk and hardcore.
Precocious Neophyte, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.09 What: Warper, Precocious Neophyte and Blackberry Crush When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Warper released its new album Something, Sometime in October 2025 showcasing its further development from moody, atmospheric emo band into a heavier shoegaze band. The new record also showcased the band’s development as songwriters since its 2021 Lateness EP. Sure, you can hear a touch of possible influences like Hum and Sunny Day Real Estate but also newer groups like Cloakroom. Warper doesn’t shy away from demonstrating musical chops in the songs as well with evocative solos. Precocious Neophyte seems to come from similar roots but its musical instincts seem to have some noise rock and metal influences along with obvious touchstones like My Bloody Valentine with a knack for fragile melodies alongside searing guitar work and crushing heaviness. Blackberry Crush has evolved into more of a shoegaze band in the past couple of years but without sacrificing a knack for writing compelling pop hooks with some clear inspiration from 90s grunge.
Watch Yourself Die, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 01.10 What:The Pretty Shabbies, The Futons and Watch Yourself Die When: 7 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: The Pretty Shabbies sound like its music is comprised of bits of 1970s jazz and funk. There’s a chance the members listened to a lot of Zappa, a bit of Jethro Tull, modern jam bands and someone in the mix probably has every Traffic record. And yet the organic free flow of the music is not without a certain appeal because it’s not like many other local bands. The Futons are sort of a psychedelic garage punk band. But Watch Yourself Die is seemingly different every time with a strong and confrontational, transgressive performance art component which is going to make it completely divergent from everything else on this bill in the best way.
Saturday | 01.10 What:Night Fishing, Nativity in Black, Tainted Blade, Halo of Lightning When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Night Fishing is a collision of fusion, psychedelic prog, surf rock and post-rock but heavy and it includes members of other much heavier and more brutal bands. This is not gentler so much as not aggressive in its sound. Nativity in Black is a Black Sabbath cover band fronted by Chella Negro. Don’t expect the poetic Americana of her other band Chella and the Charm. It’ll be legit Black Sabbath evocation. Tainted Blade is a blackened death doom band from Denver. Halo of Lightning is a “stoner-doom metal” band from Colorado.
Circling Girl, photo by Tom Murphy
Thursday | 01.15 What: Summer Bedhead, Circling Girl and Majona When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Summer Bedhead’s eclectic indie rock reflects the changing musical landscape of the past decade. In the band’s story songs you hear strands of the throwback to 90s rock, garage rock, dream pop and more. But it’s all channeled into the group’s own style of confessional pop songs with some bite and more than a little vulnerability. Circling Girl is a Denver-based dream pop band whose sound has some bright shimmer in the guitar melodies with vocal harmonies that are reminiscent of The Sundays, Lush in its more pop mode and a touch of Cocteau Twins. Its 2025 album Only My Veins Know is one of the better releases in the broad spectrum of shoegaze and dream pop of the past five years with its intricate and entrancing songwriting. Majona is the style of atmospheric pop that is adjacent to shoegaze but more in the realm of Mazzy Star-esque slowcore.
The Green Typewriters, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.16 What:Green Typewriters, Salads and Sunbeams and Teacup Gorilla When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: The Green Typewriters are the kind of psychedelic pop band that makes use of conceptual framing and aesthetics to deliver a unique style of music that blurs the line between Elephant6 indiepop including the experimental streak of that music, art rock and mystical psychedelia. Salads and Sunbeams engages in modern pop storytelling through the sonic lens of 60s and 70s psychedelic rock with poetic observations on modern life and the ways our current civilization works to erode our humanity and offering ways to reclaim it through imagination and honest feeling. Teacup Gorilla is a high concept art pop band that challenges conventional views of gender and identity in its songs and in its presentation of the music.
Kayo Dot, photo from Bandcamp
Sunday | 01.18 What: Kayo Dot and Abandons When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: New York-based avant-garde metal and Kayo Dot makes a rare appearance in Denver following the release of one of its most challenging and visionary records to date in 2025’s Every Rock, Every Half-Truth under Reason. The album was written against the idea of the creative act and creativity as a result of predictive modeling and its dystopian offspring, AI music and art. The songs are not in the vein of traditional metal or really something easily or at all identifiable as metal. It’s often like an organic, mutant and sprawling set of songs that at most has something in common with something like Mamaleek. But even more abstract. Abandons is not as avant in its songwriting but it is in the way the band writes music in a more improvisational mode and without seeming to try to fit in with a neat genre. Sure if you want to call them post-rock or post-metal they fit that but also noise rock and art rock and in moments with songs written with more abstract electronic ideas in mind.
Cherished, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 01.22 What:Cherished album release w/Tassles, Flesh Tape and Headslug When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Ever since switching names to Cherished in 2022 and a shift in sound more toward the shoegaze end of post-punk this Denver quintet has developed a body of work that defies easy categorization. There is some noisy, punk edge underlying the sonics and performance style but the atmospheric melodies and introspective and thought-provoking lyrics set the band apart from any obvious niche aesthetics. Its 2025 self-titled album was recorded and mixed by Seth Manchester at Machines With Magnets who is perhaps best known for working on records by Model/Actriz, Lingua Ignota, Battles, Big|Brave and Lightning Bolt. It emphasizes the more gritty side of the band’s sound without sacrificing the deep moods Cherished manifests live. Opening the show is bedroom dream pop band Tassles, noise-rock post-punk group Flesh Tape and Headslug whose sound sits somewhere between grunge pop and shoegaze.
Cthonic Deity, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.23 What: Cthonic Deity, Street Tombs and Death Possession When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Cthonic Deity is the doom/death metal/punk band from Denver that includes Paul Riedl of Blood Incantation fame. It’s much more stripped down and brutal in its guitar attack and includes members of Scolex and Ascended Dead as well. Street Tombs from Santa Fe, New Mexico are a collision of d-beat punk and thrash-infused death metal. Death Possession play the kind of death metal that sounds like it was inspired by many sessions of taking in early Slayer, early Possessed and Xasthur in a secret club house.
Dollpile, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.23 What: Gion Davis, Dollpile, Your Friend Nirantha When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Gion Davis is a poet with the indie rock band Clementine Was Right who is releasing a new book Designated Stranger that “spans years, states, genders, and climates as it confronts the concurrent apocalypses of being trans and poor in America.” Seems appropriate for the world today. Also performing is Dollpile fka Isadora Eden, a band whose dream pop is more theatrical and atmospherically dense than the genre is often known for producing. Also Your Friend Nirantha and its endearingly earnest bedroom dream/noise pop.
Turning Jewels Into Water, photo by Ed Marshall
Saturday | 01.24 What: Turning Jewels Into Water When: 6PM doors for Artist Discussion and Q&A, concert 7:30PM Where: Bug Theater Why: Turning Jewels Into Water is a project with composer/percussionist/turntablist Val Jeanty and percussionist/composer/electronic musician Ravish Momin. Formed around 2017 when the two met at a jam session at Pioneer Works in Brooklyn, New York. Recognizing a shared affinity for crafting unique rhythms and soundscapes and compatible methods of working the two artists have since worked together to explore the ways in which new technologies can be used to blend electronic and acoustic instruments in creating music that reflects the diverse cultural heritages and musical interests in common. The name of the project is a commentary on access to natural resources and howthat has been politicized in human struggles for power especially in the capitalist era increasingly so with the rise in climate change impacts. A casual listen to any of the duo’s three albums reveals a mastery of rhythmic arrangements and patterned tones for a sound that is ambient adjacent but more akin to the kind of early industrial beat-making and culture jamming sounds heard in a band like Cabaret Voltaire but steeped in modern sensibilities and production methods. For our interview with Ravish Momin please follow this link.
Cop Killer, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 01.24 What: Vulgarian, 908, Old Skin and Cop Killer When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Denver-based, anti-capitalist, doom/sludge/crust group Vulgarian are releasing their third album Cost of a Bullet at this show. Expect caustic and brutal riffs and plenty of pointed and incisive lyrics about what a demented and corrupt civilization we’re living through right now. 908 is a grindcore/powerviolence band from Colorado Springs that includes current and former members of Aberrant, Catheter, Throcult, Upon a Field’s Whisper, Havok and Tree of Woe. Old Skin sounds like a band that came up playing stoner metal and doom but leaned into the Unsane and Cherubs end of that sound and now is almost more of a noise rock band with some sludgy grooves while still sounding incredibly menacing. Cop Killer is the hardcore band from Denver that thankfully has lyrics that are appropriate to the name of the band and a confrontational performance style worthy of the name as well.
Jim Ward, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 01.29 What:William Elliot Whitmore and Jim Ward (Sparta) When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: William Elliot Whitmore is a singer/songwriter from Iowa who earned a reputation as one of the more skilled practitioners of folk Americana since the late 90s. With releases on Southern Records, ANTI- and Bloodshot Records Whitmore’s respectable body of work has garnered him a bit of a following and he has toured with Chris Cornell, Murder By Death, Converge and Esmé Patterson, with whom he has worked, to give a sense of his broad appeal beyond the obvious for his charismatic performances and fine songcraft. Also on this bill is Jim Ward, the frontman and guitarist of Sparta and former member of At the Drive-In performing his solo material that spans genres but all graced with his vulnerable yet passionate vocals.
Call Sign Cobra circa 2006, photo by Tom Murphy
Friday | 01.30 What: Call Sign Cobra w/Friends of Cesar Romero, El Welk, Total Cult When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Back in the mid-2000s Call Sign Cobra was a bit of a local supergroup that included members of now, minus the punk cognoscenti of the day, forgotten punk bands like Scott Baio Army, The Facet, Mail Order Children and Out on Bail. It’s sound was a kind of loose around the edges garage rock and what later “neo-classic rock” bands aimed for but could never quite nail in trying to sound pro. Imagine a Memphis garage rock band of the 90s, The Dirt Bombs, Teengenerate and a glam rock band mixed together and add a horns section and you have some idea of what you’re in for. It’s raucous, ridiculous and here’s a rare chance to see the band nearly twenty years after it dissolved. Also on hand will be modern garage punk luminaries Friends of Cesar Romero and Total Cult as well as noisy post-Americana group El Welk.
The Crooked Rugs, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 01.31 What: The Crooked Rugs, Rugburn and Chroma Lips When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: The Crooked Rugs from Fort Collins live come off like a countrified psychedelic rock/shoegaze band with a deep appreciation for T. Rex. But one with a knack for memorable and transporting melodic hooks. Rugburn’s own flavor of psychedelia is more steeped in grunge and more distorted sounds in general with a bit of an edge. Denver’s Chroma Lips has more synth in the music and its motorik beats point to some inspiration from Krautrock, possibly a touch of Silver Apples and possible hints of having soaked up bits of the better end of King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Black Mountain and the most inspired bits of Tame Impala but with more interesting guitar work.
Corey Ledet is a zydeco musician and composer who was born in Houston, Texas but grew up around Louisiana Creole culture spending summers with relatives in Parks, Louisiana just east of Lafayette. As a kid Ledet started playing drums around age 8 or 9 playing on his grandfather’s old kit, which the latter had played when he was a drummer in Clifton Chenier’s band (Chenier was one of the pioneers of zydeco). From there Ledet was playing shows and eventually switched to playing accordion around age 12 or 13. The musical style fuses elements of blues, rock and roll, soul, R&B and Creole folk songs and its lively energy and uptempo rhythms helped to make it popular well beyond its southwest Louisiana origins. Zydeco artists entered underground and mainstream American music throughout the 80s with the popularity of artists like Rockin’ Dopsie, Terrance Simien and of course Buckwheat Zydeco. Ledet came of age during this time and over the course of three decades has established himself as one of the musical form’s most prominent practitioners twice nominated for a Grammy.
On December 23, 2025 Corey Ledet Zydeco & Black Magic released the album Live In Alaska on CD, download and streaming. It is the sixteenth record led by Ledet and a solid representation of his band’s chemistry as a performing unit. The recordings were culled from three separate performances during the Anchorage Folk Festival. The songs showcase the collective’s ability to take improvisational passages and the album includes a piece created at one of the shows: “Alaska Funk.” It’s a vibrant document of the vitality of the musical style and Ledet’s band in particular.
Listen to our interview with Corey Ledet on Bandcamp and follow the musician and songwriter at the links below.
Captain Buckles is a crew of veteran New Orleans sidemen that released its debut full length album Hurry Up on November 14, 2025 on streaming, digital download and cassette. Steeped in the eclectic blend of styles that have come out of the Crescent City with elements of funk, jazz, blues and psychedelic improvisational rock, Captain Buckles’ new album demonstrates the band has a style of their own. The members of the band have played with each other previous in line-ups touring and backing the likes of Samantha Fish, John “Papa” Gros, Russell Patiste and others. The group is comprised of New Orleans natives Rob Davis and Ezell Smith Jr., Floridian Alex Mallet, Los Angeles born Smitti Supab and Phil Breen originally from Pennsylvania but all have been playing professionally in the Big Easy for several years. The record was recorded at Dockside Studio in Maurice, Louisiana where Dr. John and B.B. King once laid down some music onto tape and it captures the natural chemistry and energy between the musicians and their ability to fuse styles and play to an evolving dynamic and organically shifting rhythms. The recording of Hurry Up was funded in part by a grand from the Threadhead Cultural Foundation.
Listen to our interview with bassist Smitti Supab on Bandcamp and follow Captain Buckles at the links below.
The Salt Collective formed in 2016 with songwriter and guitarist Stéphane Schück, guitarist Ken Stringfellow and lead vocalist and keyboardist Anton Barbeau. The core group was joined by bassist Fred Quentin and drummer Benoit Lautridou and released a debut album The Loneliness of Clouds in 2019. Schück had come up with an appreciation for American jangle rock and power pop and he and Quentin and Lautridou became friends during high school in Caen, Normandy, France. The trio formed a band in their college years but Schück and Quentin went onto careers in medicine and Lautridou in education. In the 2000s Schück contacted one of his musical heroes on a lark and received a letter back. Which is how he came to work with Scott Miller of acclaimed Paisley Underground-affiliated group Game Theory to produce a demo. The two would go on to co-write a few songs brfore Miller died in 2013. But Schück wasn’t done making music and when he started making music with Stringfellow of influential power pop band The Posies and former Miller associate Anton Barbeau it seemed that the songwriter had a knack for crafting songs as well in the vein of the musicians that had inspired him.
The group shrank to a trio by 2022 but by then it had begun working with The dB’s singer/guitarist Chris Stamey, bringing in another circle of the band’s influences. Stamey in turn was able to help bring aboard collaborators for recordings including the likes of Juliana Hatfield, Matthew Sweet. Mitch Easter, Richard Lloyd, Susan Cowsill and Matthew Caws. The group’s subsequent records have continued an ambitious type of pop songwriting and its latest A Brief History of Blindness (released November 21, 2025 on 12” LP, CD, digital download and straming via Propeller Sound Recordings), is a bit of a concept album about how we as humans approach the world we try to navigate as best we can. The contributors to the new album include Lynn Blakey of Let’s Active, Mike Mills (REM), Aimee Mann and Andy Partridge of XTC as well as some of the aforementioned. It is a vibrant record that expands beyond the power pop roots while honoring the level of songcraft of the group’s most obvious influences.
Listen to our interview with Stéphane Schück on Bandcamp and follow The Salt Collective at the links below.
Trouble’s Braids just released Live at Stone Cottage including intimate and lively versions of “Precipice” and “The Pines.” The former is a lighthearted song about living on the edge of mainstream society and striving to pursue one’s passions with integrity. The latter a more somber composition telling the story of being pulled between two types of live, one more safe and predictable and one more satisfying and liberated. The spare guitar work and vocal harmonies really draw the listener into the song’s heartfelt storytelling. Both songs come in the wake of the late June release of the Americana duo’s debut EP, The Big Tourist. The warmly rendered songs from the EP have an earnest energy mixed with a knack for creating mood that one doesn’t always associate with music associated with folk Americana. Trouble’s Braids consists of Oliver Franklin and Emily Pennington who got their starts in music in Seattle and Los Angeles respectively but now call Boulder home. The two new songs were recorded at Stone Cottage Studios in Boulder and highlight the project’s diverse musical instincts and style.
The Silver Snails has been percolating its new album Speed of Light for over a decade since the 2012 release of its debut album The Seven Melodies. The core of the group is husband-and-wife duo Lucas Ward and Elisa Fantini and fashions itself a “glam rock space pop family band.” Even a casual listen to the new album reveals great attention to songwriting detail, performance and production. It has a huge, uplifting, deeply melodic sound and in moments it may remind listeners of something Jeff Lynne and Trevor Horn had their hands in making. In fact, the group covers “Video Killed the Radio Star” by Horn’s New Wave band The Buggles (the video for the original song was the first to be broadcast on MTV) for Speed of Light including a music video made by the members of The Silver Snails. The couple’s three children Jasmine, Celeste and Elias also contribute to the project’s creative efforts including live performances. Long before The Silver Snails became a band Ward was a close friend of singer/songwriter Elliott Smith from whom Ward took some inspiration in his own musical endeavors as someone who writes and records his own songs with keen attention to craft and performance. The album is indeed like a glam rock affair but one that is just as informed by the playful, experimental and imaginative psychedelic rock of Flaming Lips with some sonic resonances with the more space rock end of ELO. Co-produced by Dylan Magierek, mixed by Peter Katis and Adam Selzer and mastered by Greg Calbi and Sterling Sound, its an album that sounds like something from a classic era of pop but with an immediacy that hooks you in with every song. Speed of Light was released on September 5, 2025 on streaming, digital download and CD.
Listen to our interview with Lucas Ward on Bandcamp and follow The Silver Snails at the links below.
Laveda formed as a dream pop band in Albany, New York in 2018. The core duo of Ali Genevich and Jake Brooks released two outstanding albums of deeply introspective, atmospheric and tender records with 2020’s What Happens After and 2023’s A Place You Grew Up In. As though the title of the latter was a prompt to evolve creatively Laveda relocated to New York City the same year and whether it was already happening then or more came together once in the big city the band evolved in a decidedly different sonic direction without losing its instincts for crafting memorable melodies and vivid, emotionally vibrant and immediately relatable lyrics. 2025’s Love, Darla marked a change in style for a more gritty, more angular, almost No Wave sound as though Genevich and Brooks had delved further into the Sonic Youth catalog and found their way to the likes of Live Skull and, perhaps unrelated, The Cleaners From Venus. The new album sounds like the work of people who made the move to pursue their art further and didn’t come out the other side jaded. Instead transformed and challenged to do something to reflect their own development as people and artists.
Listen to our interview with Genevich and Brooks on Bandcamp and follow Laveda at the links below.
Tuesday | 12.02 What:The Home Team: The Crucible of Life Tour w/Arrows in Action and Makari When: 6:30 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Seattle’s The Home Team is touring in the wake of the release of the deluxe edition of its 2024 album The Crucible of Life. The record is a combination of its post-hardcore roots, R&B and modern alt-pop with the kind of production and electronic elements one would imagine out of that melding of sounds and styles. Also on the bill is Arrows in Action who recently released their new album I Think I’ve Been Here Before (Nettwerk). Since forming in 2017 the group’s fusion of modern rock and pop songwriting with R&B vocals and electronic pop production has garnered a bit of a wide online following. But live the band’s energy and commanding performances are proving it’s more than a studio creation capable of delivering a more visceral version of the slick production of its recordings.
Death Possession, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 12.04 What:Decibel Magazine Metal & Beer Fest: Denver pre-fest with Terror Corpse, Vimana and Death Possession When: 7 doors Where: Ratio Beerworks 2920 Larimer St. Why: Decibel Magazine’s Metal & Beer Fest has been pretty reliable for booking some of the most interesting bands in the realm of extreme metal since its inception. This pre-fest event includes performances from Texas-based blackened death metal group Terror Corpse, technical death metal/grindcore band Vimana and the ominous sounds of Denver-based death metal outfit Death Possession.
Story Of The Year, photo by Ryan Smith
Friday and Saturday | 12.05 and 12.06 What: Story Of The Year and Senses Fail w/Armor For Sleep When: 7 Where: The Summit Music Hall Why: Two of the better and more popular bands out of that post-hardcore and pop-punk crossover in the early 2000s are sharing the bill on this tour with Senses Fail and Story of the Year. The latter settled on the name in 2002 after forming in 1995 in St. Louis. It’s intricate yet hooky guitar riffs and emotionally charged vocals weaving between emo sensitivity and more distorted screaming meant Story of the Year was in the pocket of a popular style with younger fans of punk looking for something with more edge than the typical pop punk of the day. The band split for a couple of years in 2011 and reconvened in 2013. For this tour you may be able to hear some of the quartet’s forthcoming album A.R.S.O.N..
Blood Incantation, photo by Julian Weigand
Friday and Saturday | 12.05 and 12.06 What: Decibel Metal & Beer Festival Day 1 (12.05) Blood Incantation, Chat Pile, The Red Chord, Panopticon and Castrator, Day 2 (12.06) Acid Bath, Eyehategod, Deadguy, Primitive Man, Conan and Necrofier When: 6 (12.05) 5 (12.06) Where: Fillmore Auditorium Why: Decibel Magazine brings to Denver a generous sampling of the best of current extreme metal for a two day festival. Attendees can opt to buy a ticket that includes getting in on the beer varieties being showcased at the event or a mere “Metal Only” pass for just the music. The first night is headlined by Denver-based psychedelic, progressive death metal band Blood Incantation and one might argue also the political noise rock legends Chat Pile. The second night is indisputably headlined by influential and foundational sludge metal group Acid Bath who are reuniting for a handful of shows this year. Also on that night earlier on is Denver’s death grind trio Primitive Man who recently released their latest sprawling epic of an album Observance with its even more pointed and withering commentary on a corrupt and self-destructive society and economic order and even their own part in its continuance.
Primitive Man, photo by Vanessa ValadezWet Leg, photo by Alice Backham
Sunday | 12.07 What:Wet Leg w/Capture This and Bob Moses (club set) When: 5 Where: Mission Ballroom Why: Wet Leg is the scrappy post-punk/pop band from the Isle of Wight that started garnering a bit of a cult following after the release of its debut single “Chaise Longue” in 2021 followed by the full-length including that song in 2022. The song and the band’s general presentation is frank in its depiction of sexuality but with a wit and charm and undeniable hooks that keep you coming back to listen. The full length was brimming with tales of everyday life delivered with the spirited sass that you would hope would inform the rest of the songs. The group released its sophomore record Moisturizer in 2025 and its own eclectic set of songs delivered on the promise of the debut including lead single “Catch These Fists” about not defaulting to being polite when you get harassed in public places.
House of Harm, photo from Bandcamp
Tuesday | 12.09 What: House of Harm w/Past Self and killyouclub DJs When: 8 Where: The Crypt Why: House of Harm is a post-punk band from Boston whose sparkling melodies and melancholic vocals could be like any other band out of recent darkwave. But there seems to be a bit more emotional urgency in the singing and keen attention to the electronic end of the soundscapes that drive the music. Past Self is a darkwave/death rock band from Las Vegas with leanings toward more ethereal dream pop.
Belly, photo from the band’s Facebook
Friday | 12.12 What:Belly 30th Anniversary of King – 2 sets one night When: 7 Where: The Oriental Theater Why: Belly Formed in 1991 shortly after Tanya Donelly left influential post-punk band Throwing Muses. She had spent a brief stint in the early version of The Breeders but after 1992 Belly became the singer/guitarist’s main creative focus and the 1993 release of the group’s debut album Star landed the music on regular rotation on MTV during that first great wave of alternative rock. Founding bassist, and former Throwing Muses member, Fred Abong left the outfit a few months after the release of the record to be replaced by Gail Greenwood (who would go on to play in L7 and recently Gang of Four). The new lineup would record the follow up album, 1995’s King. At the time grunge was, in face, king, and the jangle-y, atmospheric power pop of the record meant it didn’t perform as well commercially as its predecessor but artistically it was a step forward into interesting directions. Belly gets the chance to revisit those songs live with you if you show up and there’s a better than average chance that some material from the first record and 2018 album Dove will end up on one of the two sets.
Flutter, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 12.13 What:Lawsuit Models, Flutter, Black Dots, State Drugs When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Lawsuit Models is the kind of modern punk band that clearly has roots in 90s and early 2000s pop punk but didn’t get stuck completely in that sound. But preserved is the best of that music and its relatable yearnings and an ability to take topical cultural references and make them into statements of more enduring human experience and struggle. The rest of this bill is also interesting because Flutter is a great power pop band who seem to have translated an older sound and sensibility into a modern context with a charismatic live show. Black Dots are a veteran punk act from Denver that has also made a transition into a more modern mix of sounds from a pop punk adjacent early sensibility to something more seemingly informed by a touch of Americana and more straight ahead rock. State Drugs come from that stand of punk that as into power pop of the late 80s and early 90s like they listened to the cooler end of The Goo Goo Dolls, Gin Blossoms and Soul Asylum and decided the songcraft in those bands and a knack for a melodic hook and earnest emotional expression was perfectly fine a well of inspiration as any other.
Jorma Kaukonen, photo by Vernon Webb
Saturday | 12.13 What: Jorma Kaukonen When: 7 Where: Paramount Theatre Why: Jorma Kaukonen was one of the members of the classic lineup of Jefferson Airplane. The latter helped define the San Francisco Sound of the late 60s and the early psychedelic rock of the era. Kaukonen came into the group as a blues guitarist who had earlier played a gig with Janis Joplin before either came to anything resembling prominence. The Airplane had hits like “Somebody to Love” and “White Rabbit” and its 1967 album Surrealistic Pillow is a classic of the 60s with songwriting that endures because it was unlike much of anything else in its then realm of rock music. Kaukonen’s instrumental “Embryonic Journey” and its elegantly intricate guitar work brought more than a touch of experimental folk to one of the great psychedelic rock albums of all time. Later in the 60s Kaukonen and some of his bandmates in the Airplane formed Hot Tuna, a group that continues to this day. Somewhere between a psychedelic country blues band and free improvisation outfit, Hot Tuna was a little difficult to pigeonhole though today would be considered on the higher end of the jam band spectrum. Kaukonen has also had an acclaimed solo career in which he can no more easily be classified but in which his energetic and free-flowing finger style guitar and seemingly endless ability to find ways for the guitar to express great feeling with nuance remains. For this tour, possibly the musician’s last on a wide scale at age 84 (soon 85 on December 23) Kaukonen will be joined on stage by heavy hitters R. Carlos Nakai & Will Clipman, David Hidalgo, Jack Casady, Justin Guip, and Ross Garren.
Silver West, photo by Tom Murphy
Tuesday | 12.16 What: Silver West (album release and Hali’s birthday) w/Marty Nation and Whitless When: 7:30 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Silver West will release her debut album Ballads of a Heartbroken Hunter at this show. The songwriter/musician is relatively new to performance but has been around music her whole life and as a sound person at various clubs and other live show situations she’s certainly been witness to her fair share of music stories as well as firsthand experience with what works best in a live music format. How much of that shaped her songwriting, hard to say, but surely in the recording there will be an uncommon level of attention to detail and production. But if you’ve seen Silver West there is a compelling vulnerability to her particular style of cosmic Americana that is refreshingly raw and thoughtful.
Takipnik, photo from Bandcamp
Thursday | 12.18 What:Takipnik, Lost Relics, Chew Thru and Sungrave When: 7 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Takipnik is a Denver-based heavy band that formed in 2019 and recently released its third album Awakened. The record reveals the band has a keen ear for ethereal atmospheric elements mixed in with those more distorted and raging. Think something like Agalloch and Russian Circles and you have an idea what to expect. Lost Relics bridges the gap between extreme metal and noise rock. Some of its members came out of the more interesting end of the Denver stoner rock scene of the 2000s and 2010s and found a way to sharpen the sound some without losing the ability to maintain a solid groove and thus hooks. Chew Thru has more roots in post-hardcore but still has the aggression and knack for a touch of melody that one might expect from a band with influences in 1980s thrash. Sungrave is in the metal universe as well but its sound clearly has some origins in psychedelic rock and the kind of post-metal one heard in the various incarnations of Isis and Neurosis. In moments the shoegaze fusion has Sungrave sounding more like the majestic pastoral side of Jesu.
Cop Killer, photo from Bandcamp
Friday | 12.19 What: Cheap Perfume, Arson Charge, Gunk! and Cop Killer When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Arguably the punk show of the month headlined by feminist/political punk band Cheap Perfume from Colorado Springs. Its latest album Don’t Care. Didn’t Ask. really does pushes its critique of society and capitalism to new heights and connects the dots in many realms of human life in the intersectional way that the current moment requires. Arson Charge includes former members of Native Daughters, Chieftain and Love Me Destroyer and fronted by SPELLS singer Ben Roy. It’s thrashcore and Roy takes on a different vocal style than you’d expect from him and it’s potent stuff tackling issues related to deeply personal experiences with abuse and the legacy of that for one’s own life in ways that the adult mind is beginning to grapple with. Gunk! Is a like-minded hardcore band from the Springs with a raw, caustic sound. Cop Killer recently released its self-titled EP and it is five tracks of the kind of aggressive hardcore you’d hope with the verbal content you’d hope was there including an updated rework of the Body Count classic.
Salads and Sunbeams, photo by Tom Murphy
Saturday | 12.20 What:Salads and Sunbeams and Gadget Cats When: 8 Where: The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room Why: Salads and Sunbeams are one of the premier Denver-based indiepop bands. Coming out of noteworthy previous bands Fingers of the Sun and The Pseudo Dates (among others), the band’s songs are literary and steeped in 60s and 70s psychedelic pop but informed by modern experiences in the current socio-economic context. Its songs are tonally colorful and heartfelt and filled with creative storytelling. Gadget Cats are a grunge pop group from Fort Collins whose songs released so far seem to reflect some inspiration from 90s underground punk and indiepop.
Pons, photo from Bandcamp
Saturday | 12.20 What:Pons w/Bitchflower and Plastik Mystik When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Pons is a mutant art punk/neo-No Wave noise rock band from Brooklyn, New York that incorporates classical instruments used in unorthodox ways. Often its songwriting sounds like it’s been influenced by experimental electronic music and left field jazz with splintered, fragmented tempos and imploded structure. Bitch Flower from Fort Collins sounds like it was inspired equally by the most jagged and confrontational punk and dark psychedelic rock like the Stooges and its own blues roots. Plastik Mystic is sort of a strange blend of psychedelic garage rock and something like moody punkers Wipers.
DJ boyhollow aka Michael Trundle of Lipgloss in 2021, photo by Tom Murphy
Wednesday | 12.31 What: A Lipgloss New Years Eve When: 8 Where: Hi-Dive Why: Lipgloss has been held at various venues since starting as the prominent indie DJ/dance night in Denver and one of if not the longest running such nights in the country. Currently helmed by longtime DJ Michael Trundle aka boyollow, the night is being held perhaps for the first time at arguably the best small club in Denver, the Hi-Dive. Expect indie hits from the 90s, 2000s, 2010s and now with some sprinkling in of 80s and maybe even 70s music that inspired the music that launched the event.
Colfax Speed Queen, photo from Bandcamp
Wednesday | 12.31 What:Colfax Speed Queen, Jesus Christ Taxi Driver and Glueman When: 8 Where: Lost Lake Why: If a night of high energy punk is how you want to spend your New Year’s Eve this is the best bet. Colfax Speed Queen is really a psychedelic garage rock band that has made a name for itself in Denver and beyond. But its charismatic and charged performances propel its whole thing into the realm of punk. Jesus Christ Taxi Driver sounds like it came out of the American southeast with its blues-infused rock and roll. But its attitude is definitely adjacent to the irreverent spirit of punk and its live shows are played with a palpable intensity. Glueman these days sounds like its members were inspired by strands of the gloriously frayed and ferocious punk from Memphis, Tennessee from the 80s to now. Just raw and unmindful of a need for clean tonal lines and tapping into some wild energy. If you’re Oblivions you’ll probably be into Glueman.
Broken Record is a Denver-based band that formed after singer/guitarist Lauren Beecher and bassist Corey Fruin moved to the Mile High City from Connecticut in 2017. Both had roots in the underground and DIY scene in and around New Haven and in forming Broken Record around some material Beecher had been working on what emerged was music that reflected the influence of punk and hardcore, certainly in the ethos of the group, as well as the atmospheric melodic qualities of The Cure. If you caught the band early on you might be excused to hearing in the music a touch of Hüsker Dü’s emotionally rich and fierce yet gentle aesthetic. The fledgling outfit found a home in the local hardcore scene and played early shows with the likes of then relatively newly founded bands like Destiny Bond and Ukko’s Hammer. And yet Broken Record never seemed out of place even though the catharsis of its music wasn’t formed from the same set of sounds but the emotional core of the songwriting shared a similar vulnerability and intelligence in expressing emotion with a keen sensitivity in the language of emotionally charged rock music.
The quartet released its debut full-length I Died Laughing on April 24, 2020 and of course could not tour around the record due to the global pandemic. But on that album one hears the knack for melodic jangle and shimmer embedded into earnestly energetic hooks with the expert pacing and Beecher’s warmly thoughtful vocals that strike the perfect emotional coloring for songs that are often poignantly melancholic and always deeply observant. For the 2023 album Nothing Moves Me the songwriting seemed to experiment further with tone and style incorporating delicately minimal guitar leads and triumphant choruses while seeming to be able to mine the more interesting ends of adolescent angst as a lens by which to understand the sometimes disillusioning aspects of adulthood. Like an entire record of what your teenage self might have to say about your current adult self. The 2025 album Routine (via the band’s own imprint Power Goth Recordings) and its cover of suburban American would-be normalcy takes the band’s established themes further to seemingly comment with great insight into the compromises and perils of navigating life in late capitalism and how that can cast a pall over your life if you’re not equipped to find some meaning in a socioeconomic environment seemingly designed to erode your joy and ability to live a full and dignified life. But also on the album the band seems to find the threads of psychic resistance to it all in creative acts and writing songs that feel like a shaking off of the gloom with music that feels like an expression of basic human solidarity.
Listen to our interview with Lauren Beecher and Corey Fruin on Bandcamp and follow Broken Record at the links below. The band is celebrating the release of Routine with a show at The Skylark Lounge Bobcat Room on Saturday, November 15, 2025 with Precocious Neophyte and Safekeeper, doors 8 p.m., show 9 p.m.
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