Washington City Paper » Music
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Washington City Paper is your source for local news. We report on all things D.C. with an independent and local lens. Like alt-weeklies across the country, we center the people and culture of our hometown in our reporting, reviews, and columns. Read the latest on D.C.'s music scene and go-go, hip-hop, jazz, rock, and more in the DMV.
Washington City Paper » Music
1w ago
By the time I got the call, I had lived in D.C. for 2,146 days. I’ve received invitations to exclusive events, swanky galas, and a boat party or two. But none quite as cool as the show this summer at NPR’s headquarters. The Baylor Project felt the same way about their own Tiny Desk Concert ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
3w ago
Bottled Up, the frenetic, art-rock brainchild of D.C.’s Nikhil Rao, is not like other bands. Rao studied classical, grew up listening to the music of Bollywood, and is fluent in writing and performing several modes of rock and electronic. The band’s sound can emulate ’90s garage rock, post-punk, house, and jazz, sometimes all at once ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
3w ago
In publicist and strategic planner Stacey Palmer’s estimation, the DMV’s go-go community can and should become a political force. Beyond the musicians, that community encompasses those who support the music in various backstage and behind-the-scenes roles and its sizable community of fans. “We have the numbers, and as a collective, we matter,” she says. “We ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
3w ago
Halpine, Awake in a Dream The first line on Halpine’s debut LP, “I’ve got to know if you’ll be around when the big bomb drops down,” doesn’t feel as much like foreboding as a comfortable inevitability. The mostly solo project of Joey Bentley is reminiscent of the type of bedroom recording that became de rigueur ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
1M ago
Twenty-five years later, wintery young-adult alienation still creeps over “Spider in the Snow” like frost. The fourth song on the Dismemberment Plan’s Emergency & I starts with synthesized strings wafting like steam through a sidewalk grate. Air hangs cold and still around the bass and drums as Travis Morrison looks back on a group of ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
1M ago
The best jazz soloist, they say, is one whose solos “tell a story.” Muneer Nasser has more than one story to tell—but they’re not all his own. Chances are you’ve heard Nasser on trumpet somewhere around town. In just the past two months, he played the D.C. Jazz Festival, Blues Alley, and Westminster Presbyterian Church ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
1M ago
The Christmas lights went dark about two minutes into “24 Hr Drive-Thru.” On a Saturday night in November 2019, D.C. emo duo Origami Angel were celebrating the release of their debut album, Somewhere City, at Planet Slush (a College Park basement venue with cinder block walls), topping a bill packed with local acts such as ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
1M ago
For 20 years, Nick Johnson, under his radio sobriquet of Dr. Nick, has charismatically and creatively brought the sounds of blues and soul, new and old, popular and obscure, to listeners via a trio of outlets. An Anacostia High graduate and former air traffic controller, Johnson started with the D.C.-based WPFW in 2004. Two years ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
1M ago
Two conversations I had in September: The first was with a much-loved D.C. jazz musician, as we stood together watching tenor and alto saxophonist BJ Simmons play at the Wharf’s Transit Pier during the DC Jazz Festival. “Wow, he sounds great,” the musician said. “I think I first heard him 10 years ago, and he ..read more
Washington City Paper » Music
2M ago
If you have any interest in documentary cinema, you probably know Sky Sitney. She is the festival director of DC/DOX, the city’s new-ish documentary film festival that ran for the second time earlier this summer. A cinema professor at Georgetown University, Sitney attracts luminaries in the nonfiction film world, and sometimes even the subjects of ..read more