Tag Archives: rick rubin

Johnny Cash - Ain’t No Grave

  By johnmfinn | March 25, 2010 - 5:12 pm | Music, The Culch
4 Comments

I idolize Johnny Cash. So much so that I drink tea exclusively from a cup emblazoned with his image. This is the level my obsession has reached. Despite being a country artist his life is the quintessential rock and roll story. Most people know the story from Walk The Line but where that film ends is where things get really interesting. The 70’s and 80’s were a lean period with critical and commercial success in short supply. By the dawn of the 90’s he was just another washed up country star, trading on past glories with little or no appeal to modern audiences. Enter Rick Rubin. Rubin was the founder of Def Jam Records. As a producer he had worked mostly with rap and rock acts such as LL Cool J, Run-DMC, Slayer, Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Public Enemy. In 1993 Rubin renamed the label American Recordings … There’s more →

Keep It Like A Secret: The (International) Noise Conspiracy - Armed Love

  By johnmfinn | October 18, 2009 - 9:29 pm | Music, The Culch
1 Comment

Scandinavia gets all the coolest bands. I don’t mean the good bands, I mean the cool bands. The type of bands that look great and make great music and have great back stories and hair and clothes and friends. The type of bands that I imagine live their lives in black and white and wear sunglasses indoors or in the rain without looking like twats. Some day I will marry somebody from one of these bands and dilute their super cool gene pool but that is a story for a different day. The (International) Noise Conspiracy are four Swedish communists/socialists/leftists who mix garage rock, soul and punk. The band was formed in 1998 by Lars Stromberg and Dennis Lyxzen. Lyxzen was previously a member of seminal hardcore group Refused. Following Refused’s breakup he set out to form a band which would use its music to convey a more political message … There’s more →