On Tyranny: Maria BC Reflects on ICE’s Minnesota Murders as Trump’s Vigilante Goon Squad Still Goes Unchecked and Terrorizes American Communities

Posted in Features, Interviews, On Tyranny, On Tyranny with tags , , , , , , , , , on 10/12/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

About a month ago, AllMusic rolled out our interview with Maria BC that mostly revolved around Marathon, an album that teems with more sincerity and human emotion than their past two releases, as it addressed Americans and the hardships they are currently experiencing. So as to focus on the trials and tribulations of the “average American,” we mostly avoided discussion of Trump, even though the majority of U.S. citizens are finally waking up to the reality that he is the source of so many of the country’s seemingly intractable problems.

Today, following the much-needed and frankly long-overdue “Power to the People” music festival/ extravaganza that Tom Morello hosted earlier this month, we bring you an excerpt from our interview with Maria BC that was left on the cutting-room floor but nevertheless deserves to be heard and read by those who care about the survivability of democracy; how Americans treat each other regardless of legal status; and what it will take for us to finally put a stop to the lawless, sociopathic atrocities that ICE is inflicting upon citizens, legal immigrants and other residents of the so-called “greatest nation on earth.”

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Top 10 Best Chinese Metal Bands, According to Homegrown Heathens Dehumanizing Itatrian Worship

Posted in Features, Interviews, Lists, Videos with tags , , , , , , , , , on 10/12/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

When we launched what we’re unofficially calling The Bad Penny Passport earlier this year, we never would’ve imagined we’d get a submission from a Chinese heavy metal band listing what they consider to be the top 10 bands of their ilk who also hail from their country. (Frankly, we didn’t think we’d score one from a Russian musician either.) But thanks to the devoted efforts of one of our closest allies, Jon Asher of Asher Media Relations, the truly unlikely came to fruition. Think of it as our version of Guns N’ Roses’ Chinese Democracy gambit.

Lots more info on Dehumanizing Itatrian Worship – a brutal slamming death metal group founded in 2014 – is below. But first, let’s take a look at what they consider to be the top 10 best metal bands in their homeland of China.

1. Tumourboy

One of my favorite Chinese thrash metal bands. Some punk influence makes the songs really aggressive; I lean toward fast riffs, and the arrangement and vocals are both well done. 

2. Zuriaake

This is probably one of the most famous black metal bands in China. Perfect fusion of black metal and Eastern aesthetics.

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Chat Pile’s ‘Who Loves the Sun’: Two Cent Review

Posted in Album Reviews, Reviews with tags on 10/12/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

In the strongest sign yet that the quixotic quartet known as Chat Pile are neither to be underestimated nor to be considered a band that’s only willing to strike the iron while it’s hot, they have delivered Who Loves the Sun. While that news no doubt titillated fans, many of us wondered, “Yes, but do they have anything left to say?” The answer, of course, is an unmitigated yes.

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10 Best Bandcamp Free Downloads #22: Nadja, Left Arm Tan, Mom Jeans, Paper Girl, Serpent Column, Oceanlord

Posted in Lists, MP3s with tags , , , , , , , , , on 10/11/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

1. Najda‘s BSP Live Series: 2026​​​​​​​-​​​​​​​09​​​​​​​-​​​​​​​23 Tokyo

Home: Berlin, Germany
Genre: Experimental ambient doom metal
Label: Broken Spine Productions

2. Paper Girl‘s i (instrumentals of covers) EP

Home: Nashville
Genre: Instrumental ukulele bedroom pop
Label: Self-release

3. Genocide Kvlt‘s Promo 2025 EP

Home: Lubsko, Poland
Genre: Black metal
Label: Self-release

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Favorite Films: Radio Karma Dig ‘Evil Dead,’ ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll High School,’ Multiple Tim Burton Flicks, ‘Stopmotion’

Posted in Favorite Films, Features, Interviews, Videos with tags , , , , , , , , , on 10/11/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

Welcome to the latest installment in our Favorite Films series, in which we chat up musicians about the movies they treasure the most. Today we host Radio Karma, a power-pop/rock project led by lyricist/songwriter Richard Rossi and multi-instrumentalist Joe Giddings, who was previously a member of Star Collector and has his own solo material to boot. Radio Karma recently released a three-song EP, We Were Gods, which we’ll tell you more about in the near future. But as it’s the weekend, when we bring you new installments of Favorite Films, we’re rolling out this part of our conversation with the gentlemen first.

Enjoy learning about Rossi’s and Giddings’ most treasured movies … we can virtually guarantee at least a couple of them will be new to you.

Joe Giddings’ Favorite Films

Evil Dead (1981): “I watched that in the theater 13 or 14 times. I started doing call-outs during the movie, like The Rocky Horror Picture Show. In one scene, the lady’s being dragged across the floor, drenched and covered in blood. And you see her from top to bottom, and there’s barely any blood on her. So there’s a continuity [issue] there, and as that’s happening, I’m yelling, “Got a tough stain?” which at the time was [a commonly used phrase in laundry detergent] commercials. Everybody in the theater cracked up. (2:45) Apart from that silliness, I appreciated the practical effects, the stop motion and the comedy that was involved.”

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Mitski’s ‘Nothing’s About to Happen to Me’: Two Cent Review

Posted in Album Reviews, Reviews with tags on 10/11/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

Mitski reins in her sometimes thudding humor, fuses the musical sophistication of her previous album with the mutant pop genius of Be the Cowboy and delivers easily the best album of her career. The songs on Nothing’s About to Happen to Me sear the heart, with the loose narrative of a woman losing herself preparing beautiful dramatic scenes of the storms of the inner heart in the midst of seemingly-mundane common life.

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The Unfinished Bruce Springsteen Track That Made Patti Smith a Global Rock Icon

Posted in Essays with tags , on 10/11/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

While Bruce Springsteen and his band released the riveting song “Because the Night” in 1986, it actually originally appeared in 1978, on the studio album Easter — not by Springsteen, but by revered proto-punk poet Patti Smith (read my interview with the punk-poet legend here), who made it the best-known tune among Patti Smith Group tunes. The reason that occurred is because Springsteen allegedly couldn’t finish the tune, and engineer Jimmy Iovine (who later cofounded Interscope Record in 1990) facilitated the transfer of Bruce Springsteen’s unfinished song, “Because the Night.”

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Phoenix’s Midvale Park to Scream Their Way Through Boise for the First Time Tonight at Realms Arcade

Posted in Concert Previews, Interviews with tags , , , on 10/11/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

Well, thanks, eardrums. It’s been real. Unfortunately we’re going to have to part ways at this point, as there’s a certain band from Phoenix playing Realms Arcade in Boise tonight, and they’re gonna rip you out of the ear holes of all in attendance. Why, you ask? Well, let’s let vocalist Alex explain …

Congrats on the release of your Pursuing One’s True Identity EP. How long was it in the making?

The EP was in the making since around February after we got off our first run of out-of-state shows. We took “Frail” and put it on the EP with the other four songs we made.

Did the EP turn out as you envisioned, or did it evolve in unexpected ways?

Not really. We wanted to make an album, but we slacked too long on making more songs, so it turned into an EP of the collection of songs we had made in those six months (plus “Frail”).

It seems to me that the EP really speaks to the pain that people – young people in particular, I imagine – are facing in this day and age, given that the world is so fucking hostile and cruel. “Frail” seems especially powerful because, at least in my interpretation, you’re empathizing with people who feel hopeless yet swaying them away from suicidal ideation. Is that at least somewhat accurate?

The EP name came from my issue with knowing who I am as a person, but the songs are were really just my emotions at the time – besides Frail. “Frail” is actually speaking about those who hold higher status than others and how they abuse it, the end is just saying how much I hate it.

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Unto Others Frontman Delivers Definitive Interview: ‘The Answer That I’ve Reached as I Get Older Is There Is No Answer. And if There Is No Answer, Then You Are God.’

Posted in Concert Reviews, Interview Transcripts, Interviews, Reviews with tags , , , , , , on 10/11/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

“I don’t like not being able to control my destiny.”

-Unto Others frontman Gabriel Franco

—

Portland, Oregon’s Unto Others are no strangers to Boise, having graced stages in this city in November 2021, May 2022 and November 2024. Tonight marked the retro rock band’s fourth performance in the City of Trees and its first time playing at the Shrine Social Club. Unto Others set the table for Castle Rat‘s rousing, hallucinatory, medieval-fantasy performance – while simultaneously erasing all memory of superfluous opening act Wraith Knight, which refers to itself as “dungeon synth,” whatever the hell that is.

One of the many reasons Unto Others were the band that should’ve drawn the biggest crowd in Boise this evening – even with Iron and Wine playing at the Knitting Factory and lovable death-metal goofballs Nekrogoblikon hunkering down at the Shredder – is that Unto Others are a truly one-of-a-kind band in a music climate that seems to subsist on copycats. Unto Others’ sound is a blast from the past; no other band is busting out throwback dark rock with the acumen and authenticity that frontman Gabriel Franco and his pals are producing.

Last year, this writer penned a story about Unto Others for New Noise in which Franco rejected the lazy and inaccurate labeling of Unto Others as a “goth” band. While the article possibly helped deflate the erroneous pigeonholing, it presented just a small fraction of the extensive conversation Franco granted to yours truly. In honor of Unto Others’ fourth performance this evening in Boise, The Bad Penny now brings you the entire – dare we say definitive – conversation that Franco graciously granted to us on November 8, 2024.

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Best New Music Videos (September 2026): Emma Ruth Rundle, BBBBBBB, Death Valley Girls, Kinetic, Actors

Posted in Lists, Videos with tags , , , , , , , , , on 10/10/2026 by Kurt Orzeck

Always at least a day late. But never a dollar short.

1. Emma Ruth Rundle’s “God’s Picture”

2. Thief’s “Moon and Kill”

3. BBBBBBB’s “Sexy Boy”

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