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Review: Slash

When Guns N’ Roses disintegrated in the mid-’90s, few would have suspected that the popular act’s top-hatted guitarist would go on to enjoy a more successful career than any of his band mates.

Review: Nick Lowe

Sometimes all a show needs is a nice guitar, a smooth voice and a pile of good songs. That’s what Nick Lowe brought to Knuckleheads on Thursday night, where a crowd of more than 400 gave him and those songs lots of love and warm ovations.

This weekend: Denver Broncos UK top a busy four days

The group Denver Broncos UK is not from the United Kingdom and has nothing to do with professional football. It is, however, affiliated with some of the more charismatic music to come out of Colorado in the past 20 years.

Review: Glen Hansard

LAWRENCE -- The opening number was called “The Storm It’s Coming,” a song off “Rhythm and Repose,” the solo album by Glen Hansard, the headliner Wednesday night at Liberty Hall. “Storm” is a harbinger, a song about profound change on the horizon, and it was apt foreshadowing for a show that took almost 1,000 people on an odyssey through the ever-changing climates of the heart.

Review: The Head and the Heart

Popularity arrives sooner than it once did in the music world. It used to take bands three albums and years in holes-in-the-wall and small clubs before they graduated to 2,000-seat theaters and national festivals. These days, if you catch the right wave, you can do it with one album.

Review: Frankie Valli

Frankie Valli is a master of understatement.  

"We've had an extraordinary career and an awful lot of hits," Valli said Tuesday during a sweetly nostalgic performance at the Muriel Kauffman Theatre.  

Review: The Lumineers

LAWRENCE -- Hype is momentum on fire, and right now you can see the flames surrounding the Lumineers from a fair distance.

Monday night, five months after it sold out the Riot Room in Westport, the Denver trio (with two backing musicians) filled Liberty Hall from wall to wall and floor to ceiling. More than an hour before the doors opened, a line stretched south down Massachusetts Avenue and then east down Seventh Street, all for a band that released its first and only album less than six months ago. 

Under-radar show: Attn. Ween fans

The Tuesday night lineup at the RecordBar, 1020 Westport Road, is one for the groove-aphiles, the adventurous and the open-minded. The opener is the swinging, free-wheeling Mike Dillon Band, featuring the inimitable Dillon and his stellar three-person lineup, including the ever-vibrant and brassy Carly Meyers on trombone. The headliner is keyboardist Marco Benevento, who dabbles in an array of styles, including avant-garde jazz and experimental/post-rock. The rest of his trio is Dave Dreiwitz, bassist for Ween, and Andrew Borger, who has played drums with Tom Waits, Ani DiFranco and others.  Show time is 9:30 p.m. Admission is $12. Go and be delivered.

Your Plaza Art Fair music guide

The Beautiful Bodies perform at 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. Friday.

This weekend’s music calendar is light on national and regional touring bands, but the good news: It’s loaded with opportunities to see some of the best local bands in Kansas City for free or less than $10.

Review: Bryan Adams

Photo by Susan Pfannmuller/Special to The Star

The phrase “18 Til I Die” is the biographical entry of Bryan Adams’ Twitter account. It could also be the motto of many of the 1,000 fans who attended the pop star’s concert Wednesday at the Uptown Theater.