When Tony Dekker debuted Great Lake Swimmers six years ago, comparisons to the exquisite chamber Folk of Nick Drake, Elliott Smith and Neil Young seemed inevitable. Dekker channeled the expansive desolation of his soul into his eponymous GLS album by way of his whispery vocals, sparse accompaniment and unique studio environment.  

CincyPunk Fest organizer Adam Rosing has a number of reasons for booking what has become one of the area's most anticipated Punk-and-whatever events. "I do it every year because it's a great time and it's a chance to get everyone together." For CincyPunk Fest VIII, the audience will also have the opportunity to catch up with bands they haven't seen in years: Spodie, Pincushion and Saturday Supercade.  

If anyone ever makes a movie of Paul Thorn's life, they may have to leave out some of the details just to make it believable. Just after his birth in Wisconsin, his Pentecostal preacher father moved the family to Tupelo, Miss., famed birthplace of Elvis Presley.  

Keeping up with today's popular music performers is like walking past a funhouse mirror. For every favorite culture or literary hero you or anyone else is liable to have had, real or fictional, there's probably a contemporary Rock act appropriating the name.  

Already formed and broken up once by 1982, The Queers began to grab headlines with the reemergence of perennial frontman Joe Queer in 1990. Queer would be the consistent nucleus of a band whose roster was a haphazard game of musical chairs; roughly 30 members since 1982 have been a Queer. Twenty five years later, the band still shows no signs of stopping, with an upcoming CD release slated for 2009 and a tour that included a stint at South By Southwest in Texas.  

Handsome Furs is that whole mystery/riddle/enigma thing wrapped in a musical quesadilla, a concept "band" without a concept.  

If Glenn Tilbrook had never done another thing in his career outside of his work with Squeeze, his place in music history would be secure.  

Obits are a band without a plan. Even though their debut full-length, I Blame You, will be released via Sub Pop Records on the same date that they’ll headlining in Newport, this Brooklyn quartet has yet to outline any long-term ambitions for the group. This sense of irresolution is to be expected from a group led by Rick Froberg, the frenetic guitarist/vocalist that previously served in Garage Punk firestarters Rocket from the Crypt and the rabid Post-Punk Hot Snakes.  

When Pomegranates released their 2008 debut album, it was the culmination of a number of significant advances in a relatively short time. Within months of forming, the quartet had notched accomplishments that evade some bands for years. Their new album, 'Everybody, Come Outside!,' bristles with an engaging Indie Rock energy that simultaneously references and transcends their avowed influences: Talking Heads and Brian Eno.  

Take the gloriously distorted melodies of Surf guitar legend Dick Dale and the virile grit of Punk iconoclasts the Dead Kennedys and throw them together into a blender set to its most violent setting. The resulting mixture is bound to resemble the sound of Agent Orange.