Young the Giant’s ‘Home of the Strange’ Tour

Young the Giant’s ‘Home of the Strange’ Tour

Young the Giant announced a tour earlier in the year to accompany their August release of their third album Home of the Strange. On September 18th, the Orange County quintet landed in Boston with a killer set of old and new tunes playing nearly 20 songs over the course of two hours. Our first encounter with Young the Giant was back in 2011 at a Jimmy Kimmel Live show and the attraction to the bands thoroughly-developed, mammoth live sound was the immediate draw. DYFO has since attended Young the Giant both at indoor and outdoor venues between Massachusetts, Tennessee, and California. The band has only grown more and more into their live sound (which easily tops their studio recordings, in our opinion) which is reflected stupendously in any size arena, with singer Sameer Gadhia’s astounding vocals leading the charge.

Periphery’s Sonic Unrest Tour

Periphery’s Sonic Unrest Tour

Periphery came to town this week in the form of the Sonic Unrest Tour, hot off their recent release of Periphery III: Select Difficulty. For those unfamiliar, Periphery is a progressive metal/djent band who have been tearing up the metal scene since their debut in 2010 and have been cranking out albums ever since. Periphery III: Select Difficulty came to us just a month before the Boston show, the follow-up to 2015’s dual album and tour Juggernaut: Alpha & Omega. The new album, dense with the familiar heavy riffage of Periphery’s usual style, expands on the band members strengths without being overly experimental this time around – but the result is nothing but another great album from the group.

Interview: Emmy Winner Jeff Whitcher

Interview: Emmy Winner Jeff Whitcher

I had the chance to interview Emmy-winning sound designer Jeff Whitcher. Jeff was nice enough to give us some insight into his musical history and how he got to be where he is today in the industry – and I’ll tell you one thing, it sounds like a lot of hard work.

Interview:

I’ve always been nose-deep in music. I personally started my music path with the saxophone way back in elementary school, but have been playing guitar for a good thirteen years since then after seeing a buddy of mine nail the ‘Crazy Train’ solo when we were about fourteen years old. This inspired me more than any artist I was listening to at the time, and I decided I wanted to devote myself to an instrument.

Can you tell me a bit about what the inspiration behind your work consists of? What was it that made you get into music when you were young? Walk me through your process a little bit.

New Trevor Hall Album Upcoming Titled ‘KALA’

Trevor Hall has been around for what feels like ages to me. I first heard his debut album Lace Up Your Shoes back when it dropped in 2004 (he was at the ripe young age of roughly 18) and consider the songs Beautiful LunaticProof of Destruction and Venomous to be classics – for a lack of a better word – at this point in my life. Hall fell off my radar for almost ten years because of my changing interests, but I rediscovered his music just as he seemed to rediscover himself when he released 2014’s Chapter of the Forest.

Major Lazer & DJ Snake (feat. MØ) – Lean On

This song has been stuck in my head for a couple of weeks now! I’ve been familiar with Major Lazer for a while, even before the latest hit Lean On, but it’s typically a music genre I overlook or don’t think twice about.

Two weeks ago I heard Lean On on Beats 1 Radio and was not sure what I had just heard. Still not knowing what the song was or who it was by, I came across it on the dance floor of a wedding I attended this past weekend. I remember it was the third song played of the night and as soon as I heard it start I ran to the center of the floor and danced like never before. This song was fire for such a time of celebration and partying, and certainly got the attendees to loosen up, which then went to set the tone for the rest of the night.

Album Impressions: Tremonti – Cauterize

Album Impressions: Tremonti – Cauterize

Mark Tremonti. It’s hard for me to come up with an original, praiseful comment about this guy. With a track record including millions upon millions of albums sold, a Grammy for Best Rock Song in 2001, and being the lead guitarist of one of the most idolized rock bands in the world, Alter Bridge (not to mention my favorite band), Tremonti steps into the rock ring for round two of his solo project with ‘Cauterize,’ the follow up to 2012’s debut ‘All I Was.’

As many of you know, Tremonti was the driving force behind Creed, a popular band in the 90’s and early 2000’s as lead guitarist and songwriter. I don’t think I need to touch on Creed’s success as they’re a multi-platinum and even diamond artist, but once they’re downfall came after numerous issues with lead singer Scott Stapp, Tremonti and Creed bandmates Scott Phillips and Brian Marshall went on to form the astounding Alter Bridge with singer Myles Kennedy (yeah, that guy who made Marky Mark look bad in the end of the movie Rock Star by coming out of the crowd to sing).

Interview: Chris Kessaris of Parasitic Extirpation

Interview: Chris Kessaris of Parasitic Extirpation

Chris Kessaris, guitarist of Massachusetts death metal band Parasitic Extirpation sat down with us to share some of his musical experiences and to enlighten us with the many projects in which he is involved.

As a young man in his early 30’s, Chris (second from left in band photograph above) has quite the number of achievements under his belt. From his band Parasitic Extirpation, a number of SoundCloud accounts and projects in which he does his own renditions of classic Nintendo Entertainment System and WWE songs, Chris is an extremely busy man. At one point in time a guitar instructor, Chris has a knack for learning and teaching. Graduating several years ago with a degree in music, Chris remains a student of music. He told us that he will never be where he wants to be with his music, and ever since the day he heard guitarist Chris Broderick (Megadeth, Nevermore) many years ago, the talents expressed by Broderick pissed him off (in admiration for his skills) so much that this became the leading cause in his drive to constantly be improving upon his own talents.