Wind-Up Records

Thou shalt always rock in the Wide Stance.

​These days, any old band can come out as Christian (even ICP) but the title used to come with a heavier dose of Savior swagger. And maybe more guilt. Because Creed recently announced its plan to grace the Pageant (6161 Delmar Boulevard, 314-726-6161) with its divine presence May 26, we decided to harken back to the lessons Scott Stapp and company have taught us since their early '90s heyday -- and the lessons they should have learned. If being a Creed fan isn't technically a sin, being in Creed seems to include a heavy handful of them, packed in there with religious gestures, overbearing sanctity and deep, guttural growls. But in the beginning, there was God. Below is a list of the top five lessons we wish the band had learned from its man upstairs.

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Jon Gitchoff

This guy is bummed, we bet.

​The Kanrocksas Music Festival, assembled last year in rapid fashion with a lineup of surprisingly big names (Eminem, the Black Keys, the Flaming Lips...), will be taking what would have been its sophomore year off.

The Kansas Speedway, which hosts the festival, is undergoing a major construction project this summer, and Kanrocksas organizers have decided the partnership is too valuable to look for an alternate venue. The plan is to have a second festival in 2013 at the Speedway.

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Todd Owyoung

Gregg Gillis in 2011, pre-apartment party, perhaps?

​Update, 3/22 Our mystery Girl Talk party host is Chiara Andriole, whose story you can find in the comments. Pin-Up Bowl, evidently, is where you can find Nirvana fan mash-up kings.

Original post follows.

Last year's deluge* of coverage upon the 20th anniversary of Nirvana's Nevermind included just about every perspective on the punk-breaking landmark. Spin asked musicians to explain what the album meant to them, and Girl Talk's Gregg Gillis included an anecdote about St. Louis:

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​There are hundreds of hilarious Craigslist ads posted every day, but we're partial to the Missed Connections- the section where the besotted post regrets over incomplete love connections.

This week we bring you a music-related missed connection. We're not quite sure what this post means as a whole, but the individual elements are interesting: vomit, babes, cookies and the Cramps.

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Go to hell, you old Bastard.

​The sheer longevity of The Simpsons would be impressive if it wasn't so frightening. Consider: A person born on the day of the first non-Tracey Ullman Show episode is now 22 years old. And if characters from the show actually aged, Bart Simpson would be three years away from being able to assume the presidency.

Scary stuff. And individuals born in the 1980s may have felt a shiver of mortality Sunday when The Simpsons aired its 500th episode. With so many hours in the hopper, culling out particularly notable moments in its history without causing a flurry of angry debate is difficult.

Fear not: RFT Music waded through the murky yellow waters of the show's history in search of musicians and music that stand the test of time. Feel free to comment with other moments from Our Favorite Family that deserve recognition:

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​Tonight's guest at Subterranean Books' Noir at the Bar reading series is of particular interest to us here at RFT Music: It's Benjamin Whitmer, who wrote Satan is Real: The Ballad of the Louvin Brothers with Charlie Louvin before he died last year. It tells the story of the pioneering country music duo, active in the '40s, '50s and '60s, responsible for laying the groundwork for hundreds of artists and releasing an album with one of the most iconic covers in music history. That album lends its title to the book, which has been well received by everyone from Emmylou Harris to the New York Times.

Whitmer will be at Meshuggah Coffee House (6269 Delmar Boulevard, 314-726-5662) tonight at 7 p.m. Missouri's Robert J. Randisi and St. Louis' Sonia Coney and Jason Makansi are also reading.

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Courtesy of Fueled By Ramen

Having fun.

​Fun. has just announced a show scheduled for June 9 at the Pageant (6161 Delmar Boulevard, 314-726-6161). Tickets are $17.50 in advance and go on sale March 2 at 5 p.m. We think you should go. There are lots of reasons, one of which is the band's brand new LP Some Nights. It's helpfully streaming if you'd like a sample -- you can find it on the Fun. website or right here:

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Photos by Jason Stoff

If nothing else, Jay Farrar (left) and Jeff Tweedy (right) agree on Woody Guthrie.

​Over the weekend, Billy Bragg announced that he and Wilco would release a third installment in their Mermaid Avenue series. The albums draw inspiration from Woody Guthrie's notebooks of unreleased lyrics. Also drawing inspiration from that source is Jay Farrar, who has collaborated with Will Johnson (Centro-matic), Anders Parker (Varnaline) and Yim Yames (My Morning Jacket) for a tribute of his own entitled New Multitudes. That's out next week on Rounder Records.

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BeatlesTrivia.com

George Harrison spent a small part of 1963 visiting his sister - Louise Harrison - in Benton, Illinois.

​Beatlemania is arguably the most expansive musical frenzy in modern history, so it's not surprising that places big and small would try to latch on to every bit of the Fab Four's legacy.

But it may be a revelation to some that the mania extended to Benton, Illinois, a smallish town located in the Land of Lincoln's nether regions. George Harrison spent a small part of 1963 visiting his sister, who had moved to America after marrying a mining engineer. George stayed at Louise Harrison's 113 McCann Street bungalow for a short time before jettisoning off into rock immortality.

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​Water Liars is Justin Kinkel-Schuster and Andrew Bryant. They're releasing their debut, Phantom Limb, on Friday at Off Broadway (3509 Lemp Avenue, 314-773-3363). You can check back tomorrow for our review of the album, but in the meantime comes the incredibly opportune debut of a new streaming music feature from our friends at KDHX (88.1 FM) called Hear and Now. RFT Senior Music Writer Roy Kasten lends some words, as well.

Listen: Phantom Limb by Water Liars

See also: Introducing Phantom Limb (The band has since changed its name to Water Liars)