Arcade Fire’s Will Butler is not one for idle time, apparently. In the five years since his first solo release, Policy, Butler has released a live record, recorded and released a No. 1 album with Arcade Fire, earned a master’s degree in public policy from Harvard and raised his three…

Kendrick Lamar In addition to ranking music, I am a professional data journalist. I analyze numbers and do math every day for money. So you’d think I could count. But apparently we skipped Feb. 24 for some reason and ran 1974’s column on March 2, which means everything got…

Franz Ferdinand took you out, and made breakfast in the morning. It’s another edition of RIFF Rewind crowdsourced from the RIFF staff! Which means rock music was still overproduced and generic, and I couldn’t stand to slog through it. Look, I realize this may cause a minor mutiny among…

Whipped into form by religion and the restrictive indoctrination it often entails, Kentucky singer-songwriter Sarah Beth Tomberlin finds herself searching for answers her religious upbringing could not provide. At Weddings Tomberlin Aug. 10 Toiling with the denouncement of her faith while reflecting on the negative repercussions of her Baptist…

  Photo: Jay Demetillo This is the second in a three-part series. Read the introduction to learn how I’m scoring my list and find out about my “special consideration” in PART 1. Favorite Shows 2016 | Favorite Shows 2015 | Favorite Shows 2014 Favorite Shows 2013 | Favorite Shows 2012 11 – CATHEDRALS at the Mezzanine – June…

Photos: Steve Carlson OAKLAND — Five albums in, it’s tough to think of Arcade Fire as the indie underdog the Canadian group was for its first few years. When the band rolled through town Saturday, it played not a small club but Oracle Arena, the pinnacle of massive stages…

It’s already been four years since Arcade Fire released its last LP, Reflektor, but now the Canadian indie rock band is back with Everything Now, out July 28, and an autumn tour that includes a date at Oracle Arena in Oakland. The self-titled first single is reminiscent of the band’s most recent style, combining alternative…

Photos: Ian Young By all accounts 2016 was a shitty year. But amid the chaos were much needed distractions in the form of live music. This year I traveled to Iceland, Chicago, Indio, Los Angeles and Seattle to attend 110 shows and eight festivals, watching and photographing more than 250 bands. Here’s…

Chance the Rapper. Matt De Mello/STAFF. The other day I wrote an column on where we, not just as a country, but as a world, go from here. That piece was unique for RIFF. Ours is not a political publication. However, some events transcend politics. Many of us are nervous, some…

Photos: Jon Ching This is the third in a five-part series. Read how I’m scoring my list and find out about my “special consideration” acts in Part 1, HERE, and the runners-up in Part 2, HERE. Reminder: If the name is hyperlinked, that means I wrote about the act this year,…