Mark CaroApr 73 minTerry Chambers: XTC's powerhouse drummer meets CaropopDrummer Terry Chambers is an unlikely keeper of the XTC flame. He powered the band over its first five increasingly ambitious albums,...
Mark CaroMar 212 min'She's Not There' and other great debut singlesInterviewing Zombies singer Colin Blunstone for Caropop got me thinking about how “She’s Not There” is one of the all-time great debut...
Mark CaroMar 183 minColin Blunstone and the bizarre history of a great band, the ZombiesColin Blunstone has one of the most distinct voices in rock, and the Zombies, one of my favorite bands, has as strange a history as any...
Mark CaroFeb 284 minBig Star's Jody Stephens: The Caropop ConversationI first met Jody Stephens in April 1993 after a student group at the University of Missouri in Columbia asked the great cult band Big...
Mark CaroFeb 232 minThe Gray Side of 'The Moon'Renowned mastering engineer Kevin Gray works on a lot of albums, but sometimes even he gets excited by the sounds coming out of his...
Mark CaroFeb 222 minGary Brooker, R.I.P.Gary Brooker of Procol Harum has died, according to an obituary on the band's website. Ugh. He had one of the great, soulful voices in...
Mark CaroJan 73 minEthan Russell and his close-ups with the Beatles, Stones and Who Ethan Russell was a young San Franciscan when he saw Michelangelo Antonioni’s film Blow Up and decided to move to Swinging London with...
Mark CaroDec 10, 20213 minSteve Dawson, The Caropop Interview: Still growing after all these yearsAfter I moved back to Chicago following my post-college stint at the Boston Phoenix, I started covering local music for the Tribune. My...
Mark CaroDec 1, 20211 minTo sit or to stand while singing?One more Get Back-inspired thought: The Beatles do a lot of recording, including vocals, while sitting down. Then again, some of their...
Mark CaroNov 29, 20218 minFive takeaways (plus bonus tracks) from Get Back, Part 31. Wow. I may have mentioned that I’m quite the Beatles nerd, so I’m very much the target audience for Peter Jackson’s Get Back. That...
Mark CaroNov 28, 20214 minFive takeaways from 'Get Back' Pt. 2“Come on now, back to the drudgery.” —Paul McCartney, Get Back, Part 2 1. This is a lot. People who aren’t that into the Beatles, whoever...
Mark CaroNov 26, 20214 minFive takeaways from 'Get Back' Pt. 11. I’d read a lot about the Get Back sessions and listened to many bootlegs, but seeing this all was something else. Fears from the jolly...
Mark CaroNov 24, 20216 min'Let It Be' revisited: digging into the Beatles' rushed, troubled, non-breakup projectHere’s a key point often overlooked regarding Let It Be, the persistent problem child in the Beatles catalog: The album’s sessions began...
Mark CaroNov 19, 20213 minFitzGerald's Secret Show and Rolling Stones FOMOThe email arrived the morning of Oct. 19: PSSST! C’mon over here…SHHHHHH! OK, check it out: We got a call from a GREAT band who wants to...
Mark CaroNov 15, 20211 minRichard Thompson, in person at lastRichard Thompson is playing two solo shows at the Old Town School of Folk Music Tuesday and Wednesday nights, and though they're sold...
Mark CaroNov 8, 20215 minElvis Costello writes the latest book (and it's a good one)Elvis Costello is calling his current tour with the Imposters “Hello Again,” but a more apt title might be “Not F—king Around.” There are...
Mark CaroNov 5, 20213 minMitch Easter, The Caropop InterviewThis dates me, but I first saw Mitch Easter when his band, Let’s Active, was opening for R.E.M. in the fall of 1983 on my college campus....
Mark CaroOct 29, 20212 minCostello, Spoon bringing the rockElvis Costello and Spoon have released new songs over the past couple of days, and both boast a throwback rock energy. The new Elvis...
Mark CaroOct 28, 20213 minRiccardo Muti and the death and rebirth (we hope) of cultureSitting in the Symphony Center lower balcony on the evening of Sept. 23 was a surprisingly emotional experience for me and, I assume,...
Mark CaroOct 21, 20213 minDigging into War with founding member Lonnie Jordan War is one of those bands that I always liked more than I knew. I’d enjoyed the sing-along choruses and laugh-along verses of “Why Can’t...