Craig Finn

The Hold Steady Stay in the Key of E Street

The bar band looks to rebound after first stumble

Live: Bob Mould Plunges Into His Riff-Heavy Past At Williamsburg Park

Bob Mould Williamsburg Park Friday, September 7 Better than: Having to send a search party for the silver lining. "You've really done a lot with the place," joked guitarist-songwriter Bob Mould to the crowd as he took a well-deserved breather in Williamsburg Park on Friday. He'd commandeered his n ... More >>

Live: Bustle In Your Hedgerow, Craig Finn, Nicole Atkins, And More Pay Tribute To Levon Helm

The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down: A Celebration of the Life and Music of Levon Helm. With Marco Benevento, Dave Dreiwitz, Scott Metzger, and Joe Russo (a/k/a Bustle in Your Hedgerow) and many others. Brooklyn Bowl Monday, June 4 Better than: Nothingness. One of my favorite conversations with th ... More >>

'The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down: A Celebration of the Life and Music of Levon Helm'

STAYING POSITIVE

Craig Finn rallies the boys and girls to Mercury Lounge

Q&A: The Hold Steady's Craig Finn On The First Time He Heard The Replacements, And Which Bands Are Carrying On The 'Mats Legacy In 2011

Mark Seliger​In the new documentary Color Me Obsessed: A Film About The Replacements, you'll find a wildly diverse array of witnesses, all in thrall to the ragged glory that was The Mats in their prime. Included among these friends, admirers, whack jobs, rackjobbers, rock critics and record ex ... More >>

The Hold Steady Are Playing A Free(ish) Show At The Beekman Beer Garden On Saturday

​This Saturday, the goodtime outfit the Hold Steady will celebrate the last official weekend of summer with a free, if ticketed, show at the Beekman Beer Garden; the festivities begin at 8 p.m., and tickets are available online now. As is often the case, "free" doesn't necessarily mean free� ... More >>

Week In Review: We'll Never Get Over The White Stripes

​We started out the week on a positive jam. Riding high off Bob Dylan Week, we spent the weekend paying tribute to all those bands who came before with Craig Finn at Music Hall of Williamsburg and trying with all our hearts to sing along while the Dismemberment Plan flailed around on stage at ... More >>

Download the Hold Steady's Monday Night Set at the Music Hall of Williamsburg

"I woke up this morning and I had this weird feeling," Craig Finn told an unsuspecting audience on Monday night at the Music Hall of Williamsburg, toward the end of the second of the Hold Steady's two shows there. "I hadn't really realized this until today, but our first show ever was on January 3 ... More >>

Live: The Hold Steady Pay Homage To Themselves and Their Heroes at the Music Hall of Williamsburg

This photo (by Rob Trucks) was actually not taken last night, though he was wearing the same shirt and everything.​The Hold Steady Music Hall of Williamsburg Sunday, January 30 Better Than: Watching the SAG Awards, whatever they are. "It's Sunday night," Hold Steady frontman Craig Finn says ... More >>

Rob Harvilla's Top 10 Singles of 2010

​Not every great song this year was released by Katy Perry. From a snarling avant-electro NPR lecture to a haunted-house posse cut to a ludicrously profane viral sensation, here are 10 examples. "Teenage Dream" might still be better than all of these, though. Better get this started before I c ... More >>

Was 2010 The Best Year For Music Ever? Redeeming M.I.A.

Welcome to Sound of the City's year-in-review rock-critic roundtable, an amiable ongoing conversation between five prominent Voice critics: Rob Harvilla, Zach Baron, Sean Fennessey, Maura Johnston, and Rich Juzwiak. We'll be here all week! ​Dear Rob, Sean, Rich, and Maura, I believe, as per ... More >>

Live: The Hold Steady Try Their Best To Burn Down The Beacon Theatre

Craig Finn, taking the whole Twins thing in stride. Pics by Rob Trucks, more below.​The Hold Steady Beacon Theatre Thursday, October 7 Better than: Cirque de Soleil's Banana Shpeel or whatever usually goes on here. I'm sure some of those Allman Brothers shows get pretty rowdy, but I still ca ... More >>

The Hold Steady Are Playing At the Apple Store In A Few Hours

"Can I get some service on this iPhone, please?" Photo by Rob Trucks.​Local bar-rock heroes and Minnesota Twins fans (sorry about that) the Hold Steady have been playing great shows in New York for so long, and with such regularity, that you occasionally start to take them for granted. Until, ... More >>

Week in Review: Report Gang Activity

Have seen you seen this man?​In the week we wondered if it was still possible to sell out in 2010 (short answer: no), we also found ourselves introduced to the horrific new term "rape gaze," about which the less that's now said, the better. Cleanse your palate with the six best things you can ... More >>

Download Steve Wynn And The Miracle 3's "Resolution"; Hear It Live At The Living Room Next Week

​"Paisley Underground" veteran Steve Wynn (the L.A. rocker, not the casino owner who puts his hand through Picasso paintings) is a permanent friend-of-SOTC for the simple reason that he once let us film him singing a song while standing in a dog park. He returns with backing band the Miracle 3 ... More >>

The Hold Steady Bring "Rock Problems" to the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson

Might as well watch these as they come in, since the band isn't playing in New York again until motherfucking October. Did you see that somebody finally asked Craig Finn about his newfound penchant of actually hanging around the microphone when his band performs? "We have been blessed in order to ... More >>

Last Night: Stephen Colbert Accuses the Hold Steady of Being Graphic Designers

"Are you sure you're not graphic designers?", Stephen Colbert asks the Hold Steady's Craig Finn and Tad Kubler, the joke being that they're way too old to be playing in a band. (Like Harvilla sez: "You have to remember: The Hold Steady were wizened, wistful veterans when they started.") Then, afte ... More >>

Week in Review: May Day

Salute. Photo by Sam Horine.​In the week we finally got to unleash the initial Siren Festival details on the world (July 17! 10th anniversary! Matt & Kim, Ted Leo, Surfer Blood, Pains of Being Pure at Heart, and Harlem! Totally free!), we celebrated Cinco De Mayo like Anna Wintour, Pharrell, a ... More >>

Everyone Is Trying To Impersonate Craig Finn All Of A Sudden

​Yes, America, someone has started a fake Craig Finn Twitter feed. Results thus far are a bit uneven (boooooo), but the Hold Steady frontman certain has a vivid style to play with -- what the Times' Ben Ratliff describes, in his review of the band's new record, Heaven Is Whenever, as "typicall ... More >>

The Hold Steady Age Gracefully

On the still raucous and (only slightly) paternal charms of Heaven Is Whenever

Watch the Hold Steady Play "The Weekenders" On Letterman

Always nice to see Letterman get genuinely excited about a musical guest. The big burly third guitarist, it seems, is Steve Selvidge from Lucero; guess they're making the whole Craig Finn really never plays guitar thing official. (Maybe that's what's helping him actually sing into the microphone?) ... More >>

Live: The Hold Steady Bro Down At Bowery Ballroom

The Hold Steady Bowery Ballroom Saturday, April 17 And what better song to kick off the first of two special Record Store Day gigs than the one that ignites on the words "We put it all down on technology and lost everything we invested"?

New Hold Steady: "Barely Breathing"

​So yeah, maybe the most baroque and/or emo deployment the classic scene reprimand, "No one wins at violent shows"? (LCD Soundsystem assayed some version of this precise sentiment last night at MHOW.) "The kids are all distracted," sings Craig Finn, and we can relate, with four Hold Steady son ... More >>

The Hold Steady Announce New Record: Heaven Is Whenever, Due in May

Judson Baker​Here's to ending the longest drought between Hold Steady albums, ever. In the two years since the Brooklyn band released the hardcore revival moment Stay Positive, the former five piece toured endlessly and, at the tail end of last month, bade farewell to keyboardist and chief mou ... More >>

Lifter Puller Finally Come Back Into Print

​Robert Christgau's one-line review of long defunt Minneapolis quarter Lifter Puller's final bow, Fiestas and Fiascos: "Postpunk E Street for fuckups clocking e-dollars." Frankly, we blanch at adding all that much more than that--the Hold Steady's Tad Kubler played bass, and Craig Finn fronte ... More >>

The Hold Steady Cover the Mountain Goats

As indie-rock love affairs go, the one between Craig Finn and John Darnielle is one of the best: Finn's "Girls Like Status" memorably namechecked the Mountain Goats' "This Year," and Darnielle has been known to sub in the Hold Steady's name on "Best Ever Death Metal Band Out of Denton," to pretty ... More >>

Cautious Revelry at the Hold Steady/Drive-By Truckers Blowout

SHE

Rock & roll remains the Truckers' elusive lover

This Week's Voice: Ice-T and Richard Hell on the Election, They Might Be Giants, Craig Finn, Zack and Miri Make a Porno, and More

John Berryman, Muse to The Hold Steady: Not News, Barely True

The Hold Steady Return With Another Fist-Pumping Ode to Triumphant Fatigue

I guess this is growing up. . .

Constructive Summer

The Hold Steady Return on Top

Beer-Tossing Antics with the Hold Steady

Mythbusters

Brooklyn dance-punk octet frees minds most adeptly when their mouths are shut

Bob, Barkley, and Beyond: The Top 20

The poll's upper echelons drive us crazy, or at least drive us to drink

Living With War

Music

Stuff you need to know to avoid cultural ostracism

The Quarterly Report: Best New Albums

Cotton Candy on the Edge of Town

On the uneasily triumphant Hold Steady, once nearly dead, now born to run

Hip-Hop's New No Wave

Downtown's odd relationship with rap bravado continues this fall—now with Muppet costumes

Live: The Hold Steady Deny Involvement in Page 6 Scandal

Top Ten Plus

Register behind me bird in Arular's Sunday Illinois woodz machine

Thousands Left Extremely Tired After CMJ

Lightwave Darkwaver Sticks Mostly to the Monotone He Knows Best

The Gospel According to the Hold Steady

On their great new album, Brooklyn's best band explores why Catholic girls start much too early

Movin' Out

Nothin's cool, they found your father in the swimming pool

Listings

So This Guy Walks Into a Bar . . .