This week's SFist Memoirs takes us to the East Bay in the early 1990s, as contributor Rene Becker shares some coming-of-age stories from her time as a teenager throwing spaghetti at Blatz at the 924 Gilman, smoking weed on Telegraph Avenue, and most importantly, giving Mr. Bungle's Mike Patton a piggy-back ride on stage. Rene moved to Albany from Sacramento at age twelve and lives in San Francisco now. Take it away, Rene! more ›

Now that Phillip and Nancy Garrido's trial is over and they both pleaded guilty to kidnapping Jaycee Lee Dugard and holding her captive for eighteen years, Jaycee was finally free to give her first national television interview. She likely had her pick of interviewers, and she chose kindly Diane Sawyer at ABC, whose interview with Dugard just aired last night. more ›

by Daniel Phifer Adam Carolla first gained national attention as the much needed comic relief to Dr. Drew Pinsky’s clinical straight man on the Los Angeles based radio show Loveline. Since then his credits include television personality, voice-over artist, filmmaker, and author. more ›

by Daniel Phifer SFist sat down to talk with Dave Wakeling of The English Beat shortly before their show at Bimbos 365 in San Francisco on Friday night. The show was exactly what we expected, nostalgic and high energy punctuated with impeccable musicianship. more ›

by Naomi Kirsten Back in March 2009, San Francisco photographer Julie Michelle launched I Live Here:SF, featuring an ever-growing collection of beautiful, lush portraits shot in various San Francisco locales, which are paired with the subjects' odes to San Francisco. more ›

The rad Rad Report gave us a heads-up about this incredible interview that a wet-behind-the-ears Aaron Axelsen did for Live 105 back in 1994 at the height of Brit Pop. more ›

Today Mission Mission has a delightful chat with Junior, who's been a bike messenger about town for 35 years. He's sticking with the biz, despite it not being such a growth industry. more ›

Wall Street Journal Senior Technology Editor Julia Angwin recently took an investigative look at the back-stories of MySpace founders Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, who prior to founding the social networking and glitter-gif bohemoth dabbled in porn, hacking, spam and spyware before stumbling on their mega-million-dollar meal ticket. The book is called Stealing Myspace and you can find it here or at an independent bookseller in your neighborhood. more ›

Considering the weather lately, maybe you want to do your Chinese New Year celebration, like, indoors. Always attentive to your needs, the SF Symphony is hosting a concert this Sunday at 4pm inside the warm confines of Davies Symphony Hall. How thoughtful. It's a festive family concert with the SFS orchestra, doing a violin concerto and some Tchaikovsky, but there will also be pieces for traditional Chinese instruments, a kids choir performing Jasmine Flower, by Bay Area composer Gang Situ, and some lion's dance. Happy New Year. more ›

Almost three years ago we interviewed Of Montreal's front man, Kevin Barnes. Since that time they've "blown up" as the Hollywood kids might say. A couple of albums, increasingly amazing outfits, and legendary live shows. Lucky you-- they're playing the Regency Grand Ballroom tomorrow night (yah, we didn't know where that was either-- Van Ness and Sutter). You can check out Of Montreal's latest album, Skeletal Lamping, here. Trust us, this show will set you straight for a family filled holiday season. Read on for Barnes's take on touring and our fair city. more ›

The road to recovery post Halloween should probably include a strong dose of Bay Area pride and a dash of Delaware’s finest. Half-handed Cloud (Oakland) and The Spinto Band (Wilmington) are playing Bottom of the Hill tomorrow night. Wear your costume (or what’s left of it), and let the pop help you recover. As extra enticement the guys from the Spinto Band answered a few questions for us. One thing we could all probably agree on in this election: saying yes to MC Hammer. more ›

We caught up with Herbie Hancock the other day as he was in the middle of fixing his car. That’s right, Jazz Legend Herbie Hancock was running late because his hands were covered in oil. Hancock recently had to cancel an appearance in SF—he’ll be playing at the Mountain Winery tonight, and he said he hopes people will make the drive down. Below we’ve excerpted part of our conversation with him. ‘Then and Now: The Definitive Herbie Hancock’ will be released Sept. 23 on Verve. more ›

Local artists + fine baked goods + free admission = your Friday night plans. And good ones. Alex Beckstead will be screening his new film "Paperback Dreams", all about Bay Area independent booksellers, at the Oakland Museum tonight. Yes, there will be cookies and good times. Read on for Alex's take on the best local book shops, Sleepless in Seattle, and slow culture. more ›

SFist recently went to one of Robin William’s practice sessions at Bimbo’s and it rekindled our interest in comedy as a way to cope with national politics. The Daily Show has long been a bright spot on that front, thanks in part to the writing of Paul Mecurio. Mecurio has won both an Emmy and a Peabody for his writing for the Daily Show. He will be headlining at Punchline tonight through Saturday, tickets are available here. Still trying to decide? Watch this, and read on for his SFist interview below. more ›

Time to tear yourself away from all the awesome flicks at the SFIFF and get some exercise. Or at least stand up for a bit. Hit Bottom of the Hill tonight to check out Laura Veirs. Even if you are not a pre-teen Texan girl, or super into snow leopards, you’ll probably dig the music. We first interviewed Laura about a year ago-- although she's not offering a free tattoo this time round, her new stuff is worth the price of admission. Plus, nothing says happy May 5th like a little celebration of Indie rock. Laura answered a few more of our questions—good ideas about what to check out in Portland, and what to expect at the show tonight. more ›

Big band, small venue. People begging for tickets at $200 a pop on craigslist. Not a bad situation to be in if you've just released your second EP. Birds of Avalon will be playing tonight at Bimbo's. Sure, they're opening for The Raconteurs (gotta love Jack White and Brendan Benson), but we think you should be there to check out BoA. In addition to some seriously great rock music, BoA has some seriously great rocker names. SFist is proud to give one of their band members the "SFist Interviews Best Name Ever for a Rocker Award"-- to Cheetie Kumar. Despite their hectic touring schedule front man Craig Tilley was kind enough to answer a few questions for us. more ›

February may well be our favorite month in San Francisco. Between the Chinese New Year parade, the glorious weather, and Noise Pop, there’s really no better place to be this time of year. Noise Pop officially kicks off tonight. To celebrate we’re reposting an interview with the man behind it all, Kevin Arnold, that we originally ran last year. more ›

SFist interviews Jeff Ross, founder of Indie Fest more ›

SFist interviews Kenneth Ryan, Prop Master of the San Francisco Ballet more ›

SFist interviews Crispin Hellion Glover, who is screening his films at the Castro Theater this weekend. more ›

SFist interviews Onion editor, Joe Randazzo more ›

Ragnar left Sweden to join the SF Symphony as Chorus director in March this year. And did we throw a welcome party for him? Did we ring his door with a cauliflower casserole and a bottle of wine to ease his arrival in the neighborhood? Nope. Nada. We must have been booked when he threw his housewarming or something, but so far, search for him here and you'll find only one single measly hit. Luckily for us, that one post heaps praise on Ragnar, otherwise we'd be accused of ignoring him. more ›

By Frances Reade more ›

As the winners of Live 105's Local Band competition, Maldroid will be opening for Modest Mouse, Jimmy Eat World, Angels & Airwaves, Spoon, and Paramore tomorrow night at the "Not So Silent Night" bash at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium. Maldroid's sound is a mix between The Beatles and The Hives. They first became popular when their video, "He Said, She Said," won "The Youtube Underground" competition - Youtube's first ever music video competition. They... more ›

SFist interviews Brian Regan more ›

SFist interviews the Reverend Billy of "what would jesus buy?" more ›

With over 70 shows since July 1st, MiGGs deserves a break but not until they play one last show in San Francisco. Featured on Monday in "This Week in Le Rock" MiGGs blend an alt/rock, emo, pop and classic rock sound to perfection. They are returning to Cafe du Nord this Saturday night before they take a month off to put the finishing touches of their newest album, Unraveled (which we'll be listening to at... more ›

SFist interviews Of Montreal's Kevin Barnes. more ›

By Frances Reade more ›

SFist interviews local band Social Studies. They rock. more ›