In the news today: The Handsome Family, The Sawtooth Grin, Thin, Sunflo'er, Skrillex, Primavera Sound, Steve Vai, GWAR

Born Ruffians hail from the Great White North, and they have an innate ability to craft razor-sharp hooks out of the simplest of riffs.

Cordelia Elsewhere (Deer Lodge Records). Review by James Mann.

Unseen (Milk & Scissors Music). Review by James Mann.

A Place Where I Know: 4-Track Songs 1992-2002 (Birdman). Review by Stein Haukland.

Bitter, sweet. Gothic. Country. These opposites attract and meld in the revolving conundrum that is The Handsome Family. Stein Haukland deciphers meaning from feeling.

Weather Systems (Grimsey Records). Review by James Mann.

Daisies in My Hand (self-released). Review by Stein Haukland.

Look! Up in Chicago! Is it a Waco, a Mekon or a Pine Valley Cosmonaut? Rob Walsh straightens it all out with Jon Langford.

The Ole Blues Bergen Music Festival, featuring Grant Lee Phillips, Hawksley Workman, The Handsome Family, Ben Christophers, Kristoffer Aastrøm, and others in Bergen, Norway, April 30 - May 4, 2002. Festival review by Stein Haukland.

Twilight (Carrot Top). Review by Randall J. Stephens.