In the mean time check out their video for “As Long As Their Is Whiskey In The World” off their latest release Good Morning, Magpie, which is available right now!

Davey, Dan, Justin & other Dan recently sat down with The Onion to take part in their AV Club’s ‘Undercover’ series, covering Depeche Mode’s hit ‘Enjoy The Silence’. Enjoy yourself some of it! CLICK HERE

Don’t miss your chance to see Craig Finn and his merry men at Ottos! Not familiar with the band? Check out their critically-acclaimed album, ‘Stay Positive’, which topped most music critics ‘end of the year’ lists. While your at it, check out their newest album, ‘Heaven Is Whenever’.

Tickets are available now at YourTicketStand.com

In support of their newest album We Walk This Road – produced by legendary Grammy-winning producer T. Bone Burnett – Robert Randolph & The Family Band will make their way to DeKalb for a Kickstand show at Otto’s Nightclub on Thursday, July 15th.

Randolph began playing pedal-steel guitar in his New Jersey church but it wasn’t until 2006 that the band saw an international explosion in popularity. Their third disc Colorblind birthed the massive, toe-tapping single “Ain’t Nothin’ Wrong With That,” which popped up everywhere on television (“Grey’s Anatomy,” Subway restaurant ads and The Discovery Channel, just to name a few spots). The group continued a marathon touring schedule, hitting the road with Dave Matthews Band, Eric Clapton and O.A.R., plus appearances on “The Late Show with David Letterman” and the Grammy Awards, in a star-studded tribute to Sly & The Family Stone.

This is a 21+ show with no opening act, so get ready for a full night of Robert Randolph & The Family Band! Tickets are available now via YourTicketStand.

Check out this video below of the band performing “The March”:

Kickstand Productions is incredibly excited to announce Drive-By Truckers, coming to Otto’s Nightclub on Sunday, July 11th at 9PM.

Having straddled the indie-rock and alt-country worlds for the better half of a decade, Drive-By Truckers are on coarse to take over in a major way this year. Their eighth and newest album, The Big To-Do, has brought the group onto David Letterman’s stage (see the video below) as well as opening slots for heavy-hitters like The Hold Steady and even Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers. Leader Patterson Hood crafts workingman anthems that hark back to early Southern gothic tales of loss and religion while injecting an urgency that others in their category can’t carry.

This show is 21+ and tickets are available now via YourTicketStand. Don’t miss your chance to check out one of America’s most-talked about bands!

Metal troupe August Burns Red recently debuted a new video for “White Washed,” one of the many bombastic tracks on their most recent full-length, Constellations. The album debuted in the Top 25 on the Billboard charts when it was released last summer. View the video below!

Kickstand welcomes August Burns Red to Mad Maggie’s in Elgin, IL on Thursday, July 8th. Tickets are $15 and available via YourTicketStand.com. Get yours today!

On May 16th, 2010 at 7:45AM, American music lost one of its most influential icons in Ronnie James Dio. He surrendered to his long-fought bout with stomach cancer after he took a turn for the worse earlier this month.

Dio is Italian for the word “God,” and in the world of metal, not many other monikers could be a more apt representation of what RJD meant to his genre of music. His musical legacy spanned an astounding six decades, dating all the way back to 1957. Dio’s earlier bands like Elf and Rainbow paved the way for heavy music as we know it today. He also sang lead vocals on arguably one of the best Black Sabbath albums, Heaven & Hell, after the departure of then frontman Ozzy Osbourne. While his solo work is more popularly remembered for its unapologeticly campy videos and song stylings, one cannot deny the powerful and unique vocal stylings that Dio exhibited.

One of the biggest things that RJD will always be synonymous with is the heavy-metal gesture of throwing up the horns. While Dio has always stated that he popularized the gesture after seeing his Italian grandmother make the horns as a cultural superstition to ward off the “evil eye,” he never said he invented the sign. In a 2001 interview Dio went on to state “I doubt very much if I would be the first one who ever did that. That’s like saying I invented the wheel.”

Ronnie James Dio truly was like a rainbow in the dark.

For years now, Kickstand has been proud to bring some of the best talent in the country through DeKalb. Often, our best nights are spent watching both a gigantic local crowd and a national heavy-hitting band have the time of their lives together, fueled by sing-alongs, camaraderie and – of course – the occasional beer or whiskey!

So it’s with great pleasure that Kickstand and the upcoming Middlewest Fest present the mighty Lucero, cruising through Otto’s on Monday, August 2nd, with special guests Ha Ha Tonka. It’ll be a 21+, 8pm show.

Led by the tender, yet gruff vocals of Ben Nichols, Lucero’s tales of late-night rambling and morning regret have catapulted the group to the top of the indie-punk/alt-country scene that encompasses like-minded acts such as The Hold Steady and The Gaslight Anthem. This Memphis-bred sextet has been averaging an astounding 200 shows per year in their decade-long existence, making them a cult favorite in all corners of the globe.

2009′s 1372 Overton Park hit the Billboard Top 200, as well as scored a whopping #2 on the Heatseekers Album charts. Park, the band’s sixth record overall and major-label debut for Universal, is named for the space that several members shared in Memphis over the years – writing, recording and even living for a time. It’s also worth noting that the King himself – Elvis Presley – also took karate lessons at that same address back in the 1970′s. Perhaps its those historic vibes that spread to Park‘s joyous Memphis-soul sound, sporting horn arrangements from long-time session player Jim Spake, whose resume includes legends such as Al Green and Solomon Burke.

Get your tickets now for Lucero on Monday, August 2 via Your Ticket Stand.

In the meantime, check out the below live video from 2008, as Lucero performs “She’s Just That Kind of Girl”:

The name GWAR is synonymous with loud, bizarre and shocking behavior. They’re as much of a rock institution as some idiot yelling “Free Bird!” during a concert. Seeing GWAR live is a rite of passage, as well as a surefire way to have a once-in-a-lifetime musical experience. There isn’t much else to say, except “It’s GWAR, dude!”

GWAR’s name has often been thought to be an acronym that would give the public some sort of clue or explanation for their out-of-this-world behavior. Examples such as “God What an Awful Racket” or “Gay Weird Anal Reprobates” are as funny and as creative as the band’s music, but fall short of the truth. According to GWAR’s record label – SlavePitInc.com – GWAR is a shortened version of GWAARGGGH, the band’s original name. Turns out, that’s also the best way to tell someone what the band is all about: A noisy, weird spectacle unlike anything you have ever heard or seen.

All the cool kids here at Kickstand are very proud to announce the return of the almighty GWAR to Durty Nellie’s in Palatine on Wednesday, June 2nd. If you haven’t seen them before, now is your chance!

Joining Gwar that night will be the brutal Dirge Within, and Mobile Death Camp (featuring former GWAR member Todd Evans).

Tickets for the June 2nd show at Durty Nellie’s will be $22 in advance, and you can pick them up at Your Ticket Stand.

Here is a clip from last year’s crushing album Lust In Space:

Last week, the annual Chicago festival Lollapalooza announced its much buzzed line-up for 2010. A few weeks before the list was released, there was a “Wheel of Fortune”-style guessing game on the event’s official website, in which a few letters were revealed with daily amongst lots of blank spaces for bands. Now that the line-up is set in stone, as Larry David would say, it’s” prettay, prettay good”. The big surprise for the fest is the newly-reformed Soundgarden as one of the headliners for the weekend. Rounding out the headlining spots are Lady Gaga, Green Day, The Arcade Fire (pictured above), Phoenix and The Strokes.

Other notable bands playing Lolla that have played Kickstand shows throughout the years are MGMT, Matt & Kim, Minus the Bear, Company of Thieves, Miniature Tigers, HEALTH, Foxy Shazam, Royal Bangs and Jukebox the Ghost.

The three-day fest will be held August 6th-8th, 2010 in downtown Chicago at beautiful Grant Park.