Common conceptions of jazz music typically evoke images of time-tested, weary performers in small, dimly-lit bars of the 1950s and '60s. Read more...

When Tim Westergren created Pandora.com, he was thinking about musicians. Read more...

Stephen Tabaquin checks in with his friends at Berkeley, CSU Long Beach, Cal Poly Pomona and UC Irvine daily without racking up any mileage. Bradley Ostrander knows everyone's birthday without ever having to ask, while Naveed Mahboobian can drop his friends a line without ever licking a stamp. Read more...

Looking at Meghan Pleticha in her red and black flowing dress, you wouldn't guess that she used to sport cuffed low-riding stretch jeans, little boys' shirts, and Chucks when she first came to campus four years ago. Read more...

It happens to everyone. You're watching your evening melodrama of choice when a song of unknown origin comes on in the background. It sounds indie, so you have no idea who sings this song and you have absolutely no hope of getting it out of your head until you find out how you can possibly hear it again. Read more...

It was only four years ago that the first, sustained chord of Franz Ferdinand's "Take Me Out" was struck on the UCLA campus. Four years since those first couple of lines ("So if you're lonely / you know I'm here, waiting for you") hinted at how truly ripe for the plucking radio stations would consider the group to be. Four years since UCLA students had their first taste of the indie rock sensation that, in a matter of months, would take the world by storm. Read more...

"Room 16 Goes to Outer Space" may not have been a New York Times bestseller, but Jessica Chessani, who co-wrote the story in first grade, thought it had potential. Read more...