As the Laker Girls twirled to a thumping dance remix of AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” indie rocker Stephen Malkmus leaned back in his seat at Staples Center and explained a counterintuitive idea: Not enough classic-rock legends have died over the last few years. “More of them need to go,” said Malkmus,...

When 18-year-old Nathaniel Rateliff moved with a missionary group from his rural hometown of Hermann, Mo., to Denver, the journey was more difficult than he anticipated. "We actually were caught in a pretty gnarly blizzard. Interstate 70 closed behind us as we were going west. And there was just...