Troubled Hubble’s debut is something of a revival of the suburban psychedelia practiced by ’90s indie bands such as Pavement, but with a literate new twist. The Chicago-area quartet’s music is, characteristically, a weave of trebly guitars stitched with strings and eclectic snatches of sound. Singer Chris Otepka declaims up…
All our favorite local bands play weekend shows. Unfortunately, the shows aren’t often at the same place. Traipsing from Tempe to Phoenix and back again in an attempt to catch more than one killer live set on a Friday night isn’t fun — at least not every weekend. But luckily,…
It’s safe to call Ferret Music a metal and hardcore label. After all, the owner is the lead singer of NORA; the big band on the label is Every Time I Die; and Killswitch Engage got its start with Ferret. But somehow, Boys Night Out was scooped up by the…
It happened again the other day. I was asked what I do for a living and, when I confessed that I’m a theater critic, I got the same response I’ve been getting for years. “Is there enough theater in Phoenix for you to cover?” That’s the polite version. I’ve also…
It ain’t easy being the Jay-Z and Beyoncé of the nightlife scene here in the PHX. For real, goin’ out every week, gettin’ our drink on, and sliding up on some of the finest squirrels you’ve ever seen may look like a sweet deal, but once in a while, the…
FRI 5/20Way back in the late ’80s when college radio was actually a living, breathing entity, many a dorm room in these United States was filled with the smart-ass humor and sublimely amateurish pop-punk of Philadelphia’s Dead Milkmen. Such heartfelt songs like “Punk Rock Girl,” “Bitchin’ Camaro,” and “The Thing…
WED 5/25Face facts, game junkies, everyone’s gotten tired of your bragging. Whether it’s disgruntled friends — weary from getting “pwned” at Unreal Tournament — or your ex, who left after your declaration that a high kill ratio in Battlefield: 1942 translated into bedroom prowess, it’s “game over” for your personal…
SAT 5/21And now, ladies and gentlemen, we are proud to announce a one-night-only event filled with murder, mayhem, and all that jazz! A soiree celebrating the red-hot moving picture Chicago hits the stage at 9 p.m. Saturday, May 21, at the Pumphouse II, 4132 East McDowell, a secluded night crawl…
TUESDAYSHold on to those collagen-coated dreams, because that little Botox blast you’ve been praying for might just be within your grasp. Palazzo, the downtown hot spot at 710 North Central — and advocate of sexy, hedonistic fun — is paying homage to both the addictive television show and the cosmetic…
Fashion designer Angela Johnson hasn’t made any Day-Glo straitjackets yet. Nevertheless, she’s dubbed her Fall ’05/’06 runway show “Sideshow Freak in the Padded Room.” The co-founder of the LabelHorde fashion network likens her latest threads to creepy carnivals and mental disorders. “The Padded Room theme is because many of the…
It’s a warm Tuesday evening in May, and Aaron Rosen is chilling on the outdoor patio at Three Roots Coffee House in Tempe, demonstrating his digital deftness to anyone who’s interested. While the air is clogged with the sound of Mill Avenue traffic zipping by, the lanky 24-year-old uses his…
Here’s the scenario: You’re Jet Li, the international action star who has finally become a semi-household name in America, thanks to imported DVDs and various cinematic team-ups with rappers and singers. But in Hong Kong, where you’ve done several movies that don’t depend solely on ass-kicking, you are revered as…
It’s a question to which the response should be more than a shrug, but it’s the only thing I can offer anyone who asks, “So, how was it?” The final installment in the mostly irrelevant second Star Wars trilogy is far superior to its immediate two predecessors, The Phantom Menace…
Somewhere, this could all be happening right now,” spoke the narrator in the trailer for the first Star Wars movie (thereafter known as Episode IV: A New Hope), and to those who were small children then, it rang true. For an entire generation, the Star Wars trilogy could never be…
Though they’re known for their laptop beat acrobatics, Canadian duo Junior Boys will actually be putting the needle on the records after their show with fellow Canuck Caribou on the evening of Saturday, May 21. The show with Caribou (recently known as Manitoba) is at Modified Arts, but the DJ…
While you may not hear an obvious Smashing Pumpkins influence when listening to Stiletto Formal, the Phoenix indie-core band says it gets all gooey over Corgan and crew. On its MySpace profile, the band declares that the Smashing Pumpkins are one of their collective favorite bands. Good thing, too. Stiletto…
While band-of-the-moment Franz Ferdinand and the opportunists in its wake are hyped as “dance rock,” Gang of Four, the cool-influence-of-the-moment, barely played rock at all, much less dance music. 1979’s Entertainment!, the debut of the now-reunited British quartet, is a trove of beguilingly tilted political songs, more alien to hoary…
On its seventh record, the Portland trio Sleater-Kinney finds itself in the same predicament as its heroes Sonic Youth and tour mates Pearl Jam: It’s honed its sound so precisely that it has to decide where to go next. With The Woods, the answers are jumping to indie-label heavyweight Sub…
One of the most innovative electronic music acts to emerge from the ’90s, Autechre was one of the leaders of the IDM and glitch movements, styles that employ waves of static, mechanical bleeps and stuttering clicks to fashion cold, spooky soundscapes leavened by snatches of melody. The British duo’s chaotic…
A dozen years ago, preparing to make his solo break from N.W.A, Dr. Dre recruited a 20-year-old onetime drug dealer to rap aside him on The Chronic. That was the cauldron that forged rap’s most colorful character this side of Flava Flav, Snoop Dogg. Perennially enveloped in a milky haze…
The last time Dan Snaith came through town, he was operating under a different moniker: Manitoba. But thanks to the threat of a lawsuit by grumpy ol’ Handsome Dick Manitoba (of the NYC punk band The Dictators), the Canadian-born tunesmith has changed the name of his outfit to Caribou. It’s…
Scott Herren (a.k.a. Prefuse 73) awoke one morning this past February to find that his new album, Surrounded by Silence, had been linked to the Internet a full three months before its scheduled release. While this is an increasingly common phenomenon, it didn’t make the pill any easier to swallow…
