As you walk down Tempe’s Mill Avenue, somewhere past the Gap and Hooters but before you get to Abercrombie & Fitch, you’ll pass Long Wong’s, a funky bar plopped on the corner of Seventh Street. Within the shiny surroundings, it seems an architectural and cultural anachronism. It remains one of…
The Supersuckers look like satanic cowboys and sound like punks-gone-metal. Onstage, front man Eddie Spaghetti, guitarists Dan “Thunder” Bolton and Rontrose Heathman and drummer Dancing Eagle strike rock-god stances in black clothes and matching shades while ripping through gonzo anthems like “How to Maximize Your Kill Count,” “She’s My Bitch”…
It’s been hard not to feel a little bit sorry for Gloritone. It’s not that the local trio isn’t a good band; it is. It’s just that the group had the misfortune to come along a couple of years ago, as the golden age of Tempe music had ground to…
There’s a fantasy that probably every rock fan and critic has shared at one point or another. It involves the notion that somewhere, likely in a bedroom or basement in some small town, a group of unknowns is working in the shadows to create music as powerful and important as…
Rock is not dead. Just ask anyone who was onstage at Sunday’s Arizona Music Forum’s all-day festival. Performers made frequent references to just how much “local music rocks” or “how great all the bands are here today.” Unfortunately, those making the observations must have been at an altogether different event…
You wouldn’t know Judy Pollard is Bob Pollard’s sister just by talking to her. At least you won’t find any of the telltale signs that would brand her as kin to one of indie-rock’s most-recognizable and talked-about figures. You won’t catch Judy discussing the merits of Wire’s 154 or contemplating…
Kimber Lanning is a petite, fair-haired lady. Plopped down in a beanbag chair in a corner of her Tempe Stinkweeds record store and surrounded by records, tee shirts and magazines, Lanning’s youthful face and diminutive figure suggest an earnest indie-rock kid rather than the self-made businesswoman she is. Lanning has…
Saturday, July 17, 1999: A sold-out crowd of 70,000-plus crammed inside Pasadena’s Rose Bowl to watch one of the final performances of Sarah McLachlan’s three-year-old fem-festival, the Lilith Fair. At 6:30 p.m., a plane buzzed over the stadium. Trailing the aircraft was a banner bearing a message intended to be…
“Detroit is a virtual ghost town except for the music scene.” So says John Krautner of Motor City rock band The Go. The 22-year-old guitarist speaks with authority, having lived in and around the city his whole life. He’s watched as depressed economic conditions and urban flight have turned the…
As front man for the Gin Blossoms, Arizona’s most famous rock band, Robin Wilson fulfilled all his adolescent fantasies. For years, he played to sold-out clubs and arenas, earning a wall full of gold and platinum records. He wrote or co-wrote four hit singles and was nominated for a Grammy…
Within the Valley music scene, few artists or songwriters enjoy the kind of universal admiration of Dead Hot Workshop’s Brent Babb. So it comes as no surprise that the city’s musical cognoscenti are abuzz at the prospect of seeing the band perform for the first time in several months –…
The Peeps are discordantly glamorous. Guitarist Paula Monarch is all tattoos and red hair. Bassist Chela Mischke is tall and dark — with dark makeup and a helmet of even darker hair. Liz Adams is shy and soft-spoken until she gets behind her drum kit and becomes a reckless blur…
Roger Clyne is in a reflective mood. The Peacemakers’ front man has had plenty to think about over the last year. He got married, became a father for the third time, lost his record deal and saw his band break up under acrimonious circumstances. He went on to form a…
“Yeah, Kraftwerk and the Backstreet Boys,” chuckles Markus Schulz. The Phoenix DJ is laughing at the juxtaposition of the two, shall we say, diverse artists. For Schulz both have played important, though vastly different, roles in his development as an internationally respected DJ and music-industry player. The former — the…
It’s easy to be taken aback by the depth of Calexico’s The Black Light. In under 60 minutes, the group’s auteurs (and erstwhile Giant Sand rhythm section) John Convertino and Joey Burns explore more than a dozen musical idioms and bring those elements to life with the cinematic grandeur of…
The Go Whatcha Doin’ (Sub-Pop) For rock ‘n’ roll fans, these are troubled times. Contrary to popular belief, it has nothing to do with the emergence of the Backstreet Boys, Ricky Martin, Limp Bizkit or any of the other cretins currently occupying the upper echelon of Billboard’s Top 200. Manufactured…
When Outside Looking In: The Best of the Gin Blossoms hits stores on October 19, the first question on the lips of most people will be, “Why?” Why would a band that broke up less than three years ago and with only two albums (and one EP) to its credit…
You’ll have to excuse Bob Corritore if his head has been in the clouds lately. It’s understandable given the fact that the release of his All Star Blues Sessions album (HMG/Hightone Records) is the culmination of a lifelong dream for the 42-year-old promoter, radio personality and performer. At lunch with…
If Dave Alvin hadn’t written or sung another note after 1986, his place in rock ‘n’ roll history would still be secure. As a founding member of Los Angeles’ seminal roots-rock revivalists the Blasters, and a guitarist for L.A. proto-punks X (and their acoustic offshoot the Knitters), Alvin has been…
In theory, but all too rarely in practice, music can — as former rock scribe Jon Landau once wrote — “answer every impulse, consume all emotion, cleanse and purify — all the things that we have no right to expect from even the greatest works of art but which we…
By the time the punk-rock revolution finally arrived in the Valley around 1978, the music quickly began to become filtered through the overheated minds of its desert practitioners. Groups like the Consumers, the Nervous and the Chemists offered up a uniquely Arizonan take on the anarchic sounds coming from New…
“That was fucking insane.” When all was said and done at last Wednesday’s Buck Owens birthday salute, that succinct verdict from Flathead bassist Kevin Daly was probably the assessment that best captured the tenor of the evening. Standing in a corner and looking resplendent in a Nudie-style suit and silver…
