The Queensrÿche intent on pummeling the Marquee is not your father’s Queensrÿche. The 30-year-old band recently underwent a major overhaul, with only founder and principal singer/songwriter Geoff Tate remaining. “After working with the same people for 30 years, it gets very difficult,” Tate said in a September blog post on…
As 2012 draws to a close, we’ll be looking forward to the 2013 and spotlighting 13 Phoenix bands that will be making a mark on the Southwest throughout the new year. Prog rockers The Oxford Coma just so happen to be featured in this week’s issue, in a story written…
The cultural history of China dates back thousands of years with ideas, images and sayings still propagating through modern culture — particularly in the West. Yet, the 1960s Cultural Revolution attempted to erase that past for a future that could be shaped. Following Chairman Mao’s 1975 death, artists reset their…
The Oxford Coma doesn’t sound like any other band you’ve ever heard, and that’s the idea. With thumping, funky-to-furious bass lines mixed with propulsive drumming and searing guitar action, the band blurs the distinctions between modern rock, alt-metal, and punk. The band’s debut album, Adonis, is not something that easily…
Boots, big buckles, tight jeans, and 10-gallon Stetsons is the non-official dress code (but garb of choice for most attendees) for the annual KMLE Acoustic Christmas, benefiting St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. There will be plenty of good tidings and twang in the air as rising country stars Randy Houser,…
The photo on the web site promoting the Mesa Arts Festival makes the event appear more biker rally than art festival. But behind those rows of parked Harleys lurk the colorful canopies covering the sprawling aisles filled with original art and gift items from 38 local, regional and national artists…
It doesn’t have to be scorching hot to find satisfaction in a fine brew. In fact, as the weather cools it becomes the perfect time to search out something new and bold. Which way to turn? Ask the helpful brewmasters at the inaugural Phoenix Invitational Brewers Festival. The invitational suds-a-thon…
Bob Weir is a restless soul. Already fully engaged with Furthur — his latest and perhaps most true-to-form post-Grateful Dead venture — his solo band Ratdog, assorted musical projects at his TRI Studios, activity in various political and environmental organizations, plus the occasional mountain bike foray, Weir now prepares to…
When Garland Jeffreys broke onto the New York music scene in the early 1970s — the same scene that spawned Patti Smith, Lou Reed, and (via New Jersey) Bruce Springsteen — his songs were a little too close to the reality of the times. Music was supposed to be an…
In this week’s issue, we chat with with former Grateful Dead and current Furthur guitarist Bob Weir. We ended up with more material than we could fit, so please enjoy another installment of Outtakes, where we sweep up all sorts of good stuff that ended up on the cutting room…
When Garland Jeffreys broke onto the New York music scene in the early 1970s, the same scene that spawned Patti Smith, Television, The Ramones and (via New Jersey) Bruce Springsteen, his songs were a little too close to the pressing realities of the times. Music was supposed to be an…
World Party @ Crescent Ballroom|12/2/12It was almost with a sigh of relief that Karl Wallinger and World Party began their Crescent Ballroom concert with “Waiting Such A Long Time,” as it has been some years since Wallinger has taken World Party on a large-scale tour. See also: World Party Offers…
Singer, harmonica player, songwriter, and frontman — Rick Estrin wears plenty of hats leading Rick Estrin & The Nightcats down the ever-bumpier blues road. Estrin, who inherited the Nightcats when former band namesake Little Charlie Baty retired in 2008 after 30 years and nine albums, has breathed new life into…
The Christmas holiday is typically a bi-polar event. On one side we experience the joy of sharing and giving gifts. On the other we combat the stress of making it happen — and the post-consumer remorse that accompanies the mounting stack of credit card receipts. But even the pain of…
“Fayuca” is Spanish slang for the contraband markets that spring up in Mexico. These are places where any assortment of illicit goods can be found and purchased, from televisions to leather jackets, prosthetic limbs to staple foods. And it is where that Phoenix’s reggae-punk-Latin rock band gets its name. “We’re…
Karl Wallinger has been conspicuously absent from the music scene the over the past decade — but with good reason. The former Waterboy and World Party founder suffered a debilitating brain aneurysm in 2001 that left him unable to walk and talk, let alone sing or play any of the…
Karl Wallinger has been conspicuously absent from the music scene over the past decade — and with good reason. The former Waterboy and World Party founder suffered a debilitating brain aneurysm in 2001 that left him unable to walk and talk, let alone sing and play any of the many…
When Canadian rock trio Rush’s self-titled debut was released in 1974, liking the band as a teenager was a risky proposition. On one level, there’s nothing about the band’s essential makeup that should render them off limits to the cool kids. Rush was a progressive, hard-rocking band influenced by Cream…
Just about anything can get turned into a play these days. Heck, even pop-punk band Green Day was given the stage treatment. But turning a near-mythical sports legend into a theatrical work takes true talent and cunning. Yet, Lombardi holds up brilliantly to the glare of Friday night lights. Based…
Gliding across a musical spectrum, from the infectiously groove-laden “Itchin’ on a Photograph” to the dance pop of “Tongue Tied,” from the indie quirkiness of “Naked Kids” to the bubblegum pop of “Sunny Day,” Grouplove clearly has a group love of all forms musical on its debut album, Never Trust…
It’s hard to put a finger on exactly what’s pulsing in the world of underground shoegaze pop, but it seems to sound an awful lot like the hazy, languid rock of San Francisco’s Young Prisms. Heavy, droning, swirly, fuzzy, gothic, melancholy, and cathartic, Young Prisms’ music is reflective of an…
It’s not clear whether Reverend Peyton actually is an ordained minister or just likes the moniker, but his Delta-blues-meets-moonshine-fired-hillbilly songs are undeniably sermon-like, with an all-or-nothing fire-and-brimstone delivery. Then again, all that hootin’ and hollerin’ also makes him sound like a man possessed. In any case, it’s the spirit of…
