“Engangled” The candles from Standard Wax don’t just smell good; they look good, too. Samantha Thompson and Andrew King’s creations are meant to be art — a decision certainly influenced by King’s outside work as a contemporary painter and pastel artist. A collection of his recent pieces, “Entangled,” debuts this…
After years of living on the edge, caught up in a world of rock ‘n’ roll hedonism, Strokes guitarist Albert Hammond Jr. eventually managed to break the cycle and get clean. Yet, it wasn’t before the band’s fabled aura of rock greatness was severely tarnish by a pair of lackluster…
Max Frost sounds like your prototypical modern pop star serving up a cool blend of driving dance beats, chunky grinds, silky rhythms, and rich vocals. That we’re even talking about Frost is simply the case of him being in the right place at the right time — or rather, one…
There’s a story circulating about Royal Blood, the hottest export from England since fish and chips. The story claims that drummer Ben Thatcher picked up friend and bassist Mike Kerr at the airport and Kerr immediately said, “Let’s form a band.” Incredibly, the band performed its first gig the next…
“Cactus and Coral” It is a rare moment when one can see the world from someone else’s point of view. Through Each Others Eyes, promotes that concept via cultural exchange, placing photographers in unfamiliar settings to understand how they see things. With the “Cactus and Coral” exhibit, photographers from Australia…
Here are our co The Donkeys – Friday, September 4 – Valley Bar The Donkeys, not to be confused with the late-’70s power pop band from West Yorkshire or the Japanese noise rock outfit, have a solid fan base in Phoenix, prompting these Californians to visit about once a year…
Aerial Silks Class When it comes to extracurricular activity, we figure that if Real Housewives in multiple cities can do it, the general public can, too. Which is just as good an excuse as any to try out Scorpius Dance Theatre’s aerial silks class. The company’s master of aerial arts,…
The blues has always been about regionalism. While feeling, intent, and themes consistently overlap the form, there’s no denying the particular impact of an artist’s surroundings. Forceful Chicago blues will never be mistaken for gritty Texas blues, just as the breezy West Coast blues style stands alone from the rollin’…
When a band loses its last original member, it’s typically the signal for the remaining members to call it quits. In the case of Yes, which began in 1968, the musical legacy outshines the sums of its parts. Yes is a band that was always destined to continue after Phoenix…
“It feels good to get into weird stuff,” Heaters bassist/vocalist Nolan Krebs says of the trio’s deep, spaced-out, fuzzy psychedelia, the kind that comes only from full immersion into the darkest recesses of the form. “It’s hard to say why that is, and I don’t think any of us feel…
Developing the rootsy edge that inhabits Jackie Greene’s latest album — and first in five years — Back to Birth, has been a long time coming. Though Greene was once hailed as the “New Dylan” for his acoustic guitar/harmonica soirées during the coffeehouse period that informed much of his teenage…
Hair 1968’s Hair was a groundbreaking Broadway musical with a killer soundtrack, all about hippies and love and drugs and stopping the war and resisting the Man, man. Seriously. And hair, of course. Those days might be the last time the elements of a musical drenched our culture so thoroughly…
Controversial, ego-driven, demanding, and at times excessive, Billy Corgan has never ceased to do whatever the hell he wants. Recently, the Smashing Pumpkins frontman publicly lamented the fact that his career-long fans still “live in the past” because they want to hear music from Gish, the band’s 1991 debut album…
There’s no mistaking the popping horns, staccato guitar licks and gritty lyrics pushing the infectious dance groove that’s the English Beat Now, some 30-plus years after the band’s last proper release (there have been at least a half-dozen hits albums), Here We Go Love is being readied. “I can’t believe…
“I’m starting to get really nervous about the show,” Wilco bassist John Stirratt says from Maine when asked if the band’s booking agent was fired for scheduling an outdoor concert in July in the desert. “We’ve played in some pretty harsh environments, but I’ve had more people ask me about…
The John Butler Trio is all about making good music. Sure, every band says that, but Butler takes a more spiritual approach to his songwriting. His intention is to let the listener not only into his world, but perhaps become him. “It’s with intention, a sense of purpose, and a…
“Super Heroes” Move over Avengers — the real “Super Heroes” are here. The newest Heard Museum art exhibition offers a Native American view point on what makes a super hero. These views, mostly drawings and works on paper, include animals, humans and magical beings who fight “evil” in everyday life,…
Like the characters in many of their songs, HoneyHoney lead singer/banjo player/violinist Suzanne Santo and vocalist/guitarist Ben Jaffe also experienced a profound period of searching and minor desperation in the quest to finish their forthcoming album, 3. It isn’t uncommon for musicians to take years between album releases, but rarely…
Unmotherly Insights (Into Modern Mothering) Debra Rich Gettleman is a writer, an artist, an actress and, as so many of us must be these days, many other things. But what she is every minute of every day is a mom, and she shares the highs and lows of that honorable…
Astronomy in the Garden Humankind has often looked to the skies for answers, but when was the last time you, personally, got a good look at the stars? This weekend you can become re-acquainted with the Sonoran sky at the Desert Botanical Garden, 1201 North Galvin Parkway. An instructor from…
Ernie Halter is an alien. He’s an alien because he played one Star Trek: Voyager (he was beamed away), and he’s an alien because his time in cyberspace has defined, in large part, the direction of his musical career. Through dedicated, hard work, Halter’s music is now beamed (okay, streamed)…
Prior to the white man’s arrival in Sonoran Desert, indigenous groups used native plants for strictly utilitarian purposes such as housing, ladders, and security. Today, the woodturning of Arizona’s indigenous plants spawns new thoughts about potential uses. Working with everything from mesquite to saguaro ribs, the brothers Moulthrop — Philip…
