Janet Jackson — who you may remember for such accomplishments as wearing the world’s worst shoulder pads, being related to the weirdest weirdo in the weirdo-filled history of popular music and letting Justin Timberlake expose her saggy and ugly pierced breast to the largest television audience assembled on any given…
Drummer Scott Kusmirek — who did two stints with the Gin Blossoms in the midst of the band’s feud with Phillip Rhodes, the drummer they rode to prominence in the early 90s — has a new project.”The Kooze’s” new band is called Vinyl Station and an “indie-rock” trio also featuring…
Amy Joanne Loughner, mother of Tucson shooting suspect Jared Lee Loughner, works for Pima County as a manager at Agua Caliente Park. A lot of people ask that we pray for Amy and her husband, Randy, Jared’s father. That’s about all we can tell you about Amy and her place in…
“What kind of music did he listen to?” It’s a question as old as loonies have gone on shooting sprees. Jared Loughner, the 22-year-old Tucson man who shot 20 people, including a federal judge and U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, was a band geek, as you can see in photos of…
This Kinch video is too cutely funny for words. So I won’t write any more than strictly necessary. Enjoy. (Watch all the way to the end; it gets better and better as it goes.)…
Stephen Drozd of The Flaming Lips is releasing a soundtrack to the documentary The Heart Is a Drum Machine which was produced by local filmmakers Ryan Page and Chris Pomerenke.The film, a documentary which explores why people feel such a connection to music and features cameos by George Clinton, Maynard…
Alice Cooper will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in a few months. If you’re like me, it’s easy to see Al as he is now, an old dude who plays a lot of golf and does a little radio show and reps for JC and…
It’s the fourth day of 2011, which means many of you are probably close to giving up your New Year’s resolution.Need a little inspiration? A few good reasons to buckle down, hit the gym, stick to your principles and/or work harder?Give Bob Seger’s “Like A Rock” a listen. Now, I…
Song: Social Distortion, “California (Hustle and Flow)”Context: Social D’s rescheduled shows at Marquee Theatre are next Thursday and Friday. The band will have a new album, Hard Times and Nursery Rhymes, out the Tuesday after their Tempe show. So far this track has been warmly received — “[Singer Mike] Ness…
Dick Dale is the King of the Surf Guitar. Actually, the Boston kid turned OC beach bum pretty much invented the guitar sound associated with everyone from Brian Wilson to Wavves.So it makes sense that Phoenix’s Musical Instrument Museum is super stoked about his January 29 show, an acoustic/electric affair…
Jimmy Eat WorldFiesta Bowl Block Party in TempeDecember 31, 2010 – January 1, 2011Playing a New Year’s Eve concert is sort of a big responsibility. Sure, it’s easy to impress a merry and well-lubricated crowd, but there’s a larger obligation, too. If you’re playing before the largest crowd assembled in…
Over the last days of 2010 Up On The Sun has counted down the best live shows of 2010. Today we look at the #1 show of the year, Sufjan Stevens at Mesa Arts Center…
Jay Bennett is a “fan” of popular music in the truest and best sense of the word. How else could a 41-year-old copy editor with a house, a wife, and a profound love for Cheap Trick be persuaded to forsake the record collection he’s been lovingly curating for a quarter-century…
Naming Phoenix’s best records is always a tough task. As far as year-end lists go, it’s exponentially more difficult than naming the best albums overall. Why? Well, for a national list, I have no problem just going with what I enjoy. But when it comes to the local list, I…
You know that Person of the Year thing where Time magazine profiles a person who “for better or for worse has done the most to influence the events of the year”? If I were doing something similar for the Phoenix music scene, Zack de la Rocha would get the nod…
Over the last days of 2010 Up On The Sun will be counting down the best live shows of 2010. Today we look at the #3 show of the year, Lady Gaga at US Airways Center…
This week’s issue of New Times has Best of 2010 lists from a slew of contributors to our music section as well as Nothing Not New columnist Jay Bennett and a few other staffers. We compiled 13 writers’ lists of the top 25 albums of the year into our own…
Song: The Love Me Nots, “Move In Tight”Context: The Love Me Nots are back playing shows after singer Nicole Laurenne beat a recent cancer scare. They’ll be at Yucca Tap Room on New Year’s Eve. Oh, and a familiar face — original drummer Jay Lien, who left the band in…
Song: Jon Hardy & the Public, “A Hard Year”Context: I’m sure this song rings all-too-true for a a lot of people on this, the last Monday of 2010. Jon Hardy & the Public – A Hard Year…
Could the new Gorillaz song “Phoner To Arizona” be about an interview I did with Damon Albarn?That sounds like, at best, a ridiculous stretch and, at worst, a fit of narcissistic insanity. I can only imagine what Carly Simon would say… According to the band’s stat sheet, the song –…
Over the last days of the year Up On The Sun will be counting down the best live shows of 2010. Today we look at the No. 5 show of the year, The National at Marquee Theatre…
Something the owners of the soon-to-be-defunct Eastside Records in Tempe said in this week’s feature story has been bothering me all week:”And it got to the point in Tempe… that, yeah, we could stay open, but we would have to sell a bunch of shit we don’t like. None were…
