Later tonight, the Trunk Space will wrap up both its 10-year celebration and its ambitious performance project, the Indie 500. As we’ve previously reported, the multi-day concert festival — which dozens of bands playing the space over the last week and change — sought to have a total of 500…
Fresh country acts are typically more concerned with gaining staying power, Twitter followers or radio spins above all else. For Thompson Square, the Nashville-based husband and wife duo composed of Shawna and Keifer Thompson, their first intention was something a hell of a lot more admirable: They immediately set out…
Sleigh Bells is long overdue for a Phoenix show. It’s been more than three years since the noise pop duo rocked a sold-out show at the now-defunct Clubhouse with a wall of Marshall amps and lots of screaming. Since then, frontwoman Alexis Krauss says the band has developed significantly thanks…
Summers in Northern Arizona are some kind of magical. I spent my childhood helping my dad load our battered red farm truck up with alfalfa bails, unloading them under building monsoon clouds, racing from the barn to the house as the rain fell, hay hooks in hand. As idyllic a…
There’s a new music editor running Up on the Sun. My name is David Accomazzo. Nice to meet you, Phoenix. I’ve spent my life in the mountains of Colorado, and nine days ago, I sold most of my worldly possessions, packed the rest in a U-Haul, and started the 13-hour…
There are many reasons people keep coming back to the Trunk Space, and it’s not necessarily because of the music (although that is the biggest reason). There’s the whole sense of community that’s developed around the DIY gallery and venue, which has become a wayward home and all-inclusive haven for…
It’s a good time to be a music fan in Phoenix, particularly those who dig both indie and country. Thanks to our fair city’s plum position along Interstate 10, numerous bands bound for Indio, California over the next couple of weeks are swinging through the Valley on their way to…
In an era of canned, saccharine pop country that’s characterized by love songs and songs of love lost, there are few musicians that can make a statement quite as well as Miranda Lambert does. The Texas native has morphed from reality show contestant into superstar over the last decade, releasing…
I don’t even know you, and I want to argue with you. About music. That’s right. It’s been almost two years since the record store I used to own, Hoodlums Music, closed — and that’s the main thing I miss about it. Arguing about music. Seriously, Geek? You owned your…
You may know Cassadee Pope in one of three incarnations: There’s the former frontwoman of Warped Tour pop-punk outfit Hey Monday, the winner of NBC sing-off show “The Voice,” or the country act with a gigantic range and a penchant for breaking records only previously set by one Ms. Taylor…
PHX AM After Party feat. DEATH The Pressroom 4/5/14 The PHX AM After Party, sponsored by local board shop Cowtown Skateboards, is always an interesting happening. Over the years, the company has put together some of the more eclectic shows to hit the Valley in celebration of one of the…
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts Cyclefest at WestWorld 4/4/14 Iconic rocker Joan Jett played a solid set of old favorites and new tracks as she and the Blackhearts got the party started Friday night during Cyclefest at WestWorld in Scottsdale…
If you’ve been into the EDM thing for more than a few minutes, you’ve heard about the Mad Decent Block Party the last couple years. Heard about the great performances by the label’s regulars like Riff Raff, Diplo, and Major Lazer. Heard the tales of wild crowds and even wilder…
If you pass by the front door of Palazzo tonight during First Friday, don’t be surprised if you hear the haunting sounds of darkwave and witch house wafting out its front door. That’s because the gothic nightclub has returned from the dead and is once again welcoming freaks, geeks, and…
A very special guest will make surprise appearance at the Trunk Space during one of this weekend’s editions of its ongoing Indie 500 concert series, and it’s someone that fans the Grand Avenue venue are intimately familiar with. Namely, Andrew Jackson Jihad…
Curious about what’s going on around town this weekend? Need some suggestions as to how to rock, dance, or krump in the Valley of the Sun? Don’t fret. We’ve got the hook up on what shows you might be interested in attending over the next couple nights and days. This…
The Phoenix Suns need all the help they can get right now. The surprise team of the 2013-2014 season is currently in ninth place in the NBA Western Conference playoff race, and with only seven games left in their season, the team needs something — anything — to help propel…
Philadelphia’s The War on Drugs began as the home-studio project of Adam Granduciel – an unrepentant tinkerer and gearhead whose deeply layered songs put a new spin on classic rock. After the breakthrough success of the expertly crafted Slave Ambient, Granduciel’s project became more of a live band, a move…
Now more than ever, there are a lot of metal — from comedy to thrash to black to grindcore — getting slung in and around Metro Phoenix thanks to concerts and gigs by locals and touring acts alike. As such, Up on the Sun’s resident metal scribe, Lauren Wise, is…
If you hadn’t heard of Death before 2012, don’t feel bad. Until recently (read: within the last couple years), few rock ‘n’ roll fans were familiar with the Detroit garage rockers/proto-punks, who were, at best, a minor footnote in rock history. Then, a little documentary by filmmakers Mark Christopher Covino…
Stephanie Carrico knows what it’s like to be an underdog, an outsider, the one who was picked on in her youth. The 38-year-old Trunk Space co-owner remembers not having a place as a teenager where like-minded misfits could hang, could exert their nascent creativity in an atmosphere where conventional notions…
The world never cared about Death. Until now. In the early 1970s, before even the long-revered “godfathers and godmothers of punk” were trailblazing the genre, the Detroit trio was doing it first (and quite well, for that matter). But nobody outside of sibling band members David, Dannis, and Bobby Hackney,…
