What Wavves’ Nathan Williams vividly renders on cassette and aluminum isn’t the Beach Boys’ carefree beachscape, with its bathing beauties, surfboard-wielding Adonises, and pinks-on-the-line drag races. Last year’s Wavves (Fuck It Tapes) and new disc, Wavvves (Fat Possum), paint a decidedly grimmer, less idyllic picture: goth zombies everywhere, early 20-something…
“Punk rock, comedy, and politics” can be a great combination — look at NOFX. But when a local band declares in its self-penned biography that it’s playing with these elements, I get a little nervous. The new album by Tempe punk rockers VW Trainwreck, Dramaturgy, is exactly why. With a…
THURSDAY 12 Bunkhouse: DJ Doom (dance) Cherry Lounge: Scandalous Thursday with DJ Juan Rocha (house, electronica) Club Red: The Blunt Club with Tricky T, Pickster Uno, DJ Element, more (hip-hop) Copper State Tavern: DJ Kavi, & guests (hip-hop) Cream Stereo Lounge: Blush Thursdays (Top 40, hip-hop, mash-ups) Homme: So Paid!!!…
PHOENIX Kinch: The piano has gotten a bad rap lately, thanks mostly to schmaltzy lite-pop bands like Keane and those dueling piano bars that seem to be springing up everywhere. Fortunately, Kinch has come along to give the piano its balls back. The band’s debut, Advances, veered from rollicking, up-tempo…
Though the term “guitar hero” means less in mainstream music than it did, say, 25 years ago, that doesn’t mean the world doesn’t have or need them anymore. Clapton and (Jeff) Beck are still active, but who’s going to carry on when they join Stevie Ray Vaughan and Rory Gallagher…
Valley indie rockers Emperors of Japan have already contributed two excellent albums to the local music canon in the form of 2006’s Your Freak Majesty and last year’s Activator. Based on the lineup for this weekend’s Shizzfest, you may as well add “ace concert promoters” to their list of accomplishments…
Trying to pull off a cello in today’s indie/alternative rock scene is tricky. On one hand, a cello can set a band apart from a mass of whiny, boring acts, and having an accomplished cellist adds a touch of class that bearded, flannel-loving four-piece bands from the Pacific Northwest will…
On St. Patrick’s Day everyone is Irish, and everyone’s liver gets a workout. Music is, of course, a big part of the fun. Who doesn’t love day drinking while listening to the likes of Dropkick Murphys and Flogging Molly, bands whose style of music is the perfect complement to pitchers…
It seems as though the summer arrives earlier and earlier each year, as that unforgiving beeyotch Mother Nature delights at ratcheting up the Valley’s thermostat way before we’re ready to start enduring the sweltering, 100-degree-plus temperatures. So it’s good to know that Joel Davis (a.k.a. DJ Epidemic) is already preparing…
We don’t typically write up concert announcement blogs for shows in tiny, all-ages venues but this one deserves it. Because, well, YOU HAVE TO SEE WILLIAM ELLIOT WHITMORE! The bluesman who lives on a horse farm in Lee County, Iowa mesmerized me at Virginia’s MACRoCk a few years back.Whitmore, who…
At long last, it has come to this–after weeks of watching tone-deaf wonders humiliate themselves during the first round of auditions, some slightly less tone-deaf wonders forget the lyrics to their songs during Hollywood Week, Casey Carlson give a bad name to bubble tea makers everywhere and Pacittigate–we finally get…
By No Age standards, last night’s 45-minute show at Modified Arts was an epic. After all, the the Los Angeles-based noise-pop band’s last album, the critically-beloved Nouns, clocks in at only 28:17. Though it normally feels a little short for a headliner, even at a small club, 45 minutes was…
Now that Coachella, Sasquatch, and Bonnaroo have all confirmed their acts for their respective music festivals, we are left to ponder only about the lineup of August’s Lollapalooza Festival at Chicago’s Grant Park. The Chicago Tribune’s music blog recently leaked who is expected to headline this year’s 3-day affair. It…
Conner CecilConner(Old Dominion Records)There was a time when hearing a boyish and manicured voice like Conner Cecil’s alongside a willowy pedal steel wasn’t uncommon in country music. That time is long gone, though, and hearing Conner — a Globe native whose voice matches his cherubic face — on his debut…
Coming from a long line of neurotic Jews and, on occasion, being one myself, I give mad props to anyone who can figure out a way to make a living out of doing what comes naturally to people who grow up with the guilt of the world on their shoulders…
It’s been a few years since we snapped shots of the jolly drunkards at Casey Moore’s. We all know what Casey Moore’s is like on a Friday or Saturday. And, with our drinking habits, we happen to know what it’s like there every other day of the week. Sunday night…
Did BANNED in Tempe get, er…banned in Tempe? Not quite. DJ Johnny Volume has decided to relocate his long-running weekly punk rock night on Wednesdays from its original home at Stray Cat Bar & Grill in Tempe to Jugheads in Phoenix starting with next week edition on March 19. DJ Mark…
-moody Trent Reznor. Nine Inch Nails will supposedly be making their final appearance in the Valley for the foreseeable future on Friday, May 15, at Cricket Wireless Pavillion. I say “supposedly” because of the following: A). The date hasn’t been confirmed by the venue or its management (but has been…
In news that should come as hardly shocking, Amy Winehouse has officially been dropped from her Saturday slot of this year’s Coachella Valley Arts & Music Festival lineup. Of course, the first thing that comes to mind when she ditches out on a concert is “what drug is it this…
The Format’s breakup left a huge hole in the local music scene last year. Just when the duo seemed poised to put Phoenix on the map when they split up, but hopefully Nate Ruess’s New York-based band Fun can alleviate some of that pain. They’ve booked a Valley show with…
All week we’ve been sharing personal essays about Jimmy Eat World’s Clarity, online and in print. Sadly, I don’t have a Clarity story because I wasn’t in to the Mesa emo/pop act until my college paper got an advance copy of Bleed American, the follow-up to Clarity, in July 2001…
“Clarity is an album that I have repeatedly gone back to over the years. It is still fresh and that shows as so many of today’s bands are heavily influenced and inspired by this album. Because of that, it’s finally getting it’s due credit! 16-year-old kids will continue to re-discover…
