Music

As Music Editor at Phoenix New Times, I usually run around town every weekend, going to various events and meeting up with any number of people, sometimes falling into misadventure and often falling into disrepair. My weekend often starts on Thursday and doesn’t end until Monday morning, when I have to drag my ass back to the office and affect some image of wakefulness/awareness. I figured I might as well be as self-indulgent as music critics are now alleged to be – at least those who are still walking the plank. Might as well document these times of my life and simultaneously share my experience of the scene and happenings around P-city, before I am too old to stand in front of another amplifier and dying from some debauchery-rooted disease.

The first New Times Summer of Sound show took place Saturday, May 24, at Exit 7 in Glendale. This was the punk show, and it lived up to its name, as locals Harlequin Babies, Asses of Evil, Dephinger, and Glass Heroes warmed up the stage for the legendary Dickies with spasms, spit, and attitude.

Arch Enemy singer Angela Gossow has fired back at a fan that she feels disrespected her and her webmistress.

Here’s a handful of shows that were just announced this week.

George Michael, touring behind his new double CD collection, Twenty-Five, is scheduled to perform at US Airways Center on Sunday, June 22, and Ticketmaster’s offering $25 “select seat” tickets to his concert. The offer starts at noon on Sunday, May 25, and ends at 1 p.m. on Monday, May 26. (Regular ticket prices for Michael’s show range from $46.75 to $121.25)

By Jonathan McNamara Metal bands In Flames, Children of Bodom, Job For a Cowboy and High on Fire were lead by Megadeth to their inevitable, guitar-screeching end as Gigantour 2008 came to a close. See for yourself in our explosive Gigantour slide show…

Phoenix band Crushed will get some radio play this weekend, as local radio station host Jonathan L at 98 KUPD spins the band’s song “Distance Between Us,” from their album My Machine on his “Lopsided World of L” program. Listen for the song this Saturday, May 24, between 9:50 and 10:05 a.m. Crushed will also be performing live on the “Lopsided World of L” on Sunday, May 25, between 6 and 8 p.m. Out-of-staters can listen online at www.98kupd.com.

If U.K. pop/pipe chanteuse Amy Winehouse was an American pop star living in the States, we’d never hear about Britney Spears. Sure, a sheared Spears might attack the paparazzi with an umbrella, but Winehouse still makes her look like a Disney kid by comparison. Winehouse is arrested/cautioned for suspicion of drug possession and assault so often that we’ve completely lost track of her debauched trajectory down into the dregs. At the very least, she could do with a lower-maintenance hairdo than that damn beehive she’s been sporting for two years. It doesn’t seem to hold up well in the drunk tank.

Every Thursday, we’re going to start posting a “Flier of the Week.” Our first flier comes from a band called the Peeholes. Their name alone would make any flier eye-catching, but the graphic makes this flier even more eye-popping…literally.

There is a portion of Police and Elvis Costello devotees who have single-mindedly followed both artists’ careers through three decades, tenaciously collecting each cherished release and carefully housing them in clear vinyl slipcases. There’s also a large contingent of mutual casual fans — the ones who will probably attend the…

With Ozzfest now firmly entrenched as a cultural institution (read: over-bloated corporate circus), Megadeth leader Dave Mustaine must have suspected that he could fill a different niche and compete on his own terms with Gigantour when he launched the package festival in 2005. Now in its fourth year, Gigantour, which…