Thursday 9 Bikini Lounge: Sophisticated Boom Boom with DJ HFE (rockabilly, surf, jazz, classic country, indie, obscuro, R&B) Club Mardi Gras: DJ Dana (outlaw country) Club Vibe: DJ D’Anthony (hip-hop) Coconut Club: DJ Coolstylz (Top 40, hip-hop) Crown Room: Naughty Thursdays with DJ Gable, & Kevin Dow (mash-ups, dance, rock)…
Forget the mainstream-underground battle. In hip-hop, success at either end of the spectrum often depends on stereotype and formula. Either rappers get all blingy, or they waste all their time dissing the bling. Sage Francis is the exception. Operating outside the mainstream, Francis makes a different kind of poetry —…
Last weekend, we decided to bite the bullet and inconvenience ourselves with light-rail construction to visit one of our favorite central Phoenix standbys, the George & Dragon. (Click here for more photos.) With a decent crowd filling the pub, it was obvious that we weren’t the only ones ready to…
In 1977, the Village People burst onto the disco scene, and by 1978, thanks to the success of their single “YMCA,” the homoerotic disco singers had become infamous for their costumes and “American man” personas: police officer, American Indian chief, construction worker, biker, cowboy, and military man. What you might…
When the members of Psycho Gypsy first applied makeup to their young faces in early 1992, it was at a time when their musical heroes had thoroughly scrubbed the stuff out of their pores, seemingly for good. Psycho Gypsy co-founder and bassist/guitarist Tim Cheney says, “Before we put together our…
It’s not uncommon to jam some wax or silicone noise-stoppers into your ear holes while at the club, especially when hearing the Tempe-based, normally short-form punk trio of percussionist John Ryan Nelson, guitarist/effects-pedal fiddler James Fella, and saxophonist/vocalist/sometimes knob-twiddler Ashley Hohm, collectively known as Soft Shoulder. But when listening to…
It’s no small source of stupid pride for me that there are a million cool anagrams for my name, everything from Mr. Iodine Scene to I Sneer Demonic to No Dicier Semen. Any one of these would make a natty album title. But apparently, it’s equally no small source of…
Hard to believe, but in the 10-plus years that The Cremains have made rawkin’ their business, they’ve never been represented by a full-length recording. Besides the two EPs that started them off, there was the Sacred Stage album they did with Navajo singer James Bilagody. On that album, The Cremains…
The 2006 album Exodus Into Unheard Rhythms found Oh No sampling only from Galt MacDermot’s musical theater scores. In doing so, he discredited the theory that says pulling loops from one well yields rigid results — Exodus stings in champion pairings and expert compositions. Less than a year later, a…
One-man acts are a lot like power chords: Just when you think they’re getting a little old, you realize that you’ve still got a long way to go before you get sick of them. Tucson’s Bob Log III is certainly not above resorting to gimmick. After all, the man dons…
It’s unusual for an opening band to have better stage presence, greater energy, and a more dedicated fan base than the headlining act that follows it. But as rare as that is, nobody in the audience seemed surprised when Norwegian EBM/power-noise hybrid band Combichrist eclipsed industrial icons KMFDM at the…
Rachel Nagy is a strong, sexy frontwoman. Her vocals canter, strut, and shimmy with the knowing look of the much-adored — half coquettish tease, half jaded indifference. She coos to the rocked-up Latin swing of “My Delight,” swings her hips with rockabilly swagger on “If You Don’t Think,” and dives…
There’s much musical lore about the Lone Star State, but what is it about San Antonio, Texas? There are many songs about Houston and Dallas, but relatively few regarding San Antonio, considering the town’s alumni include Sir Doug Sahm, the Butthole Surfers, and Carol Burnett. (Is it the water?) Add…
Here’s the thing: Hair rock is a lot cooler now that it’s become ironic. Every year, band after band that used to be something somebody once cared about sometime in the ’70s reunites and hits the road together to milk whatever celebrity they have left for a few more dollars…
Wanna play doctor? The ghoulie girls and beastly boys of Club Hell definitely do, which is why they’re gonna transform the Ruby Room, 717 South Central, into a fetishistic freakfest of naughty nurses and devious doctors for Medical Fun 2.0 on Saturday, August 11. The ER goes BDSM as Club…
Three sources have now confirmed the latest Van Halen hype: the band is reuniting with original singer David Lee Roth and embarking on a 50-date tour this October. (The sources are Web sites Melodicrock.com, BillBoard.com, and MSN.com).
The Meat Puppets: Rise To Your Knees
Anodyne Records, 2007
Since it was my brilliant idea and all to name our bouncing baby blog after a Meat Puppets album (not the best one, but we damn well couldn’t call it “II” now could we?) and considering my marked tendencies to fawn and drool whenever said Puppets pop up in conversation, it was only natural that I was ready and raring to kiss their asses up and down for this one. Well, you can imagine my consternation when I listened to it several times over and found it dull as snot. Flat vocals, plodding paces, boring drumming, with some nice guitar solos but not enough to pull the whole thing outta the muck. Almost seventy minutes long and a chore to listen to, see.
However…
WOW! RUSH WAS, LIKE, SO AWESOME! GEDDY LEE WAS PROBABLY THE BEST BASS PLAYER EVER! AND NEIL PEART WAS AMAZING! IT WAS SO COOL! AND THEN THEY PLAYED ‘TOM SAWYER’ AND IT WAS AWESOME! BEST SHOW EVER! THEY HAD PYROTECHNICS AND LASERS AND EVEN A REALLY HOT GIRL WHO CAME OUT AND BASTED THEIR CHICKENS AND…
Oof, sorry about that. Sometimes my little brother gets a hold of my computer thinking it’s one of them super-fun Speak ’n’ Spells and he just makes such a mess. G’wan, git! Ye rascally scamp.
Anywho. As someone who generally thinks still-existing classic rock bands are by and large old, fat, greedy, boring corporate thunder lizards who deserve to be swept off the face of the planet to make room for fresher bands, I’m basically required to hate Rush. But then again I know the best way to destroy any pretenses of trying to be hip is to say they were great. And that’s the flat truth that I’m dealing with on this grey morn: I basically liked ‘em. In spite of the corporate rock trappings, in spite of the hype around their musicianship, in spite of the cheese…they rocked hard ‘n’ heavy.
Welcome to Up on the Sun, the new and improved New Times music blog. I am your new blog captain and man-on-the-scene, Matt Neff. As the new reporter on the, uhh, thriving Phoenix music scene, it’s my duty to inform you of what I plan to write about.
Thursday 2 Bikini Lounge: Sophisticated Boom Boom with DJ HFE (rockabilly, surf, jazz, classic country, indie, obscuro, R&B) Bobby Cs: Willy B. (old-school R&B) Burn: Club She with DJ Domenica (hip-hop, indie, electro) Charlies: DJ Bryan (country, Top 40, hip-hop, dance) Cherry Lounge: DJ Tranzl8tr (rock, ’80s, old school, hip-hop)…
There’s nothing quite like dive-bar karaoke at 7 on a Thursday night. Especially in a No. 1 dive like Kay’s Lounge. When my guest pig, Zep, and I open the door to this place, it is immediately palpable that the new NO SMOKING legislation is a huge mistake for the…
I know there are people out there who spend their time considering what’s punk rock and what isn’t. I’m not one of them. But something happened not long ago that’s made me think a lot about what’s punk. And I can tell you that the most punk rock thing I’ve…
