The most obvious difference in Hanni El Khatib’s music these days is a sense of control. The former skate punk — “playing the world’s worst guitar” (but “Guitar Hero is helping out),” he jokes — still dabbles in garage, psychedelia, punk, and blues, only now his songs are tighter, more realized…
For someone not even old enough to drink, Sareena Dominguez sure has accomplished a lot: After signing to the River Jones Music label less than a year and half ago, she’s played South by Southwest, released an album (her debut, Moonbeams), and starred in a music video of the same…
It’s no coincidence local rockers Mergence have been likened to California’s Cold War Kids. Not only is the Phoenix band a quartet, but it also has a knack for crafting bluesy, soul-inspired opuses — kinda like those other guys. So it seems only natural that they would get the nod…
There comes a time in every music snob’s life when they realize pre-judging a band based on the city where it resides and what musical genre it fits into is just as stupid as it sounds. In the case of L.A.-based duo In the Valley Below, a new musical project…
The story of Orpheus and Eurydice, a myth originally told by the ancient Greeks but best-preserved in Western culture through the Roman poet Ovid, generally is interpreted as a cautionary tale about the perils of living in the past. Orpheus, a famous Greek bard, loses his wife to a snake…
Don’t mean to sound like an etymology spazz, but there’s a huge difference between dorks, dweebs, and doofuses. God help you if you’re a doofus: hapless, ham-fisted, hopeless. Calling someone a dweeb at least connotes a smidge of intelligence, albeit a kind that is nerdily articulated or used pathetically for…
How do you figure a song called “I Am the Antichrist to You” should turn out? Awfully metal, right? Well, in the hands of Kaoru Ishibashi (who records and tours as Kishi Bashi), the track materializes as a fleet-footed, cloud-soft slice of folky chamber-pop — practically the mathematical opposite of…
It’s not often one hears a musician proclaim he wants to start a “vocal-driven pop band,” but such was the case with Mother Mother guitarist/frontman Ryan Guldemond. But why aim for such commonplace pop fare? Because this is the kind of music the generally unaware music populace loves — it…
For all the snarky comments Vampire Weekend gets about biting Paul Simon’s style, maybe it’d be worth looking back even further? Sure, Simon was the one who released the landmark Graceland in 1986, incorporating African polyrhythmic sounds and vocals. But, uh, pre-existing actual African musicians who already made those kinds…
If you’ve never witnessed the turntable swagger of DJ Logan “Element” Howard at any point during his 16-year career, you’ve missed out on something special, fool. The YouTube videos of the local legend scratching away on hip-hop vinyl like a rabid cat don’t do it justice as seeing him in…
If there’s one thing that The Sail Inn is famous for — besides its granola-friendly jam-band sessions and ultra-irie reggae fest on Sundays — its enormous musical repasts featuring local bands and DJs. The venerated Tempe venue is built for the task, given its amphitheatre in the back and a…
Music has been recognized as one of the higher art forms for centuries. In modern pop music, its most recognizable tool has been the guitar. I find the guitar fascinating. I could spend hours poring over photos of guitars and learning about the intricate construction process behind how to make…
Bassist Victor Wooten has always been musical innovator, challenging the limitations of the electric bass and, in the process, developing new sounds and ways to play the instrument. His songwriting follows the same pattern. Whether composing as a founding member of the genre-bending bluegrass/psycho-space outfit Bela Fleck and the Flecktones,…
Listen, I’m a sore loser and a sore winner. I used to cry after losing my elementary school chess matches, which thankfully directed me away from competitive pawn-pushing and into the soothing subjectivity of the arts. However, I also love to gloat when proved right: I put my chips down…
By David Thorpe While perusing Insane Clown Posse’s Twitter timeline, like a person does, I came across something interesting: Our favorite rap clowns announced a new update to their official smartphone app, which I didn’t even know existed. For the advancement of pop journalism and human knowledge in general, I…
For the pasty-faced, pleather-clad members of the Valley’s goth and industrial scene, 2013 already has been a year of tumult and turmoil. First, longtime venue Sanctum, which hosted freaky-deaky fetishistic adventures during numerous nights like TekNOIR and Black Mass for years, decided to kill off its dance events in late…
Since 2001, Claudio Sanchez — the huge-haired and highly conceptual frontman of prog-tinged emo outfit Coheed and Cambria — has devoted every moment to building an immersive science fiction storyline known as The Amory Wars. Thus far, the interplanetary narrative has spanned seven albums and a parallel series of comic…
Somewhere between Dwight Yoakam’s honky-tonking cover of Cheap Trick’s “I Want You to Want Me” and Terry Manning’s power-pop take on “Guess Things Happen That Way,” the Jack Clement-penned single made famous by Johnny Cash, lies Reckless Kelly’s “She Likes Money, He Likes Love.” The standout track from the Austin-via-Bend,…
Anberlin has never been the band to drop copious amounts of J-bombs in its songs, but the band’s music often has served as a musical metaphor for how people maintain their faith during troubled times. Anberlin’s latest, Vital, combines aggressive modern rock and New Wave beats with stories of people…
Victor Wooten loves his bass so much that he may as well have it welded to his body. Though that might prove awkward when getting on the bus or in an elevator, it virtually is the reality of his situation. For Wooten, who can rightly be considered one of today’s…
For the pasty-faced, pleather-clad members of the Valley’s goth and industrial scene, 2013 already has been a year of tumult and turmoil. First, longtime venue Sanctum, which hosted freaky-deaky fetishistic adventures during numerous nights like TekNOIR and Black Mass for years, decided to kill off its dance events in late…
Post-hardcore rockers The Used have been put through the wringer more than a couple times during the 12 years they’ve spent together as a band. It’s hard to imagine that even before the time spent addicted to drugs, label shifts, and the on-stage injuries, the members had already experienced homelessness,…
