Hanging out at Bar Smith on a Friday isn’t just another night out on the town. It’s pure adventure, especially when trying to navigate the crowd on either floor during the phenomenally popular Sticky Fingers weekly.It’s doubly difficult if you’ve had a few, as some of the drinkologists at Bar…
In 2010, our New Times operations manager and Up on the Sun contributor Jay Bennett wrote a column about listening to only new music called Nothing Not New. For a whole year. Some time has passed, but not the lesson that column taught me. There’s nothing wrong with favorites, but…
We’re pretty excited about Hooves’ homecoming gig in March, and listening to “Animal Mother,” our exclusive sneak peek at the band’s upcoming Fetch, Little Doggie LP, justifies the commotion. A live staple at the band’s shows for some time, the recorded version offers a certain clarity that isn’t always present…
Heads up to all the dry cleaners in town — psych-pop choral band The Polyphonic Spree is coming to town, and they’ll be bringing loads and loads of “the whites” with them. Good luck fitting the whole crew on the stage of the Crescent Ballroom. Seeing how they cram everyone…
We let you know about the first five bands on the Punk Rock Bowling lineup, and we’re pleased to announce a bunch more. There’s Sham 69 with its 1977 Jimmy Pursey/Dave Parsons/Dave Tregunna lineup. Hot Water Music returns — just not Chuck Ragan and/or The Draft, but Hot Water Music…
Beau MacMillanFood Network star MacMillan is the executive chef of elements at Sanctuary Camelback Mountain Resort and Spa. When you put your key in the ignition and turn on the radio, what station would play right now? ESPN Sports Radio.What’s the first album you bought? Led Zeppelin, the fourth untitled studio…
This week, New Times ran a list in our print publication highlighting some of the most interesting posts published at Up On The Sun over the past week. Here are links to those posts. What inspired Pickster One, Z-Trip, and LL Cool J’s “Super Baller”? What five singers should team…
You expect the typical rock ‘n’ roll drama when a band takes to the studio to tackle its sophomore album: band fights, creative control struggles, and gigantic egos. But it wasn’t any of that stuff that caused the four year gap between Source Victoria’s The Fast Escape and their airtight…
Resident rapper Jaron Ikner, better known as Black One, may call Phoenix his home, but his heart still lives in his hometown. Tucson. Fresh off of his first full-length album, Black Sun Rising, Ikner looked to T-Town for a lot of the material that comprise the 14-track record. Only two…
This scene invariably has played out in every musician’s life — the point when one band member informs another he just proposed to his girlfriend. Following a stretch of confused ground inspection before resuming eye contact, instead of offering congratulations, his friend says something along the lines of, “Well, I…
You don’t know the meaning of “poignant” until Glen Campbell, sitting two feet from you, starts to sing “Ghost on the Canvas,” the title track of his new — and final — album. The country great, who’s going through the early stages of Alzheimer’s, sometimes forgets which family member once…
When The Darkness entered the spotlight in 2003, the parenthetical question was: “Are these guys for real?” Glam rock long had given up for dead. So, did these guys really and truly love all things ’70s and ’80s rock, or were the spandex unitards, feather boas, long hair, lavish stage…
Bon Iver is the new Arcade Fire of the Grammy Awards. In classic “Who is…” Tumblr fashion, a plethora of people have taken to the interwebs to express their disdain for Justin Vernon and co. because they won the Best New Artist and Best Alternative Album awards, simply because they…
Road trip anyone? The Beach Boys — you know, those old dudes in funny hats who played with Foster the People and the certified cool guy and totally-not-the-worst Adam Levin-fronted Maroon 5 at the Grammy’s — are coming to Arizona, but they are skipping Phoenix in favor of launching their…
If the Grammy’s taught us anything, it’s that despite Dave Grohl’s apparent objections, electronic dance music, or EDM, has stepped boldly into the spotlight, with artists like Skrillex and Deadmau5 leading the charge toward the mainstream. Director Amir Bar Lev’s RE:GENERATION Music Project, a documentary produced in part by the…
One of the great faces of Motown, Smokey Robinson, will be visiting the Valley of the Sun soon.Get ready to hear some of the best crooning that Hitsville, USA ever had to offer.Smokey Robinson, Kris Kristofferson, Maná and other artists will be visiting Phoenix in the coming weeks. The rest…
The Sun Club in Tempe. Mad Gardens on Van Buren. The Stumble Inn down in Tucson. In another lifetime (read: more than 25 years ago) these and a dozen other scuzzy dives around Arizona were all ground zero for punk rock.Flash forward to present day and many of the aforementioned spots…
Admit it, you don’t know much about The Jesus and Mary Chain beyond puzzling over what Bill Murray whispered to Scarlett Johansson at the end of Lost in Translation. It’s okay, you’re not alone. Jedidiah Foster, the singer and guitarist of The Bittersweet Way introduced his bandmates to The Jesus…
Doesn’t matter if you’re like me and have been mostly indifferent to fun. in the past, the band’s new single, “We are Young (featuring Janelle Monáe)” has been inescapable over the past few weeks. The song’s huge, and sounds like it was custom built for a car commercial (and yeah…
Fresh off his stint in the hospital, things are starting to normalize for Brad Dwyer. We were happy to have Jeff Owens, musician and mini-comic artist extraordinaire, fill in last week, but it’s nice to have Dwyer back. This week, Dwyer creates a whole new punk rock subset, adding “home-core,”…
A week ago, the Superbowl inspired Volkswagen to fork up millions to rework its Darth Vader commercial of Superbowls past. The New York Football Giants’ victory over Sith Lord Bill Belichick and his Patriots moved Giants fans to celebrate. Most fans were moved to the kitchen to grab a final celebratory Bud Light before calling it a night. One particularly famous fan and host of yesterday’s 54th Grammy Awards Ceremony, LL Cool J, was moved to write the song “Super Baller,” a Giant’s victory anthem that samples the NFL horns you hear at the beginning of every NFL broadcast.
Joey BradfischBradfisch is a producer for the Johnjay and Rich radio morning show on 104.7 KISS-FM. His segment, What’cha Doin At The Courthouse?, airs on the station every Friday at 7:40 a.m. When you put your key in the ignition and turn on the radio, what station would play? I’m…
