By Brendan Joel Kelley Since I assume that if you’re reading this you likely just don’t have enough to do at your place of employment, I thought I’d point you towards another site that’s got the potential to do some cool shit. It’s phoenixrockcity.com, a site with a plethora of…
By Brendan Joel Kelley A Second to Die If you haven’t noticed, I’ve spent a lot of time discussing metal lately, both in its traditional and innovative forms. It’s earned me the ire of some and the praise of others, and apparently broken up at least one band (that’s unconfirmed,…
By Brendan Joel Kelley My technical difficulties now resolved, here are the tracks I promised to give you from the Smob’s just-released-last-night album I Hate Your Face. Fresh off of a triumphant release party last night at the Sets with Zion I and Tajai sharing the bill, I’m about to…
By Brendan Joel Kelley I was going to grace you with some fresh new music today, being released tomorrow, but after wrestling with the internet for a while I found out that my capacity to upload and share music with you is temporarily hindered. Nonetheless, if you dig local and…
Having covered music in this town for more than a decade, I see and listen to a lot of bands encompassing all genres, styles, and persuasions, but what I rock and go see for my personal enjoyment is another, more specific matter. A few years ago and beyond, my steez…
Lindsey Buckingham is an artist. He peppers his conversation with references to Picasso and Pollock. He speaks of sounds as “colors.” And like the stereotypical artiste, the Fleetwood Mac guitarist has been characterized as enigmatic, remote, even flaky. “I am the Terrence Malick of rock,” Buckingham says with a chuckle…
Whatever your feelings about John Mayer, it’s difficult not to appreciate his hair, much in the same way it’s difficult not to appreciate Hugh Grant’s. Both share the same thick, wavy, dark brown locks that, let’s face it, make the lady-folk swoon. For example, British thesp Grant dated supermodel turned…
Actors and actresses have a long history of falling for musicians. But, generally, those musicians are rock stars, sexually ambiguous pop stars, and members (or former members) of boy bands. Country stars used to rank on the “cool list,” below white rappers but higher than reality show music competition winners…
By Brendan Joel Kelley (Thanks to my friend Paula Harms for taking the lovely photos of Andy Hersey) Last weekend, as I mentioned in a previous post, I took off down south to see my cowboy buddy Andy Hersey throw down at a barn dance in Sonoita to celebrate the…
By Brendan Joel Kelley Tucson This last weekend I took a road trip out of town to see some music (more on that later), visiting my favorite little town in southern Arizona, Sonoita, and cruising through Tucson on the way there and back. I don’t care much for Tucson, although…
By Brendan Joel Kelley The Heartless If you missed local pop/punk/rock outfit the Heartless at the band’s CD release party recently, you’ll want to check out the tracks below (if energetic pop/punk is your thing). When the band dropped its EP This Could Take Some Getting Used To last year…
Judging by the malevolently eager look on his face, whatever Dale Fox of Phoenix band World Class Thugs has been keeping in his trunk for the past six months promises to be good. It is. It’s three oversized masks of World Class Thugs singer Jocelyn Ruiz-Fox, blown up from a…
Morrissey, England’s most dapper downer, isn’t quite as depressed as he used to be. In fact, he almost seems to be enjoying what he does these days. Nevertheless, the guy is still as press-shy as ever and just can’t be bothered to pick up a phone to chat with nosy…
Why on Earth would anyone want to see Johnny Cash’s backing band without Johnny Cash? It’s a fair question, perhaps even necessary, given the Man in Black’s hallowed status. Cash’s music meant so much to so many that it would be easy for former bandmates to coast on the demand…
By Brendan Joel Kelley If you saw my column this week, you might wonder exactly what a guitar/drums/vocals metal three piece like John Wayne Jefferson sounds like. You can find the answer below, although you should be warned that the songs come off much better live and the production on…
By Brendan Joel Kelley Last week I blogged here about the film Once, starring the Frames’ Glen Hansard and Czech pianist Markéta Irglová. Apparently, the New York Times and myself aren’t the only fans of the film, which is pretty much a musical about two talented people who express their…
By Brendan Joel Kelley Drunken Immortals I ran into a dude who calls himself Letscherous Larry (yeah, it’s spelled wrong, but that’s how he spells it) recently, and he hit me off with a numbered “magic ticket” for a party he’s throwing at the Phix on Sunday, May 27. He…
By Brendan Joel Kelley Just a reminder for you that tonight’s the second installment of the Summer of Sound series; tonight you can hear (and vote for) the bands in the Americana category. That’s Flathead, the Liar’s Handshake, Andrew Jackson Jihad, and Wormwood Brothers, with Deadbolt as the national headliner…
By Brendan Joel Kelley Tempe singer/songwriter J.D. Stooks hit me off with one of his new tracks a couple days ago, “10 Lb Coat,” which you’ll find below. J.D.’s an incredibly talented kid, which you’ll hear below and you can hear more of on his Myspace. He’s actually out in…
In e-mails and comments on my blog, Ear Infection, I’ve gotten into it with the metal kids in town. They’ve criticized me for my opinions about metal or for my not paying attention to it. It’s generally people like Marshall Beck, a musician in several metal bands who got butt-hurt…
Even armed with an illustrated libretto, it’s hard to divine most rock opera story lines. Before Ken Russell’s film adaptation of Tommy revealed the importance of champagne, Marilyn Monroe, and baked beans to the plot, betcha just assumed it was about a deaf, dumb and blind kid pinball-messiah who gets…
Jackson Ellis is freaking out. In late April, the 26-year-old publisher of the independent music and fiction magazine Verbicide got word that starting on July 15, his shipping rates would increase by somewhere between 30 and 40 percent. “It’s not going be the thing that kills me, but coupled with…
