Army of Robots Way back in February of 2005, I wrote a column saying that Army of Robots had succeeded Tucson’s The Bled as the best band in Arizona (in my opinion, of course), and that they’d “fucked up the whole paradigm and established a new gold standard for Arizona.”…
Saki Photography Violet Wild A while back I wrote a column about Violet Wild, the band put together from remnants of the Black Moods (guitarist Josh Kennedy) and Mink Rebellion (singer Bobby Scott). Along with bassist Paul Fenix and drummer Joey Schwegler, the boys were working on an album that’s…
“Know any banjo jokes?” my roommate asks me when I tell him I’m going to see local bluegrass purveyors The Breadwinners on a recent Tuesday night. I don’t, but my roomie does. “What’s the difference between a banjo and a vacuum cleaner? A vacuum cleaner has to be plugged in…
It’s the Fourth of July at Cricket Pavilion, and kids wearing tee shirts that pledge their allegiance to every band from Anti-Flag to Less Than Jake are pressed against a makeshift stage at this year’s local Warped Tour stop to see a star their parents may, in fact, have pressed…
As you read this, the National Security Agency has probably been monitoring your phone calls, while the Department of Homeland Security peruses your e-mail, and agents from the Central Intelligence Agency torture detainees in the War on Terror. A decade ago, long before 9/11, terrifyingly Orwellian-style occurrences such as these…
Glenn Weyant’s The Anta Project — a single, 54-minute track created by playing the steel walls and barbed-wire fences along the U.S.-Mexico border using a cello bow and modified chopsticks — puts a musical face on illegal immigration under the guise of creative improvisation. Where mere mention of the hot-button…
The Harry Smith Project: Anthology of American Folk Music Revisited (Shout Factory) is an all-star, boxed-set tribute to artist and folk music anthologist Harry Smith, whose 1952 Anthology of American Folk Music helped set off the folk music revival of the next two decades. This four-disc set captures more than…
The Breadwinners In tomorrow’s new ish of the paper, I hang out with the Breadwinners, a four-piece traditional bluegrass group that plays at the Loft in Tempe every Tuesday night. There ain’t much bluegrass in these parts, but these four bring it with an authenticity you can’t find anywhere else…
While my esteemed blogging colleague (blog-eague?) Stephen Lemons has been busy picking fights with the fiesty commentators at AZPunk.com, I’ve had my ears glued to the formidable portal’s latest compilation of local punk bands, AZPunk.comp V5, which will have its release celebrated Friday night at The Sets in Tempe. This…
Pacific Coast News Happier Times Lefties get the House, maybe the Senate, Rumsfeld resigns, but even better than that – Britney filed for divorce!! Ordinarily I stick to BS-ing about local music steez up in this piece, but I had to pass on the fantastic news that Britney Spears is…
ProjectGuerilla.com Back in late August I wrote a feature on revolutionary rapper GRIME (the acronym stands for “Got Revolution In My Eyes”) and his musical perpetuation of the Revolutionary But Gangsta movement. Apparently GRIME’s getting up in the election day today in his own unique way, releasing his new single…
DJ Aaron Roberts Local producer Aaron Roberts released a tricky little EP of booty shaking house beats called Hip-Hop Stop on Nashville label Photo Records this week. The “hip-hop” reference is deceiving – this is bass-heavy house with chopped-up vocals and dancefloor cuts. Not really the sort of thing I…
Wormwood Brothers This local self-described “dustcore” outfit called Wormwood Brothers sent me a beautiful little track called “Trigger Happy” that reminds me of shoegazers with a taste for y’all-ternative bands like Wilco, Son Volt, and their ilk. It’s pretty fucking melancholy, as are the other tracks up on the band’s…
After I posted a couple of songs from the enigmatic Janis Joplin Crap N Vomit last week, the band sent me a couple of emails to explain what the deal is. And it just got weirder. Here’s the illumination from “Pete aka Solvent the Solution”: “Two piece, bass and drums…
Woodpile in New Times There was a little e-mail scuffle between an L.A. Times writer named Chris Lee and myself recently, when I wrote a column refuting his assertion that local white rapper trio Woodpile are white supremacists (he wrote that in a front page story for the beleaguered newspaper)…
Z-Trip’s Bling Phoenician ex-patriate and now Los Angelian DJ Z-Trip, who I’ve toured through the Pacific Northwest with before and is currently hitting up European dance floors, has been pretty damn busy lately, getting married in this summer and posting some new and old cuts on his website and continuing…
Jimmy Eat World I’m sure you’re all aware that tomorrow is election day, which I wouldn’t ordinarily type about up in this piece, but it’s made for some strange endorsements this year. Check out the video here, and you’ll see local music scene players like Jim Adkins of Jimmy Eat…
You probably remember Chronic Future if you’ve been around the ‘Nix for a while… “Scottsdale Brat”?? nevermind that shit though, Mike Busse is a sick fuckin’ MC these days, and they’re down with one of the most innovative/weird/twitchy beatmongers around, Ryan Breen. Breen is known publicly as Back Ted N…
There’s mu-fuckin’ two tonight, cuz its mu-fuckin’ friday… if you’re one of the artsy types, you ought to hit up the afterparty at Angelo’s Lounge (16th St. north of Osborne) and check out Telemore Repair from Long Beach, along with local mofos Underwater Getdown and An Aesthetic (stupid name guys,…
There are good radio-ready songs and there are shit radio-ready songs; a while ago i wrote about the Heartless here, now the boys are back in the studio and preparing some new jizm for yr ears. Cuz they’re nice guys (even if they’re pop-punkers), they dropped off this new track…
When you solicit musical submissions from the general public as I do (Brendan Kelley), you’re bound to run into some weird shit. Today’s winner for the most off the wall aural experience I’ve had is a local outfit called Janis Joplin Crap N Vomit. Apparently these songs are off the…
has to be the indomitable Blunt Club. Five years running and by far the best weekly party that goes down. Tonight Dumperfoo and crew have Tucson MC James Ciphurphace with DJ Grapla, fellow Tucsonians The Greyz, along with San Francisco artist and AlphaMonster crew member Eyeris One busting out the…
