When Kurt Cobain growled “Here we are now” in the early ’90s, he unwittingly sounded the death knell for the classic speed-metal thrash scene. Fifteen years later, most thrash acts have hemorrhaged crucial members and credibility, and either thrown in the towel or converted. Look no further than any barf-worthy…
Tired of all the ho-hum musicians our local scene has to offer? You know, boring bands who’d rather blast their tracks while standing on stage? Then peep the perversely non-plastic performing plaything known as Treasure Mammal. This one-man musical dynamo is gung ho like G.I. Joe, giving new meaning to…
This melodic indie rock quartet sounds a bit like another local band, radio rulers Jimmy Eat World, whom SLP once joined on a Midwest tour that included a gig in a barn. The A-side, “Hold Your Flashlight,” is a chugging, hard-edged pop number full of images of summer camp, canary…
One of the things that’s great about local hip-hop artist Jawa is that he doesn’t give a crap about mainstream success. He could have had it — Priority Records had him working with artists like Brian McKnight and Method Man in the mid-’90s — but he didn’t like being told…
Here’s a band that could easily contribute to the soundtrack that G.G. Allin, Stiv Bators, and Johnny Thunders are probably making in Punk Rock Hell. Big Vinny & the Cattle Thieves sound like old-school gutterpunks, spewing about anal rape and violence from a graffiti-covered garage. “I Was a Teenage Premature…
There’s such a fine line between stupid and clever. — David St. Hubbins, This Is Spinal Tap Metal has never been a genre of music generally associated with rocket scientists, but perhaps no band in the past quarter-century better illustrates the central truth of the above quote than the meatheaded,…
Vinyl records may seem as ancient as the Pyramids in the evolutionary chain of audio technology — the phonograph record, the eight-track tape, the cassette tape, the CD, the MP3 — but yet they’ve somehow survived even while cassettes and eight-tracks went tits up. Before shareware programs like Napster and…
All right, kids, since we haven’t had much of a winter here in the ‘Nix (not that we ever do), I’ve got a cold blast of reality for you. Your rock star aspirations, the getting signed to a major label or even a cool indie, the touring with My Chemical…
“You know the rose girl that goes around selling roses in bars and restaurants?” asks French-born, Arizona-based songwriter Marianne Dissard. “That’s what I used to do in downtown Tucson. Tucson is not like Paris. There aren’t a lot of people on the sidewalk. You’re isolated. So that job was a…
Marty Larson-Xu is confused. “I woke up and didn’t know where I was,” he says. “Was like, ‘What the hell is that smell?’ Then I looked out the window and remembered, ‘Yeah, I’m in L.A.'” It’s not quite home, but it works for now as Larson-Xu and his Eugene, Oregon-based…
All hail R.E.M.! They were the jingle-jangle morning of indie rock, and their latest albums are . . . not bad for a bunch of old farts. For all the great tunes, we have held our tongues in regard to goofy front man Michael Stipe. But no longer. For releasing…
On a recent Saturday night at Hollywood Alley, after Vin-Fiz and The Threads have run through their sets, Jared Christy, singer for The Liar’s Handshake, is perched on a stool onstage, smoking a cigarette. His bandmates Billy Culbertson and Nolan Thompson are setting up their acoustic guitar and upright bass,…
Bach. Beethoven. Brahms. Mozart. Mario. The five pillars of classical music. And while those first four dudes had a good run, it’s that last guy who enraptures us now: a Japanese-born yet ostensibly Italian plumber in a bright red jumpsuit who, in the mid-’80s, warp-zoned his way into 60 million…
It seems appropriate that local promoter Stephen Chilton (a.k.a. Psyko Steve) named his multi-venue music showcase Oh Shit! A Fest?. After all, many Valley scenesters likely will be invoking the expletive when figuring how they’ll make the most of the jam-packed lineup of 35 local and out-of-town acts spread across…
Ah, Valentine’s Day — that one day a year when you can say, “Baby, I love you as much as a diamond pendant from Zales.” Or, if you’re one of the unlucky ones, that one day a year when the loneliness actually gets worse. That’s because finding love ain’t as…
Maybe Jackie Wilson was singing about Concetta Rosa Maria Franconero when he sang “Reet Petite” — and if he wasn’t, he should have been, because Connie Francis was definitely the thing back in the late ’50s and early ’60s, the Teen Diva of Pop. Tuesday Weld opened her lips to…
“Roooooowwwwwrrrraaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrooowwwwrrrrrrr!” A guttural growl straight from the deepest pits of hell has just emanated from the throat of Melissa Cross, who follows it up with a giggle. “See, that didn’t hurt at all. But you should see the looks I just got!” That’s because the chipper, red-tressed, late-fortysomething voice instructor…
Oh, the bittersweet memories — hooking up with that nose-ring girl at the Bash on Ash, getting your teeth kicked in at the Nile, seeing some of the greatest local talent around at Neckbeard’s. . . . If you’re like most Phoenix music lovers, you’ve probably lamented the loss of…
The laws of probability and rock tradition dictate that 2006, like every year before it, will not end without a notable musical death or two. Eventually, all our rock heroes end up in the Afterlife All-Star Band. Those who went to the afterparty in 2005 — including Luther Vandross, Link…
All hail “Are You Gonna Go My Way.” That slice of ’70s-meets-’90s mass-market rock was a nice break from the sour-faced caterwauling of the “alternative” years. But Lenny Kravitz has far outstayed his welcome, and now he has debased himself for Absolut vodka. For slapping on the assless chaps and…
“My made-up age is 38,” Ryan Greene tells me while we’re sitting in his new recording studio before the immense console, overlooked by a flat wide-screen TV monitor showing some inscrutable B-movie. The legendary producer, who’s probably best known among ambitiously audiophiliac pop-punk fans, moved down to Scottsdale from the…
The most influential indie-rock record of the past decade reverently declares I love you Jesus Christ, features the songs “Two-Headed Boy” (parts one and two) and “The King of Carrot Flowers” (part one, then parts two and three combined), uses semen as a lyrical motif, crushes heavily on Anne Frank,…
