At what point, exactly, did you really begin to hate garage rock? When legions of stylist-rumpled, wanna-be retro-rockers took over the airwaves? When ad agencies started tapping into that “hipster sound” to sell Subarus and Happy Meals? Or when you were in Guitar Center, cringing as some golf-shirted goober flubbed…
Amp Fiddler disagrees with the name of the genre he’s been squeezed into, which in his case is neo-soul. His point is that after two decades of session work as a keyboardist with George Clinton, the Brand New Heavies, Lucy Pearl, and others, what he’s doing now as a solo…
While the Valley’s music scene is still adrift, the punk rock community here in the ‘Nix is congealing — not just onstage, but online, at AZPunk.com. Consider the Dames, a local all-female punk trio that sounds like the demon spawn of the Donnas and Black Flag. After guitarist Heather Shope…
If the music biz took applications for power-pop professionals, Zach Rogue’s résumé would be killer. On its debut, Out of the Shadow, his San Francisco quartet flaunts its many melodic references: high-lonesome country tunes, Simon & Garfunkel-style ballads, sunny Big Star introspection. If those credentials weren’t enough, Rogue Wave’s plum…
It’s little surprise that Wilco front man Jeff Tweedy recently completed rehab for painkiller addiction; the man who summoned A Ghost Is Born is clearly haunted. After ambitious stabs at a history-of-rock concept album and a summery pop record culminated in 2002’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot — a post-9/11 rumination on…
What’s next for Bebel Gilberto? That was the question posed by many impressed by her acclaimed debut album Tanto Tempo (2000), a delicate bossa nova update dominated by the cut-and-paste mentality of producers such as Amon Tobin and Suba, and the reported 1.2 million copies it sold in the world…
Stop me, oh, oh, oh, stop me, stop me if you think you’ve heard this one before: Band (Vue) jumps from indie label (Sub Pop) to a major label (RCA) that’s trying to cash in on a hot music trend (garage rock), submits full-length album (Down for Whatever) that keeps…
“. . . Welcome back to Entertainment Tonight, I’m Mary Hart! It’s been an up-and-down year for Hollywood’s famed Coppola family, and no one knows that better than Robert Carmine, actor and lead singer of the alternative-pop group Rooney, and son of Rocky co-star Talia Shire, whose brother, of course,…
In venues from Tempe to Tokyo, Phoenix-based DJ Radar is notorious for dominating audiences with his innovative hip-hop creations. Now, in worn denim jeans, an olive green Bruce Lee tee shirt and a cap, Radar stands poised to dominate a crowd in an uncommon venue: a classroom. Half a dozen…
Detroit rappers D12 are preparing for the ultimate test of their popularity — touring without main man Eminem. The flaxen-haired rapper with the machine-gun mouth is working on his follow-up to 2002’s The Eminem Show. D12’s Swifty (Ondre Moore) says that when Eminem gets the album under his belt, he…
A conversation between two guys, “Jeff” and “Frank,” recently overheard at a diner at 2:45 a.m. JEFF: Okay, so if Glenn Danzig fought Henry Rollins, who’d win? FRANK: Man, that’s the oldest one ever! JEFF: C’mon, who’d win? I say Rollins — he’s like a foot taller and way tougher…
Four years after her last album, PJ Harvey has abandoned the elegant, Mercury Prize-winning slickness that made Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea such an anomaly in her edgy and provocative oeuvre, and frightened longtime fans. Her transformation from angry young girl to elder stateswoman must have scared…
Top 10 sellers at Hoodlums (ASU Memorial Union Building in Tempe) for June 20 through 26: 1. Wilco, A Ghost Is Born (Nonesuch) 2. Beastie Boys, To the 5 Boroughs (Capitol) 3. Ozomatli, Street Signs (Concord Jazz) 4. Jadakiss, Kiss of Death (Ruff Ryders) 5. Various artists, 2004 Warped Tour…
THE NIGHT: Fridays at E-Lounge THE DJ: Domenica THE SCENE: A diverse coterie of same-sex couples (male and female, and the occasional straight couple) busts shameless moves on the dance floor. Narcissists watch themselves in the giant mirror that covers one wall, while exhibitionists gyrate on the platform. By midnight,…
Thursday 1 Acme Roadhouse: DJ J. Alan (house) Ain’t Nobody’s Bizness: DJ Suzy (Top 40, hip-hop) Anderson’s Fifth Estate: Piranha Room/Area 51 with DJs Jeremy & Ricky (industrial/goth, electroclash) Axis/Radius: Summer Nights with DJ MCB & Josh Royal (all genres) AZ 88: DJ Seduce (acid jazz lounge) Club Bash: Atomic…
Last month at the band’s final show in the New York City area, Phish invited special guest Jay-Z onstage for a couple of numbers, drawing a line between two retiring heavyweights of two very different scenes: jam-rock and hip-hop. Like Jay and his Black Album, Phish has proclaimed that the…
The Bled is the best goddamn rock band in Arizona. On the band’s 2001 EP His First Crush, the album cover bears the line, “Can you still feel the butcher knives?” It’s a clever play on Jimmy Eat World’s chorus to “For Me This Is Heaven,” off the Clarity LP…
Mike Castaneda is mesmerized. An eerie, bluish glow lights up his face as he kneels onstage in front of a computer screen, clicking the mouse and bobbing his head to a frantic barrage of digital beats that blast like machine-gun fire from the amps at Modified Arts in downtown Phoenix…
Beer, barbecue and a gang of good friends are all you need to make the most of Independence Day. But while you might find all of that in your own backyard, there’s one thing that your boom box can’t compete with: live bands. Join the punk-rock picnic at Ziggy’s, where…
This weekend, support some of underground hip-hop’s finest when locals Dumperfoo and Diggs team up with Scion Summer Sessions to present an unusual, cutting-edge showcase of artists from the independent Mush Records label. Performances by Circus (formerly of the legendary Shapeshifters), Andre Afram Asmar, Radioinactive, Anti MC, Curse ov Dialect…
Part of Devendra Banhart’s appeal is the sheer magnitude of his iconoclasm. Nobody sounds quite like him. With his wobbly, warbling falsetto, colorful but unusual lyricism, and penchant for musical and vocal outbursts that run counter to the slow-bubbling acoustic folk informing his arrangements, he’s like the crazy uncle who,…
If there weren’t asshole junkies and layabouts, Danny Marianino and company would have precious little to go on a tirade about. Lucky for us, there seems to be no end to the supply of good-for-nothings hanging around the social hall. This third effort goes further out than the band’s last…
