Pop star Justin Bieber took to Twitter to esplain himself shortly after tossing his cookies not once, but twice while on stage during the first night of his latest world tour in Glendale, Arizona. Bieber was quick to blame milk for his mishap, but shadowy musical advocacy group the Association…
Not all signs of the record biz’s struggle for life are depressing. Thanks to EMI’s $1.9 billion merger with Universal Music Group, a few things will get shaken up, including a chance the wretched informercial sludge Now That’s What I Call Music! series will be put six feet under…
James Mabry Mabry is a comic with Duck in Cover Comedy. Learn more about the troupe here, and watch him perform Saturday, October 13 at the Speakeasy Comedy Lounge in Scottsdale at 10 p.m. When you put your key in the ignition and turn on the radio, what station would play…
Curious about what’s going on around town this weekend? Need some suggestions where to rock, dance, or krump in the Valley of the Sun? Don’t fret: These are our Five Shows to See This Weekend…
So, last night’s debate was weird and surprisingly civil. Republican candidate Mitt Romney was crowned the unofficial “winner” by even the “left wing media,” in spite of constantly cutting Jim Lehrer off and threatening to destroy Big Bird’s livelihood (there’s already a Fired Big Bird Twitter account). My recent vegetarian…
Big Gigantic @ Marquee Theatre|10/3/12Doors at 6:30 is pretty strange thing to me, but when it comes to music I like to be punctual. I want to make sure all is set for an entertaining night. Due Big Gigantic has always stood to the left of EDM, owing as much…
Local punk vets The Father Figures have been pretty busy lately. The band is headed to the studio next week to record a full length album that will tentatively be released in mid-November. The trio has a couple of big shows to look forward to, sharing the stage with PiL…
Earlier this year, soulful goth songstress Zola Jesus confessed to New Times that she has a secret dream of transcending modest indie success and becoming a full-fledged Mariah Carey-type pop star. There’s a significant number of art-warped pop singers whose R&B hooks and highly cultivated visual aesthetics betray a similar…
Mac Miller should serve as an inspiration to all suburban white boys with a bong in their hand and his album coursing through their overpriced headphones. Malcom James McCormick, the 20-year-old Pittsburgh-born rapper, is proof that average talent and the privilege of his race can still take a white boy…
The first step is always the hardest, and while the members of Phoenix’s Zero Zero have been busy the past four months — writing songs to fill an album, generating international indie radio airplay, and making a video — the “electro fuzz” trio has yet to step on a stage…
Last year, two mixtapes dropped that shifted R&B on its axis: Frank Ocean’s Nostalgia, Ultra and The Weeknd’s House of Balloons. Both took the standard propulsive club groove and softened it with production nuance, the lyrics conceding to self-doubt and disappointment. Soul jams were supposed to be the providence of…
So, the drummer of a massively successful, NPR-adored indie-folk band quits said band, buys a van, loads it with psychedelic drugs, and drives down the West Coast to Los Angeles, where he cranks out a record that’s equal parts Waylon Jennings honky-tonk and Richard Brautigan “mayonnaise,” with songs about driving…
The Wednesday night lineup at one of downtown Phoenix’s favorite hipster hangouts has been on the receiving end of a major reboot recently. Bi-level EDM emporium Bar Smith, 130 East Washington, axed its moombahton night The Scenario a few weeks back in favor of two newly launched Hump Day happenings…
Thursday 4 Afterlife: Rock the Mic Competition (hip-hop) AZ/88: Black Out Thursdays with Josh 1 (soulful house, lounge) Bar Smith: International Thursdays with DJ EC, DJ StarMarz, & DJ Clavo El Parientito (hip-hop, Latin) Bobby Q’s: DJ Phlava, MC Focus, DJ Dark Vader, & DJ Skoolboi (hip-hop, reggae, R&B) Cadillac…
Speaking with Robyn Hitchcock in 1996, the conversation quickly diverged from music to the difficulties of growing tomatoes at high elevation. It was not his issue, but mine, as he lives in England, where growing tomatoes is much easier, and I was in Colorado. Still, that conversation made it clear…
People always told 66-year-old soul songstress Bettye LaVette she should write a book. Fifty years in show business should make for more than a few good tales, right? “I’d say, ‘Yeah, well, I’m sure I won’t be famous enough to sell a book before I die,'” LaVette says, her brassy…
Our sister blog, West Coast Sound, has caught a lot of shit lately for their disdain for neo-blues rockers The Black Keys. Just remember we’re only critics, and opinions are just opinions. Nicholas Pell even offered up some alternative blues bands for you to dig. The problem is, as commenter…
With their Countdown to Extinction 25th Anniversary Tour kicking off in early November, Megadeth will be lighting up the Marquee Theatre on Saturday, December 8. God and Dave Mustaine only know how the mayhem will play out in the concrete jungle of the most-definitely-going-to-be cramped venue — especially given Mustaine’s…
Jason Mraz @US Airways Center|10/2/12 Whoever was high at the Jason Mraz concert last night most likely had a blast. There were bright and swirling colors, extensive jam sessions, and captivating backgrounds that shifted from scenes of clouds in the sky to images of the universe rotating around — not…
When Bettye LaVette swears, she swears. The Detroit songstress sounds passionate when she talks (and occasionally tosses out a little blue language), but she punctuates each burst with a wonderful laugh, one that somehow conveys the power in her voice as much as her songs. She’s been busy exercising her…
Are you a musician? Is your group having issues? Critic Jessica Hopper has played in and managed bands, toured internationally, booked shows, produced records, worked as a publicist, and is the author of The Girls’ Guide to Rocking, a how-to for teen ladies. She is here to help you stop…
The intertwined impressions of night and space that hover about The Helio Sequence’s latest album are no accident. Recording for the first time in their much larger studio — and on a totally different schedule — the Portland, Oregon, duo channeled their isolation into Negotiations, both in words and music…
