Attention rock and alternative acts around Arizona: The Phoenix Zoo wants you for 2012’s Rock the Zoo event. “We’re looking for rock and alternative acts,” says zoo PR & Marketing Manager Linda Hardwick. “In the past, we’ve done ’80s music, but this year we really wanted to involve the community,…
Neil Hamburger is not your typical comic, and DJ Horsepussy is not your typical DJ. Hamburger’s “anti-comedy” style has certainly inspired an entire crop of alt-comedians, and while Phoenix has a few DJs with “fucking” offensive names, none go as far to remain anonymous as the lucha libre-masked rocker. Both…
In the latest installment of “Wait, Fox said whaaat?” Eric Bolling, host of Fox Business’ Follow the Money had a conversation with Media Research Center guest Dan Gainor and Andrea Tantaros, co-host of The Five, where they discussed the staunch anti-corporate tone of The Muppets. Jason Richard Kron, of local…
Dream Theater at Ikeda at Mesa Arts Center Loyal fans talk about Dream Theater’s live show in hushed, reverential tones. I’d never experienced the band live before last night, but years of hearing fans rave about the prog-rock theatrics of the long-running group set my expectations high. Mesa Arts Center’s…
My favorite moment of Herman Cain’s “That’s it, I’m out of here” speech was when quoted Donna Summers’ “Power of One,” a favorite “poem” of us, and coincidentally, the theme from Pokémon 2000. Brad Dwyer features another kids show in this week’s installment of Record Heat, the much-loved Yo Gabba…
The idea of Scottsdale resident Jerry Lawson, onetime leader of The Persuasions, one of the most prominent a cappella group of ’60s and ’70s, competing on NBC’s a cappella competition The Sing Off seems crazy. But that’s exactly what happened last season, when the popular Nick Lachey-hosted show featured Lawson…
Iron & Wine Crescent Ballroom 12/2/11 How much saxophone is too much saxophone? You might want to ask the young lady who passed out during the extended dub-into-free jazz-psychedelic blues skronk of “Wolves (Song of the Shepherd’s Dog),” the fifth song played by Iron & Wine last night at Crescent…
Well, it’s December, which means you can’t avoid it any longer: it’s time to start Christmas shopping. That’s my plan at least, a desperate attempt to get it done sometime before, oh, December 23, as is my usual scramble. But there’s plenty of music going on, too. After you get…
Ladies and gentlemen, The Blind Boys of Alabama have gone country. Well, kind of. The long running gospel group, which formed at the Alabama Institute for the Negro Blind way back in 1939, released Take the High Road in April of this year. Featuring Hank Williams Jr., Willie Nelson, The…
Do you ever feel like every band has a clothing line? Rock-beats-electro duo Analog Sweat and the Native American clothing company UN3EK SY5TEM are connected (but separate), and the ties connecting the two run deeper than the fact that Tyson “Illfranklyn” Powless is involved in both. The music and the…
This week, New Times ran a list in our print publication highlighting some of the most interesting posts published at Up On The Sun over the past week. Here are links to those posts. What songs are we excited to spin this holiday season? What Back to Black Friday vinyl…
Don’t call it a come back: mythic Phoenix art-punk Eddy Detroit never went away, releasing a string of albums all throughout the ’80s, ’90s, and ’00s, but thanks to Ammit Records, the vinyl imprint of downtown music shop Revolver Records, he’s back in vinyl form. Eddy Detroit Meets the Sun…
Phoenix songwriter Eddy Detroit walks slowly and talks fast. Both qualities are easy to account for. At 59, his body is worn from years of psychedelic experimentation, S&M sex, and a mix of what he describes as Karmic retribution and ailments passed down through his Lebanese heritage. But his mind…
There’s mysterious, and then there’s mysterious as defined by Tom Waits, a songwriter who’s maintained an air of impenetrable mystique. In an interview with website Radical Wacko, Waits expressed a fondness for Tucson’s Bob Log III. “It’s just the loudest, strangest stuff you’ve ever heard,” Waits said of the motorcycle-and-jumpsuit…
Music can be a lot of things: powerful, divisive, heartbreaking, cathartic. When Manu Chao came to Phoenix in September, his music served a rare purpose: healing. Like it or hate it, The Sound Strike has linked the topics of immigration and music. The Sound Strike endorsed Chao’s appearance (it was…
“I know hits when I hear them,” Miss DJ MJ says, hanging out in the New Times office. I believe her. She’s been on the air for 10 years, working as music director at Power 98.3. She recently left the station, but not before becoming the first female on-air mixer…
When The Dollyrots left Joan Jett’s Blackheart label earlier this year, they went to their fans to help raise money for the band’s fourth record of buzzy, catchy punk. The fans came through. The band set its Kickstarter goal at $7,500, but fans wound up pledging $33,124. “It blew us…
Even with rumors rumbling that the Big Four (soon to be three?) will cease producing CDs at the end of 2012, Seattle-based label Light in the Attic has teamed with Rhino Handmade to help distribute ultra-deluxe compact discs. Turns out, certain people (collectors) still want some physical, musical products, provided…
Legendary concert promoter Barry Fey’s Twitter bio is pretty revealing: “Its Barry Fey. I am a rock promoter. I have promoted a few shows here and there. Maybe you have heard of me?” Fey, “The Rockfather,” retired from the business in 1997, but not before establishing himself as one of…
Like most of you, I was pretty surprised by that Radiohead concert announcement, but you know, this one might actually take the cake: Guns N’ Roses is coming to Comerica Theatre on Tuesday, December 27. G N’ R fans might be soured by the current lineup (Axl backed by DJ…
In “Take it Or Regret It,” one of my favorite pieces of music writing this year, songwriter and Seattle Weekly columnist John Roderick wrote: Music writers aren’t engaged in a conspiracy of bitterness and bad taste (at least not most of them), they’re just trying to make their deadlines. When…
Busy giving thanks over your four-day weekend? Don’t worry, here’s what you missed at Up on the Sun: Sister Cities and Doctor Bones The Rogue Bar kicked off Saturday night with a charismatic and interactive performance by Doctor Bones followed by local charmers Sister Cities. Both bands were on point…
