Tempe kiddie-poppers The Maine have announced the release date for their new record, Black & White, the major-label followup to Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop. Sire will drop the record, produced by Howard Benson (Papa Roach, Creed, Hawthorne Heights), on July 13. In the least surprising news of the week, the…
Hoodstock is scheduled for this weekend in Tempe.This weekend’s event is (CORRECTION) not the same event called Hoodstock in Tempe which has its own wikipedia entry. It’s also not the Oakland Dance party of the same name or the Miami rap showcase of the same name. Whew. This is the…
Song: Crystal Castles’ “Vietnam” (Lightsoverla Remix)Context: It’s been 40 years and one day since the Kent State shootings. …
Song: Bone Thugs-n-Harmony’s “Thuggish Ruggish Bone”Inspiration: A delightfully sub-quality “bootleg” of the group’s show at Celebrity Theatre Sunday. Damn, I should have gone…
Remember that Surfer Blood show at Trunk Space that got canceled? Yeah, well, that was the closest the band will come to playing here. Ever.Yup, that’s a fact. How do we know? Umm, well, we just got a press release which says the band will never, ever play the Grand…
Something about an Arizona beer festival felt a little trivial Saturday, a day when angry hordes across the country beat up our state’s idiotic new immigration law at May Day rallies.Hell, they were protesting the law in Milwaukee. If Milwaukee could ignore beer for a day, you might wonder, what…
The lineup for Arizona Fall Frenzy 2010 has been announced and it’s a huge step-forward for the festival, in its second year at Tempe Beach Park.Stone Tempe Pilots and The Cult top the bill on Friday, September 17. Tickets are $75 or $80 at the door. Weezer, “Sublime” (with scab…
What do you when you can’t sniff another appearance on Leno? When your agent can’t get AM radio to touch you? When there’s no literally viable source for promoting your music to mainstream audiences beyond a television shopping network?If you’re Meat Loaf, you go on QVC on May 4 (noon…
If you have any doubts about just how crazy big this whole SB 1070 controversy is, consider this: Fucked Up singer Pink Eyes (a.k.a. Damon Abraham) wrote an op-ed on the subject for highly influential music blog Stereogum. You know, the Webby-winning Zeitgeist-capturing music blog all the cool kids love…
Sure, Latina pop sensations, Latino comic legends, and Canadian Indie bands, are upset with Arizona’s crazy new immigration law, SB 1070. They’re the usual suspects, right? You might, however, expect the “Okie From Muskogee” to be on board.Nope. Merle Haggard, the outlaw country star who made a lot of waves…
Arizona musicians, it’s time to stand up.As the fallout from our state’s crazy new immigration law continues to spread, it’s been really great to see stars like Shakira and Zach de la Rocha join in the fight. I’m sure we all appreciate their efforts immensely. But it’s also important that…
Sure, Kings of Leon suck. Hard. Soooooo hard. But damn it if the only legitimate arena-ready act born of the early naughties garage rock revival doesn’t know how to pick openers.The last time I wrote about them, announcing their July 10 show at Cricket Wireless Ampitheatre made a quip I…
A concert film that takes viewers inside Phish’s three-day Festival 8 will be screened at two Phoenix-area movie theaters next week.Phish 3D was shot at Festival 8 in Indio, California during Halloween weekend (I was there!) and boils the eight set super-show down into an easily digestible two hours of…
And so it starts…Stars, a Canadian indie-pop act most famous for the song “Take Me to the Riot” has become the first of what will surely be a dozen or more indie rock acts to threaten a boycott of Arizona over the crazy new immigration bill which more-or-less requires cops…
Mexican-Americans are getting stiffed right and left here in Arizona, the so-called Meth Lab Of Democracy.The State Press, a student newspaper representing the largest university in our fair state, reports that Arizona State University is axing its mariachi band after 25 years.ASU’s current version of the program, which began during the…
Blessthefall, The Maine and The Summer Set are all featured on the new Fearless Records compilation Punk Goes… Classic Rock.It’s no secret that the California label — essentially Tiger Beat magazine with A&R dudes — loves Phoenix pop-punkers like these three. The Maine was signed to the label before hopping…
Our sister papers in south Florida ran a fantastic piece on brilliant-turned-bloody-nosed-cokehead producer Scott Storch last week. In case you haven’t already seen it, there’s a lot to love about this hard-hitting profile, including some real gems from Scott’s mom, who bemoans the fact that her son never took care…
M.I.A. probably didn’t plan to release her new video — which graphically shows the U.S. government violently kidnapping and assaulting redheads, then taking them out to the desert to kill them — as a commentary on Arizona’s incredibly controversial SB 1070.Then again… Hmmmm.Kinda makes ya think, huh?…
Not many acts more colorful than Baby Dee drop by Phoenix.Dee, sort of a cross between The Dresden Dolls (who she’s toured with) and Joanna Newsom (just because of the harp), is a transgendered Clevelander-turned-New-Yorker-turned-Clevelander who really has no interest in talking about her life’s story. A protege of Bonnie…
The debate over a crazy Arizona law that would, essentially, make it a state law to violate federal immigration law (and thus empower state and local cops to enforce federal immigration law) is something the folks over at Valley Fever and Feathered Bastard can tell you a lot more about…
The latest issue of AZ Kaos has an interesting dissection of my theory on Aesthetic Atrophy which is worth sharing.In case you missed it, “Aesthetic atrophy is the diminished capacity to appreciate new or unfamiliar music or other sensory stimuli. It is typically accompanied by the sufferer’s retreat to familiar…
The Old Gray Lady is getting a little bit hipstery today. The New York Times is streaming The National’s newest record, High Violet, here.It’s the first time the paper has streamed a record. The multimedia is paired with a feature from the Times’ magazine which comes out Saturday.A few things…
