Music

This CD is like an old, crusty friend who jams safety pins through his nostril, shaves his pubic hair into an anarchy symbol, and makes coffee with the water from hot dog packages — it’s just so inane and fun. Let’s get something straight about Numbers on Napkins — this…

Tramps & Thieves’ first full-length release (with a whopping 16 tracks) is a lot more rockin’ than the band’s 2004 Mill Avenue Cowboys EP, with fewer acoustic moments and more straight-up shit-kickin’ songs that address issues like the Iraq war, outlaw hippies, and hallucinating in the desert. Songs like “Sidewinder”…

Bad Religion singer Greg Graffin gets old-timey on Cold As the Clay, an unplugged sophomore solo LP that mixes original songs with similar Deadwood-era tunes like the finger-picked murder-hoedown “Little Sadie.” Graffin plays traditional music as convincingly as he handles punk. He’s no Mike Ness, though the disc will probably…

“We ain’t no Harajuku Girls/We just straight-up rock ‘n’ roll,” Puffy AmiYumi sings on “Call Me What You Like,” the opening track from their eighth studio album. The song primarily expresses the female Japanese duo’s desire to be taken seriously as “rockers” — a tall order given the kiddy-fluff nature…

You could do a lot worse than to listen to this trio of DJ/producers from Holland all summer. After a string of sought-after 12-inch singles on London’s Jalapeno Records, Kraak & Smaak (the name is a Dutch saying, not a drug reference) makes its U.S. debut with a tasty full-length…

As a teenager, John Lee Hooker Jr. was a featured player in John Lee Sr.’s road show, and then spent the next 20 years fighting the demons of drugs, drink, divorce, and jail. Given his troubled past, you might expect Junior’s music to be even more dark and dangerous than…

India.Arie has always sounded a little too much like the musical equivalent of Oprah. The singer-songwriter’s music (best exemplified by her debut, Acoustic Soul) has always centered on overly positive, Afrocentric songs that embrace love, life and the challenges of womanhood. Her first two albums were innovative experiments with a…

The first time Tom Petty decided to cut a solo record with Jeff Lynne of ELO producing, it ended up being his biggest collection of pop hits since Damn the Torpedoes. While there’s not much chance that Highway Companion will do what Full Moon Fever did on radio — it’s…

Anthony Hamilton hasn’t had an easy time of it. His first release was shelved when Uptown Records hit the skids. And then, after proving himself a critical darling with sales to match on MCA, he signed to Soulife, which went out of business just in time to not release what…

When Social Distortion first started cranking out punkabilly anthems like “Mommy’s Little Monster” in the early ’80s, punk hadn’t yet pogo’d into the realm of pop-culture pretentiousness — something Social D front man Mike Ness addresses on the band’s 1998 live album Live at the Roxy. Before the band launches…

Caleb Engstrom is old enough for you to buy him a drink, but young enough for you to still feel guilty about it. This 21-year-old Iowa City boy is living the dream. He dropped out of the University of Iowa (but don’t worry, kiddies, he says he’ll probably go back),…

The turntable scene here in the PHX seems pretty fucking fickle sometimes, as DJs repeatedly relocate their record-spinning gigs from club to club — or pull the plug on them entirely — faster than they can send out notices on MySpace. In the past year alone, local scenesters have been…

Second only to the fabled Sports Illustrated cover jinx is the curse of Winona Ryder, whereby most musicians who date the actress — Dave Pirner, Adam Duritz, Evan Dando, etc. — subsequently watch their careers crumble. Perhaps Jersey singer-songwriter and former Winona boy-toy Pete Yorn can buck that trend. His…

Of all the labels to be unfairly saddled with, the oxymoronic “Christian punk” tag has dogged this Pacific Northwest trio for more than a decade. Sure, these fine, not-so-young lads don’t spew expletives like hardcore legends Black Flag, nor do they wallow in sexual depravity like punk godfather Iggy Pop,…

1. The Format, Dog Problems (Nettwerk Records) 2. Rise Against, Sufferer and the Witness (Geffen Records) 3. Thom Yorke, The Eraser (XL Recordings) 4. Hinder, Extreme Behavior (Umvd Labels) 5. Panic! At the Disco, A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out (Decaydance) 6. The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, Don’t You Fake It…

Hey, Joey, baby, it’s me — Johnette. I know I haven’t called in a really long time, but I wanted you to know that in case you never heard that one song, I’m still not angry anymore. In fact, I’ve been feeling pretty content lately (at least that’s what my…