Welcome to another installment of Up on the Sun’s 2011 Review. Over the next week, editor Jason P. Woodbury and the staff will countdown their favorite songs, shows, national and local releases of 2011. Earlier this year, someone called me “an old soul.” A little earlier, someone joked that my…
Want to know what new release discs and platters are moving across the Valley at local record stores? We’ve got you covered with another installment of What’s Selling. If top selling lists and viral videos are any indicators of trend setting, don’t be surprised if there’s an outbreak of hip…
Welcome to the first installment of Up on the Sun’s 2011 Review. Over the next week, we’ll be counting down our favorite songs, shows, national and local releases of 2011. This installment comes from Lenni Rosenblum, who has been a major contributor to Up on the Sun for a few…
If you were to base what you know about teenagers on the misunderstood, black-clad fans of As I Lay Dying, you might think that underneath every angst-y, tattoo-covered teen exists the soul of a good Christian kid. Not so. These fans are a special breed. They reappropriated the devilish look…
It’s important for a band to have a solid name, one that provides a sense of identity, a visual hint of what to expect musically. Smashing Pumpkins embodies this ideal. Imagine hundreds of turtles emerging from the sea in a full-moon frenzy to lay eggs on the beach but forced…
Chris Cornell has led the rock star life, though his Seattle childhood indicated that he’d wind up a programmer at Microsoft, not one of the biggest names in alternative music. The socially awkward pre-teen actually spent a solid two years listening only to The Beatles, being a loner, and avoiding…
Following a major-label disaster, much-hyped and beloved San Diego band Three Mile Pilot broke up before the dawn of this millennium. The group’s splintering allowed members to focus on other projects: Armistead Burwell Smith IV turned his focus to the proggy Pinback, while Pall Jenkins and Tobias Nathanial turned their…
Maynard James Keenan isn’t known for being forthright, but he’s pretty open in his description of Conditions of My Parole, the latest album from his folk-electro-hard-rock project Puscifer: “This is an Arizona project. Its inception was in ’95, when I was living in L.A., [but] when I turned on the…
Hipster dance nights have a shelf life, burning brightly before flaming out into obscurity and leaving only hazy memories of drunken exploits, goofy photographs, and tales of hedonistic bliss. Party Foul was no exception, as the weekly electro affair at the old Homme Lounge earned a serious and scandalous reputation…
If sunshine were audible, it would probably sound a lot like Allen Clapp’s music. Based in the Bay Area, the Northern California native has been producing a gorgeous soundtrack to the Golden State lifestyle for almost two decades under his own name and with his band The Orange Peels. Mixed…
Organizers of the annual Air Guitar World Championships oughta consider holding next year’s event at Rockbar Inc. in Scottsdale, particularly since many folks in attendance at it’s grand opening on Friday, December 2, were strumming faux Fenders and invisible Ibanez while classic rock hits came from the sound system. When…
Out of Reverie, Come On Die Young, Alaurabyrd, Just Animals, and Death By Routine will all be bringing down the house this weekend for what is sure to be a very punk rock Christmas. Just look at that Mexican folk-skull dressed as Santa. The flier just screams visually. Not only…
Want to know what new release discs and platters are moving across the Valley at local record stores? We’ve got you covered with another installment of What’s Selling. It wasn’t so long ago that Jimmy Brooks and his best friend Spinner Mason walked the halls of Degrassi High School. In…
We hate to generalize about festival attendance, but oh, well: Hipsters have Coachella, hippies have Bonnaroo, metal fans have the Big 4, and indie kids have South by Southwest. But what about pop music diehards? The kids? Well, cancel that road trip out to Jingle Ball or an iHeartRadio Music…
It must be frustrating, confining, and sad to be a teen star — rather, to have been a teen star. Your audience comes to adore you and fixes you in their minds just the way they love you, just the way you are. Or just the way you used to…
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…
People — maybe not the kind you want to associate with, but people nonetheless — will pay good money to be peed and shit upon, because, for them, it’s all about the way humiliation makes them feel, I dunno, giddy. On the other side of the uncomfortable spectrum, you have…
There’s a rumor that East Coast electronica artist The Juan MacLean is reportedly more machine than man. Though it might just be shtick (or one of those kooky musician affectations), there is ample proof to support the idea that the 40-something is an automaton: album titles like Der Half-Machine and…
“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…
Radius hosted Electroball, its first 18-and-over rave on Wednesday, November 23. Axis was closed off, but guests had plenty to be thankful for at this pre-Thanksgiving bash. DJs Henry Dilema, Sean Watson, and EddieNMarco provided the house, hip-hop, and dubstep beats while the crowd danced under a cover of fog,…
We’re used to being shown a whole lot of fliers here at Up On The Sun. Each of them is artistically unique in its own way. But none of them has ever struck me quite like this one.What Laura Says has an absolutely beautiful flier for their upcoming show at…
Want to know what new release discs and platters are moving across the Valley at local record stores? We’ve got you covered with another installment of What’s Selling. Now that Black Friday is mercifully behind us, we can move on to Music Store Monday. A day that doesn’t require you…
