Features

Here are two big shows that were just announced this week.

By Jonathan McNamara Hot on the heels of the release of her fourth book “Breaking Dawn,” a stake has been driven through the heart of the Twilight Series and possibly its fans as well. Stephenie Meyer reports on her Web site that “Midnight Sun” the fifth volume in the Twilight…

I spent the winter of 1994 through the summer of 1995 soaking myself in the Counting Crows album August and Everything After. I did lots of variations on the theme of playing it through, playing some part of it, and playing some part of a part of it over and…

On a recent Monday night, I’m inside the downtown art collective The Firehouse, where The Complaniacs drummer Matt Spastic lives. The band is auditioning a new bass player in Spastic’s bedroom. A few Firehouse regulars poke their heads in, grab beers from the mini-fridge, and watch the bleached blond, tatted-up…

Metallica’s next studio album, Death Magnetic, leaked onto the Internet yesterday, after a French retailer started selling copies of the album ten days before its scheduled release date of September 12.

Lohan’s blog has made headlines lately because — well, because it’s really written by Lindsay Lohan, but also because she 1) posted a tirade about her father, and 2) wrote a political blog that commented on Sarah Palin’s announcement that her unmarried 17 year-old daughter was pregnant.

This week’s review is the second release from local label Afro-Baile Records, an EP from U.K. collective Yaaba Funk.

Thomas Ian Nicholas: Saturday, August 30, at Cave Creek Coffee Company By Clay McNear Okay, I’m gonna throw a bunch of names at you and ask you to tell me the common denominator: Steven Seagal, Zooey Deschanel, John Corbett, Scott Baio, Kevin Bacon, Leif Garrett, Russell Crowe, Tony Danza, Jennifer…

Here are a handful of shows that were just announced this week.

This week’s “Flier of the Week” is for a show tonight featuring O Pioneers!!! and Andrew Jackson Jihad. In case you don’t recognize him by now, the surly mug on the flier belongs to Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. We particularly like the SS-style lightning bolts shooting out of his eyes.

By Steve Jansen Earlier this week, the group formerly known as the Phoenix Bach Choir announced that they have changed their name to the Phoenix Chorale. Along with the more contemporary-friendly sounding moniker comes a slick new logo (as seen above) and a cool redesigned Web site that is still…

Portugal. The Man likes spontaneity. They also like random punctuation in the middle of their name. You could even say the Alaska-based quartet has a knack for doing things ass-backwards. For example: Even though the band writes music while on the road and works out the parameters of its live…

It’s 3 p.m. on a Saturday and I’m sitting on the floor, Indian-style, across from Teague Cullen in a Mitchell Park home that he rents out with six other 20-somethings. Behind a closed door in an adjoining room, Jen McMaster is messing around with what sounds like a clickety electronic…

Labor Day is upon us once again, so we’re paying tribute to America’s celebration of the workingman by recognizing the worst jobs in rock. They don’t get any shittier than these, boys and girls. Guns N’ Roses’ management June saw the release of nine allegedly mastered tracks from Guns N’…

A symphonic heavy metal concept double album about Nostradamus may not rank among such conceptual classics as Pink Floyd’s The Wall, David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, or the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, but when the band making Nostradamus…

I recently had the chance to speak with Halford about the Metal Masters Tour, the new Judas Priest album, and his favorite things about Phoenix. You can read about the former two things in the music section of this week’s issue (“Seer Review,” August 28, 2008), but we saved the desert dishing for this blog.

The Phoenix New Times Summer of Sound series was a success again this year, thanks to the hard work and dedication of our marketing department and some of the finest local bands in town. It’s been a long, hot summer, but we finally got through all seven shows in seven genres over the course of 15 weeks. Just like last year, we had audience members at each show vote for their favorite band. But unlike last year, we didn’t announce the results at the end of each night, choosing instead to announce all winners at the awards show last night at Big Fish Pub in Tempe.

This week’s review is the “long lost, almost forgotten debut EP” from Valley rapper Rashenal.

On a recent, rainy weekend trip through northern Arizona, I cooled my heels in the tasting room at Page Springs Cellars, where new releases from Maynard James Keenan’s Caduceus Cellars are available for tastings and purchase.

Here are some upcoming shows that were just announced this week.

The City of Phoenix has shut down all pool party events on the rooftop patio of the Hotel San Carlos. The reason? According to the fire marshal, maximum capacity on the third floor rooftop patio of the hotel is 40 people. And Star Swim was drawing hundreds.

In a parallel universe that gets everything wrong, Buzz Osborne and Dale Crover would be capping the Melvins’ first quarter-century mulling over whether to wear tuxes or L.A. Dodgers jerseys to their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. Melvins albums would’ve become progressively slicker and more pedestrian over…