The music portion of SxSW starts today, but the interactive portion finished yesterday. One of the big stories out of interactive this past weekend was how ill-prepared AT&T was for the influx of iPhone-wielding hipsters and geeks descending on Austin. Tens of thousands of attendees are using their phones far more than…
Last month Neba, Underwater Getdown, Kinch, Black Carl, Kirkwood Dellinger, and Lisa Savidge all donated their time to the grassroots, DIY, volunteer-based, non-profit organization that is beginning to fill a void that Phoenicians so desperately crave. They call it Radio Phoenix, the only community-based radio station in town. Radio Phoenix’s…
Former Polyphonic Spree member Annie Clark, better known to the world as St. Vincent, will be bringing her fantastic brand of dark, melodic indie pop to the Valley this May. The former member of Sufjan Stevens’ band will release her new album, Actor, on May 5 as a follow-up to 2007’s remarkable…
Not too many acts have as streaky a career as Nine Inch Nails. One tour they’re playing the Marquee, the next they’re headlining at Cricket Wireless Pavilion with Jane’s Addiction, as they will in May. The bands are joined by Tom Morello’s new band Street Sweeper. That show is just…
Former Poison frontman — and the pride of Mechanicsburg, PA — Bret Michaels is set to release a tell-all book this June. You heard correct, folks: Christmas is coming early this year. Roses and Thorns: The Rock ‘n’ Roll Fantasy to My Reality will prove to set itself apart from…
Last week I told you about a story in the Wall Street Journal about Artist approved scalping. Well over the weekend Trent Reznor of NIN posted in the NIN forum on his website a long explanation of the current situation from the perspective of some one in the middle of…
Girls Do What They Want Tempe kiddie rockers The Maine released a new video via their MySpace yesterday. The video shows the band, which is on the cover of this month’s Alternative Press, doing typical band stuff: hanging out on the tour bus, rocking, hanging out on the tour bus,…
Promoter Lance Wilson will host his annual Rock for the Cure (aka “Save the Boobs”) benefit concert Saturday, March 21 at Tempe’s Last Exit Bar & Grill. The bill is packed with some of Arizona’s finest including Let Go, Audra, Five High, The Bollox, Breaking Down, Pants, Sleepwalk a Robot,…
When No Depression, The New York Times of roots music, stopped publishing last May, then stopped updating the site frequently shortly thereafter it left a huge hole in the alt-country scene. Now it’s back. Sorta. The magazine, named for a Carter Family/Uncle Tupelo song, launched in 1995 is now a…
Phoenix’s prime place in the vast desert between Los Angeles and Austin really comes in handy this time of year, as we get tons of shows by otherwise-usually-too-hip-to-play-here acts stopping by on their way to South by Southwest. Jose Gonzolez rounded a bunch of them up for you in the…
Jacksonville, Fla. indie rockers Black Kids will grace DJ William Fucking Reed’s popular weekly dance/rock night Shake! Saturday, April 25 following their show at The Clubhouse Music Venue at south Scottsdale’s The Rogue Bar. Some of the members will guest spin for what is sure to be a packed club…
On March 11, the Wall Street Journal ran an article titled “Concert Tickets Get Set Aside, Marked Up by Artists, Managers” written by Ethan Smith. In it, Smith explains the practice of large promoters, Ticketmaster, and artists teaming up to take the best seats at concerts and then not selling…
Like many musicians, Charlie Brand was not a happy high-schooler. Discussing his days as an art school dropout — a troubled kid sent to a Scientology-run youth camp, where he lied to the E-Meter reader to escape, only to become a chronically depressed and morbidly obese pothead — the 24-year-old…
Young Jeezy rapped it best: “It’s the recession — everybody’s broke!” That being the case, South by Southwest, Austin, Texas’ annual orgy of music and networking, is beyond many of our means. While catching local SxSWers, Dear and the Headlights, Kinch, The Love Me Nots, The Maine, Miniature Tigers, and…
What Wavves’ Nathan Williams vividly renders on cassette and aluminum isn’t the Beach Boys’ carefree beachscape, with its bathing beauties, surfboard-wielding Adonises, and pinks-on-the-line drag races. Last year’s Wavves (Fuck It Tapes) and new disc, Wavvves (Fat Possum), paint a decidedly grimmer, less idyllic picture: goth zombies everywhere, early 20-something…
PHOENIX Kinch: The piano has gotten a bad rap lately, thanks mostly to schmaltzy lite-pop bands like Keane and those dueling piano bars that seem to be springing up everywhere. Fortunately, Kinch has come along to give the piano its balls back. The band’s debut, Advances, veered from rollicking, up-tempo…
We don’t typically write up concert announcement blogs for shows in tiny, all-ages venues but this one deserves it. Because, well, YOU HAVE TO SEE WILLIAM ELLIOT WHITMORE! The bluesman who lives on a horse farm in Lee County, Iowa mesmerized me at Virginia’s MACRoCk a few years back.Whitmore, who…
Now that Coachella, Sasquatch, and Bonnaroo have all confirmed their acts for their respective music festivals, we are left to ponder only about the lineup of August’s Lollapalooza Festival at Chicago’s Grant Park. The Chicago Tribune’s music blog recently leaked who is expected to headline this year’s 3-day affair. It…
-moody Trent Reznor. Nine Inch Nails will supposedly be making their final appearance in the Valley for the foreseeable future on Friday, May 15, at Cricket Wireless Pavillion. I say “supposedly” because of the following: A). The date hasn’t been confirmed by the venue or its management (but has been…
In news that should come as hardly shocking, Amy Winehouse has officially been dropped from her Saturday slot of this year’s Coachella Valley Arts & Music Festival lineup. Of course, the first thing that comes to mind when she ditches out on a concert is “what drug is it this…
The Format’s breakup left a huge hole in the local music scene last year. Just when the duo seemed poised to put Phoenix on the map when they split up, but hopefully Nate Ruess’s New York-based band Fun can alleviate some of that pain. They’ve booked a Valley show with…
“Clarity is an album that I have repeatedly gone back to over the years. It is still fresh and that shows as so many of today’s bands are heavily influenced and inspired by this album. Because of that, it’s finally getting it’s due credit! 16-year-old kids will continue to re-discover…
