Favorite Fables

It's Midland, not Midlake:Dallas' last best hope for a new breakout band is, arguably, Coachella veterans and nouveau hard rockers Fair to Midland, who release their new disc Fables from a Mayfly on June 12. The release party takes place that same night at the Curtain Club. Fables is on the Serjical Strike label, owned by System of a Down's Serj Tankian, and it was produced by David Bottrill, who helmed works by Tool and Peter Gabriel, among others. FTM will hit the road for about a month before returning to Big D to play at the House of Blues on July 2.

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By the time I get to New York: Our absolute favorite Texas songwriter of all time, Jimmy Webb, who wrote the best disco-country song of all time, "Galveston," recently was chosen to head up the Songwriters Hall of Fame Master Class, in which he schooled young folks on the art of writing kick-ass freakin' songs. The class took place June 5 in New York, and by all reports Webb got wasted and said, "You little snots don't know shit, with your MySpace and your iPod thingies. Now here's a little ditty called 'Up, Up and Away.'"

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It's like Christmas: We know all you hipsters out there have already procured a bootleg advance version because your girlfriend's brother's butcher knows a guy who works with the guy who does the Polyphonic Spree's Web design, but for the three of you out there who aren't so lucky, let the countdown begin. Approximate hours until the Polyphonic Spree's The Fragile Army is released: 420.

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Handstamps:Gezellig hosts the country-rock stylings of Sorta on Thursday, June 7. If you can tell us what a "Gezellig" is, you win free tickets. Just kidding...House of Blues hosts a gospel brunch on Sunday with a group who bears the completely unimpressive name of The Wonderful Harmonizers. That's kind of like calling your baseball team The Really Good Throwers, but whatever...Same night, Sunday the 10th, catch Manu Chao's uncategorizable world music crazy-ass live show (a rarity, as he hardly ever tours) at the Palladium... Norah Jones and M. Ward get all quiet up in this piece at Nokia on Monday, June 11...OK, so it's only taken, like, 30 years for planetariums to figure out that you can do laser shows to something other than Pink Floyd. Leastways, that's how the UT-Arlington planetarium folks see it, and they are putting on "Rock Hall of Fame 1" every Thursday at 8 p.m. to prove it. Expect lasers, lights and animation to tunes from the likes of U2, Jimi Hendrix and others. Don't spill the bongwater!