Since 2007, hip-hop magazine XXL has promoted up-and-coming artists in their annual “Freshman Class” feature. The editorial staff picks the first nine spots, and fans pick the 10th. This year, Dallas rappers Erica Banks, Kaash Paige, Tay Money and Bobby Sessions are all candidates for the last spot on the…

It’s noon on a weekday, and Jay Gavit is stepping into his car to do an interview on his lunch break — a familiar tactic for those who live life with their right foot in the corporate world and their sinister foot in the counterculture. By day, Gavit is a…

The new docuseries Demi Lovato: Dancing with the Devil premiered on YouTube this past Tuesday. The first two episodes of the series deal with the events leading up to the North Texas-born singer’s near-fatal heroin overdose in 2018 and the aftermath of when she woke up in the hospital. The…

Avant pop star Lorelei K dropped her new release The Mythic Girl EP over the weekend. With five new tracks of lush, dreamy instrumentals, the album showcases the artist’s haunting vocals and superior writing capabilities with songs about love, loss and letting go. Lorelei K has been keeping busy during the…

Perhaps the biggest story in local music news has to do with Gov. Greg Abbott’s decision to lift the statewide mask mandate and open Texas back up entirely while the pandemic is still very much going on and this state is ranked 48th in vaccine rollout. The owners and operators…

Pinebox Serenade pretty much called it quits in 2016. It was around then that the wave of story-driven Americana music led by bands such as Fleet Foxes, The Decembrists and Bon Iver was broken apart over a groundswell for stomp & holler bands ho-ing and hey-ing the genre into radio-friendly…

St. Vincent released the new single “Pay Your Way in Pain” on Thursday. Reminiscent of Young Americans-era David Bowie, the song mixes funk rock and soul with St. Vincent’s signature surreal songwriting style. The new video also brings to mind Bowie’s performance of “Fame” on The Cher Show in 1975 with…

It’s been a big year already for legendary rocker and producer Todd Rundgren with his nomination for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and the start of his 25-city Clearly Human virtual tour, which makes a digital stop in Dallas Sunday, March 7. The idea is simple. Rather than…

In February 2020, singer-songwriter Vanessa Peters was in Italy preparing for a European tour when the country went on a national lockdown. The tour was canceled and the recording sessions that had been scheduled in Texas after the tour were scrapped. Working instead in a farmhouse in Castiglion Fiorentino in…

On Valentine’s Day, hip-hop artist Flower Child released her video for “Love Will Save the Day.” Walking in front of the boarded-up businesses in Deep Ellum with portraits from the Black Lives Matter movement prominently displayed, Flower Child raps about the need for love — not the love between romantic partners,…

On Wednesday, Feb. 10, the members of SouthFM met via Facebook Live to announce the re-release of their 2003 album Drama Kids, which will be available for the first time on vinyl on May 7. But that’s not the story. This is. One of those members, former guitarist G.I. Sanders,…

“First thing’s first, rest in peace to my mom,” begins rapper Justin King’s opening track, “THINGS,” on the debut album Dreams and Things. The album was recorded in part as a tribute to his parents, who shaped King as an artist and musician, he says. “For almost my whole childhood,…

It’s been a long seven years since we’ve heard anything new from Denton band Midlake. After 2013’s Antiphon, its subsequent single releases and vinyl rerelease of the 2006 classic The Trials of Van Occupanther, it was unclear whether we’d actually get any new music. Late last year, the band announced…

House Parties is the latest woman-fronted punk band to emerge alongside acts like penny bored, Matchstick Ghost and Velvet Skyline. Their first, high-energy single “Hindsight” is available now on Spotify. A reflection on moving on from bad situations and bad people, the uplifting track is bolstered by emocore harmonies and…

Electropop duo Secrecies dropped their new single “Far Away So Close” along with an accompanying video on Friday, Jan. 29. The dreamy song, available on all streaming platforms, was recorded before the pandemic lockdowns yet has taken on a new meaning for the band in the days of social distancing…

Dallas lost a pillar in its music community when Tim Daniels, co-owner of Club Dada, Off the Record, and other venues, passed away from COVID-19 complications on Saturday, Jan. 15. Daniels is remembered in the community as someone who was always there to support musicians and even patrons who needed…

Denton rapper AV The Great took to the studio to give his thoughts on the insurrection at the Capitol building last week. The single “Jan 6th, 2021” captures the artist’s stunned disbelief at what unfolded and notes the utter hypocrisy of the domestic terrorists’ actions with lyrics such as: “Kaepernick…

Victoria just wasn’t the right town for a band like Velvet Skyline. They had gone just about as far as they could go in the Texas city’s cover band-filled nightlife, which also boasts of its annual Bootfest, a festival that favored country tunes and old-time rock ‘n’ roll over the…

Black Tie Dynasty drummer Eddie Thomas died Dec. 26 after a years-long battle with brain cancer. After reuniting in December 2019 after a decade-long hiatus, the band played a handful of shows before the pandemic and was planning to reschedule shows that had been subsequently postponed. Thomas is survived by…

Dallas sludge metal masters Mountain of Smoke have a brand new album out called Replicated, which reimagines versions of songs as disparate as Deftones’ “My Own Summer (Shove It)” and “Only Time” by Enya. The latter features backing vocals by avant-pop composer Lorelei K. All songs are filtered through Mountain…