Let’s not mince words: 2020 sucked. It sucked for everybody. And it especially sucked for music fans, musicians and live music venues. As a whole, the music industry makes 50 percent of its annual revenue from live music performances, and the other half, it makes from recorded music in the…

Margin Walker Presents, Texas’ largest independent concert promoter since its start in 2016, announced that they were closing down this week. In a statement released on their social media on Monday, the company cited “the uncertainty and lack of resources [that] have hammered down on those working” in the music industry…

Gas Monkey Bar ‘n’ Grill announced this week that it will be closing its doors through the winter in response to  the ongoing pandemic. According to the venue’s website, “Ticket buyers for any show that will be canceled will be contacted through email and fully refunded.” The venue intends to…

The holiday spirit is certainly in the air. Jaret and Kelly (Jaret Reddick from Bowling for Soup and Kelly Ogden of The Dollyrots) have released their new holiday song “Get this Christmas Right” along with a South Park-inspired video. The song captures all the fun and heart of Christmas with…

What better time is there for us to celebrate the darkness than in 2020, the darkest year of them all? Halloween marked the release date of Dallas darkwave band SEVIT’s debut On the Edge of a Darker Place — an album that boldly declares the band’s place in the lineage…

One of Dallas’s most beloved thrash metal bands, Power Trip, was nominated for a Grammy in the Best Metal Performance category. “Executioner’s Tax (Swing of the Axe) – Live” from their 2020 release Live in Seattle: 05.28.2018 is being recognized just months after the tragic death of vocalist Riley Gale…

Out on Friday is Coping Mechanisms, the latest album from Grammy-nominated Tayla Parx. A follow-up to the Dallas-born rapper’s critically acclaimed 2019 debut We Need to Talk, the new album features singles “Residue” and “Dance Alone” — the latter was featured on Michelle Obama’s #BlackGirlMagic playlist. Out now is the…

Dallas rapper Melvin Noble (aka Mo3) was shot and killed Wednesday just before noon while traveling north on Interstate 35, near Clarendon Drive. Noble reportedly attempted to flee on foot as the gunman approached his vehicle. The gunman fired multiple rounds, striking Mo3 and a bystander sitting in his own…

Dallas music fans mourned the passing of two music legends this week. Houston-born singer Johnny Nash will always be remembered for his 1972 hit “I Can See Clearly Now.” Eddie Van Halen, who died after a long battle with throat cancer on Oct. 6, is remembered for his incredible versatility…

Beauty Bar announced Thursday they are closing their doors permanently. The dance club, which was originally located on Knox-Henderson before relocating to Deep Ellum a year ago, was known for bringing the best local DJs together. Country artist Bill Brimer released a new concept album, A Genealogy of Ghosts. With songs…

Brave Little Howl didn’t know exactly what they were getting into on that chilly night on White Rock Lake, last December on Friday the 13th. Travis Wright, host of I’m a Fan of… podcast, had asked the indie-folk band to play a small concert to a select group of diehard…

Long before the pandemic had us all becoming just a bit more health conscious, the members of Dallas metalcore band Slit were concerned with another national health crisis. “The plan from the beginning was for the EP to center around a lot of mental struggles and the idea of giving…

It’s a strange world for all of us. The pandemic has completely changed the way we consume music and the way that music is being made. For musicians like John Pedigo, the world of music seems even stranger. “My whole life, I basically have thought of music as just an…

For years, Jess Garland has told people that she was “working on it.” The longtime Dallas multi-instrumentalist and music teacher has spent most of her career playing in other peoples’ bands while quietly working on her own sound. Finally, Garland’s first single has arrived. “Glow” is an avant-garde, ethereal pop…

New Ellum might be the latest Americana act to come out of Dallas, but the band’s singer Jason Michael is no stranger to the music game. “I’ve been around Dallas as an acoustic singer,” Michael says. “I also had a blue-eyed soul project in Los Angeles and here in Dallas…

What do you do when the world won’t let you play live and you just don’t feel the vibe from a livestreaming show? You release a video that showcases what your live set would be like in a normal world. That’s what the Dallas-based, psych-rock quartet Siamese Hips has done…

Zach Youpa is stepping away from his band Light Horse Harry to pursue a dream that has been with him since he first started the band in Lakewood almost a decade ago. “I’d always played guitars, drums, bass and everything else, but in that band, I kind of had a…

Fissionary, aka Charlie Stubbs, is a one-man experimental pop superstar in the making. A relatively unknown artist in the Dallas music scene, Fissionary quietly released its first album Descriptions in late 2018 — a frenetic album filled with message and purpose. Since then, Fissionary has put out a smattering of singles leading…

Once upon a time, Scott Tucker fronted the well-known local band The Orange, but after seeing that project fall apart in the office of a major record label, he is back with a new project, Aztec Milk Temple, and a brand new song, “Digital Natives.” “All those stories that people…

Dallas’ Spanish-singing synth-punk band seres (“beings” en Español, and intentionally lowercase) hasn’t always been so angular, robotic and extraterrestrial. The times are just right for it. “When I was living in North Carolina, it was more of a blues-rock sound,” vocalist and synth player Alfonso Callejas says of the band’s…