The Top Five North Texas Country Albums of 2014, So Far

For a country music fan, living in North Texas is akin to a six-year-old getting locked inside a room over night where the walls are made only of assorted Minecraft games. There’s plenty of variety and more than enough offerings to keep one busy without ever having to look too…

Kris Kristofferson Embraced His Own Mortality at Bass Performance Hall

Authenticity and impeccable simplicity have always been Kris Kristofferson’s stock-in-trade. On Saturday night in Fort Worth it couldn’t have been more apparent, as he performed a couple dozen of his plainly poetic songs in two nearly one hour-long sets at the classically beautiful Bass Performance Hall. It was the evening…

Centro-matic Was “Above Average” at the Kessler

Centro-matic With True Widow and Cliffs of Insanity Kessler Theater, Dallas Saturday, June 14, 2014 Early on in Centro-matic’s Saturday night show at the Kessler Theater in Oak Cliff, a shout from the middle of the comfortably crowded throng provided with a well-timed bit of levity — and a healthy…

George Strait’s 10 Best Texas Songs

On Saturday at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, George Strait will ride away into the sunset as he concludes his long-running touring career. Though he will keep recording and will occasionally play the one-off gig, the days of taking another Strait show for granted appear to be over. Before frat boys…

Tom Keifer of Cinderella: “Singing is Very Much a Mental Thing:

Any discussion of hard-rock, or even glam-metal, from the 1980’s is woefully incomplete without Pennsylvania’s Cinderella receiving a good chunk of chatter. In 1988 Tom Keifer and crew began an impressive run of hitting high on the sales charts and video countdowns. Monster ballads such as “Nobody’s Fool” and “Don’t…

Lucinda Williams’ Top Five Most Playful Love Songs

For many years, Lucinda Williams seemed to have some anger inside of her. Much of that anger was directed towards the men she had fallen in and out of love with over the years. The pain and resentment that went into so many of her songs proved quite fruitful for…

John Fullbright Leads a Trio of Rising Oklahoma Songwriters

Texans are a fortunate group of folk music fans. We have legends and emerging artists that have either called the Lone Star State home at some point or are firmly entrenched here, primarily playing and making their artistic livings here so that we have more than ample access to their…

Homegrown Fest: From Humble Beginnings to Shooting for the Stars

The names of some music festivals are real head-scratchers. “Bonnaroo” and “Lollapalooza” are silly but effective. Others don’t leave much to the imagination. Locally, there’s the upcoming Fort Worth Music Festival: not a ton of mystery there, but at least we know where it’s going down, right? Somewhere in the…

The 5 Bands Who Defined Edgefest 24

On Saturday, the bustling northern ‘burb of Frisco hosted many thousands of modern-rock lovers at Toyota Stadium for the annual, all-day Edgefest aural orgy (the 24th installment, no less). Saturday’s festival roster proved to be one that, maybe more than any recent Edgefest, bridged the generational gap of those who…

The Truth About Charles Bradley’s Soul.

In the splendidly unflinching 2012 documentary Charles Bradley: Soul of America, the Florida-born, Brooklyn-based Charles Bradley openly shares the highs and lows of the point in his life when he has finally found an outlet, and an audience, for his heart-on-sleeve soul music. As a whole, the film is both…