30 miles south of town there is a mini fortress wall, and once you buy your ticket and walk through its portcullises, the Scarborough Renaissance Festival awaits. It’s a magical land, where the bacchanalia of 1533 (mead poured into horns!) meets the bacchanalia of 2013 (deep fried macaroni and cheese!)…
Final update, I swear: They’ve added a second Austin show on May 23rd. It’s also on sale right now. Update, 4/12: The sale for Paul McCartney tickets starts in half an hour, but you can “get in line” at the Texas Box Office site right now. You should do that,…
Neville Livingston, a.k.a. Bunny Wailer, has officially excommunicated Snoop Lion from the “Rastafari Community.” I say “officially”: He made a Facebook post wherein he said, “SNOOP LION IS OFFICIALLY EXCOMMUNICATED FROM THE RASTAFARI COMMUNITY!” and then posted a definition of excommunication from Wikipedia. The post has 34 likes and 24…
Dallas’ own Drowning Pool has a new album — its first with lead singer Jasen Moreno. He’s the fourth man to fill that spot and the transitions haven’t always been easy or smooth. But the band is clearly comfortable with Moreno. Comfortable enough to take a crack at an unrehearsed…
Rob Zildjian is eulogized thusly on that great modern document, Wikipedia: “Robert Zildjian (14 July 1923 – 28 March 2013) was the founder of Sabian Cymbals, the second largest manufacturer of cymbals in the world.” There’s a lot in that one sentence, if you know where to look. The largest…
Consider the damn state of things when a songwriter with a decade-plus experience, in front of an adoring sellout crowd at the Granada Theater, says the following halfway through his set: “Alright, we’re gonna do a Harlem Shake video.” Bob Schnedier pulled on a Luchador mask after he said it…
Lil Wayne has just released his tenth studio album, I Am Not a Human Being II. It’s been 18 years since his first album: True Story as one half of The B.G.’z. In that time, he’s been a lesser-known member of an embattled southern hip-hop group, a scrawny kid, a…
The Supreme Court is debating the legality of Prop 8 and possibly also DOMA by extension today. Maybe they will establish the Constitutionality of same-sex couples right here, and it seems like a foregone conclusion that even if they don’t, the end of this particular discrimination is nevertheless in sight…
Update, 3/22: You can listen to audio from Michelle Shocked’s rant below. So we have a great deal of information now — her initial lunatic outburst, her highly measured response and the reaction of the masses. Judge for yourself. Update, 3/20: The Texas Observer has an open letter from Michelle…
This week’s cover story chronicles the 11 day stretch in early March when Texas becomes the center of the music universe. There were festivals in Denton and Austin and Dallas and Grand Prairie and on and on. We were at a lot of them, and in case you find tons…
On Sunday night in Deep Ellum, a band called Zechs Marquise headlined Spillover Fest. They played at Sandbar Cantina and Grill, out back on the “beach,” flanked by palm trees and on a stage made out of some kind of soft wood. Spillover — a festival curated by local promoting…
“All the single dudes put up your phone. Now all the single ladies put up your phone. Turn to the nearest person with a phone up. Now type in your phone number. Now you have something to do after this.” That was Chuck D, talking from the Doritos Main Stage…
SXSW is not a music festival so much as it is an experiment in excess. If Coachella is a glass of water that keeps getting bigger until it more resembles a kiddie pool, then SXSW is a flood with a neglected cup somewhere in the middle. The natural result is…
Update, 3:12 p.m. And it’s sold out! See you all Saturday. Original post follows… Long Beach’s finest will grace the stage at the Energy Square Parking Lot in two days, and he will not be alone. Fewer than 200 tickets remain for the show as of this writing. So if…
It’s no accident that the name 35 Denton finally settled on features its hometown’s name so prominently. The organizers of the festival want nothing so much as to champion Denton, and to that end they have created a gathering place for not just musicians, but fans and businesses from around…
We’re eight days from Dallas’ favorite family-friendly holiday. And with it comes the Snoop Dogg concert we’ve been telling you about for several weeks now. Get excited, everybody: Tickets are $15 and on sale now…
The Hive is a gaping 12,000-square-foot warehouse at the edge of the 35 Denton umbrella, situated a few feet from the train tracks on the corner of Bell and Sycamore streets. Next weekend, it will become the largest indoor music venue in Denton — maybe for four days, and maybe…
“We used to play here. This was my introduction to a lot of local music,” says Moody Fuqua, sitting in front of Crown and Harp. He’s referring to the days when the bar was The Cavern, when it was a staple of the Dallas music community. It never changed owners,…
The Hive is a gaping 12,000-square-foot warehouse at the edge of the 35 Denton umbrella, situated a few feet from the train tracks on the corner of Bell and Sycamore Streets. Next weekend, it will become the largest indoor music venue in Denton — maybe for four days, and maybe…
As you already know, Snoop Dogg will headline this year’s Dallas Observer St. Patrick’s Day Concert on Greenville Avenue. But he won’t be alone, and today we’re announcing two of the bands who will also grace the stage on March 16: Hi-diving hip-hop group A.Dd+ and local staples Ishi. See…
Spillover (formerly Bro Fest) has announced its 2013 lineup. The annual March festival, presented by Parade of Flesh, will feature some of the best shit-kicking rock and roll available in DFW and around the country on March 17, at Sandbar Cantina. Tickets are $19.99 including tax and fees…
Update, 2/20, 9:50 a.m. The pre sales have started for East Coast dates. The link goes live to the right of the date, where it currently says On Sale Soon. Once you click, you get put in a queue for tickets, so I’d try and click as close to 10…
